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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 15, 2024

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Wow. Trump Derangement Syndrome has killed Tenacious D. On stage in Australia yesterday, when asked to make a birthday wish, Kyle said "Don't miss trump next time."

Today, Jack Black cancelled their tour and appears to have killed the band.

I've found the reactions of intense disappointment that Trump wasn't murdered to be really disappointing but unsurprising. My parents (who I was with when it happened and I broke the news to them) immediately expressed disappointment that he was still alive. Watching people post these sentiments publicly online as if they are completely unaware that advocating for the assassination of your political opponents is really bad and completely unacceptable has left me amazed. How can people not realize that it's a bridge too far? They're literally saying that to preserve democracy, they need to assassinate the leading candidate, a level of cognitive dissonance beyond anything I've seen.

That said, I also find the current cancelations hilarious. The very people who are calling Trump "literally hitler" are now pearl clutching that it's not okay to try kill Hitler. The catastrophizing wasn't acceptable before either - maybe this snapped people out of their delusions?

I was surprised by my own reaction, too. I was a lot happier that he survived, and a lot more impressed with his immediate response than I expected to be. Trump grew in my esteem a lot.

The right has been claiming a lot of scalps lately, generally using the same playbook the left used in 2020-21.

@Libsoftiktok has been particularly egregious, going after minor government employees and restaurant workers for things they said on social media. It's disappointing and hypocritical, but it's a good thing that cancellation is no longer a leftist superweapon. Now that both sides have the bomb, perhaps we can have a Cold War instead of a hot one. One can hope.

Perhaps along these lines, my Twitter feed is full of viral posts from conservatives who have accepted Kyle Gass's apology and urge people NOT to cancel Tenacious D.

But I do agree that the most hilarious thing about this whole episode is "Trump is literally Hitler and we are praying for his speedy recovery".

LoTT has been going absolutely scorched earth, and in the heat of the moment it pleased me in the spirit of "the left is getting a taste of their cancel culture medicine". Then had a moment of shame that I've been cheering collective punishment: I have zero evidence that any given person who locker-room-talks "too bad he missed" has had any involvement whatsoever in destroying people's lives over the past 8 years.

So it's back to being liberal about speech. Back to Voltaire/Hall for me.

good, good. Now you can feel righteous and pure the next time you roll over and show the belly to the lefty with a new pair of boots and the next superweapon.

👍

Don't respond to provocations with low-effort responses like this that communicate nothing but sarcasm.