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Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022

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Kanye wears White Lives Matter shirt.

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/kanye-west-white-lives-matter-shirt-yeezy-fashion-show-195054095.html

This seems to be an explicit example of Scott’s theory of fashion.

https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/04/22/right-is-the-new-left/

While Kanye obviously does some things to be provocative he’s also someone who can sense which way the winds blow.

For a long time I’ve thought the African American vote and especially the male one culturally belongs in the red tribe. For elections if the GOP simple does not get slaughtered by the black vote it would change the entire electoral map. Kanye and to a lesser extent Walker gives the black vote permission to not vote blue tribe. The black vote just doesn’t fit in as an equal to the PMC in the blue tribe. They do fit in as an equal to core Maga voters.

Kanye as someone who grew up on the southside of Chicago would know how segregated blue tribe society can be.

While Kanye obviously does some things to be provocative he’s also someone who can sense which way the winds blow.

He has done this for a while, like appropriating the Confederate flag, wearing a MAGA hat, meeting Trump, etc. It seems effective at getting media attention, but in terms of selling music or clothes, who knows.

From what I understand, the guy is a billionaire. And I don't mean a puny $1.00001 billion, he has multiple of them. I don't think whether he sells more clothes is what primarily bothers him now. I mean yeah, some of these billions are linked to successfully selling clothes, but I don't think he raises and goes to bed with the thought about how today's sales were. I think he's in it for the cultural/political impact.

I think Kanye is mentally ill and erratic. Analyzing his decisions as if they were part of a grand plan is a mistake. I know people say that about lots of people like Donald Trump and Putin too, but I think it's very very likely to be true for at least Kanye.

I thought it was public knowledge that Kanye is unmedicated bipolar?