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Small-Scale Question Sunday for November 13, 2022

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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One possible understated trigger for such developments: COVID lockdowns, and their effects on artists. At least in Finland, whenever there were COVID measures (while other measures were usually pretty light touch, the government often resorted to closing bars, or limiting the bar opening hours heavily, during COVID waves), the artists were one of the biggest constituencies to protest this, organizing several demonstrations against the bar closing hours. Of course the reasons are obvious, bars are where presenting artists perform, and the novelty of "online gigs" and such wore off at warp speed.

While this issue was not as heavily tribalized as in United States, there was still a lot of anger from the artists specifically channeled at left-wing parties for "their parties" betraying them, and I'd imagine that in more tribalized countries there might be even more similar reactions? OTOH many artists were quite happy when the COVID passports were introduced, hoping that they'd at least allow the bars to function, even if they'd lose some part of the clientele (often stereotyped as the most rowdy and problematic part anyway).

I do think the political shitshow behind COVID had a radicalizing effect on creatives but I don't know that it was the lockdowns specifically. I'm sure it screwed over a lot of performers and musicians and people who rely on art shows and in person events but lots of people also simply took a few months off or switched to their side gigs or sold online or got unemployment or did something else to make ends meet, at least in the US. Everyone is going to have a different take on this but from where I was, the thing that irritated me the most about the pandemic wasn't the governments restrictions, which were somewhat minimal where I was, but instead the peer pressure/social politicization and having to navigate the newly emerging social realities of the pandemic. Most creatives tend to be socially awkward or isolated to begin with so I can see how dealing with that would have a triggering effect on many of us. On the other hand I do have more resources than most people in the creative class so I could be isolated from the material concerns that many of my peers faced but I think the ideological implications are more galling and degrading than having to find new ways to make money imo

there was still a lot of anger from the artists specifically channeled at left-wing parties for "their parties" betraying them

I did not see much of this but I also have most of this type of person unfollowed or muted at this point, so perhaps I missed it- though anger from the left toward the left is nothing new