An aspiring authoritarian regime typically silences dissent gradually over the course of its rule over a country and its populace. But the inverse appears to be occurring with the Trump administration. In yet another sign that the autocratic ambitions of the president and his goons – particularly White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Stephen Miller, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Vice President J.D. Vance – are backfiring, more and more artists are publicly denouncing them and their sociopathic ambitions.
In doing so, artists are challenging not only the federal government’s threats of Soviet-style retribution (blacklists, harassment, even imprisonment) but contemporary music fans who bemoan entertainers for voicing their political opinions; a corporate music industry that profits from encouraging their clients to remain politically agnostic, anodyne and antiseptic; and supplicating media moguls, editors and publishers in a shrinking and increasingly conservative-dominated field.
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