Our Top Story: The band formerly known as Lady Antebellum has erased much of the good will their name change has created. By changing their name to Lady A, and removing the reference to the plantation days of the south (sorry, they don't deserve to have that capitalized), the band was showing a level of concern and respect you don't often get in country music. Some thought it was going overboard, but most saw it as a sign the band wanted to be good people, wanted to do right by a community that doesn't listen to their music in large numbers, and wanted to be one less reminder of the horrific past we still deal with on a daily basis.
There was just one problem with that; there is already a long-established artist who uses the name Lady A. The band claims they own the rights to the name, and perhaps they do, but having not enforced the mark at all while this other singer was using it could easily render that moot. The bigger problem is this; Lady A, the singer, is an African-American woman.
Yes, the band changed their name to be respectful of that community, and are now suing a member of it to take away the name she has used for decades as a performer. The band has been in negotiations to find a settlement for them both to share the name, but talks have broken down, and the band is now running to court to take Lady A's livelihood away from her. The optics of this are so awful I'm shocked (though I shouldn't be) the powers that be didn't game-plan this out before they moved forward.
It was premature and irresponsible to announce their name change before these negotiations were completed. They put themselves in an untenable situation, where they have made the change public, therefore they need to carry through with it, even though it now loses the purpose behind the move. If they had waited, they either could have come to better terms with the issue not in the public eye, or they could have picked a yet different name that doesn't have such a conflict surrounding it. They jumped the gun, and because of that now look like bullies telling a minority to give away their lunch money to a group of white people. It's a shockingly ugly look, and one I expected the band to immediately apologize for once the story came out.
They didn't happen, though. Right now, things are full speed ahead. Disgusting.
In Other News: The train of musicians showing their delusional thinking continues, this time with Iced Earth mastermind Jon Schaffer going on a conspiracy theorist's radio show to voice his opinion that COVID-19 is "psychological warfare", and that the steps being taken to slow the virus are going to lead to the downfall of society.
We've known ever since he made his anti-government side-project that Schaffer is hanging off the fringe, but never before has it come in a form this dangerous. He isn't just distrustful of the government, he is now denying reality. Millions have gotten sick, by the time we're done with this pandemic there will likely be at least a million dead, and Schaffer is literally saying, "people die every day".
Here's the thing about libertarians like Schaffer; they're full of shit.
Schaffer is in a band that tours by rolling down public highways. That was the government building roads. Private businesses and citizens didn't do that. He sends his music to fans all over the world over the internet, which was developed and subsidized by the government. The satellites that let him do that, or even talk on the radio to his other reality deniers, they were also developed and put up by the government.
Libertarianism is only possible as a philosophy because of thousands of years of governments moving us forward. You cannot start from scratch as libertarians and accomplish anything. I have had this argument with several people for many years; the libertarian idea of total freedom is incompatible with being a good person. That kind of freedom doesn't just mean not paying taxes, it logically follows that people are also free to be racists, misogynists, and every other disgusting form of 'humanity' under the sun, so long as they don't physically harm anyone. I'm sorry, but that is not society, it's the talk of a man of privilege who knows no one is going to be trying to make life harder for him.
Schaffer might not care if you get the virus and die. Heck, it sounds like he'll find every reason to deny you ever had it. But I'm going to illustrate what being a decent person is. I could very easily reflect his attitude and hope he gets the virus, and gets seriously ill, maybe even dies. But I'm not going to do that. I don't wish ill on anyone. That's part of the social contract.
Maybe he should brush up on that.
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