I stand corrected.
Yep, it’s for real.
Sure, from 40 years ago, but what the hey…
That would be for the Freakouts-of-the-left list, imho.
James Watt, Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of the Interior, was a leftist?
Huh.
No, the Left freaked out over the BB ‘ban’. If the guy in charge wanted Sousa night or whatever, c’est la vie.
Since the freakers included Nancy Reagan, I don’t think it’s accurate to portray it as a freakout of the left.
Plus, the BB had been there several times before Watt came along with his riff on US Grant: I only know two songs. One of them is “Amazing Grace” the other is not.
Guys, I’m not defending Watt. I just don’t think it belongs on the list because the reaction wasn’t from the Right.
So Watt’s reaction counts for nothing?
He didn’t react. He initiated.
IIRC, he initiated with ban in response to the fact that they had been booked for the concert (which strikes me as being something of a reaction).
If I’m misremembering, I’d be grateful for correction.
Did we do backward masking yet?
Along with the Grass Roots, the Beach Boys had played at the Mall on July 4th for the previous three years. But they hadn’t been booked for the 1983 concert when Watt pre-emptively announced that there would be no rock bands, because they ‘attract the wrong element’ and encourage ‘drug use and alcoholism’.
So I think one could argue that Watt was reacting to the 1960’s, albeit fourteen years too late.
The link posted in #383 quotes Watt as preferring that Wayne Newton (from wholesome, alcohol-free Vegas) perform instead.
I seem to recall the Reagans rebuking James Watt, saying they liked the Beach Boys.
Guys, just as I don’t have Trump proposing to buy Greenland on this list, James Watt doing something stupid doesn’t qualify for the same reason: this list isn’t about bad policy decisions made (or floated) by people with authority to make them. If it were, it would be filled with specific legislation, Supreme Court decisions, and the like.
And his reasons given actually fall under item 6:
PANTLESS A&W BEAR - I shit you not.
" The A&W post was intended to be a cheeky response to M&M’s splashy announcement this week that it would be [replacing its iconic spokescandies] with new M&M’s brand ambassador Maya Rudolph. In the below Twitter post, the image card used to display the message is the same brown block of text that M&M’s used, and A&W begins by swiping M&M’s opening of, “America, let’s talk.” The language of the A&W announcement goes on to mimic virtually every sentence from M&M’s statement."
“First it was an M&M’s, now a bear has to wear [pants],” noted Fox Business anchor Cheryl Casone. “This is the woke police. Cancel culture has gone—ridiculous.”
Later, however, after all that lamentation, Fox realized the error, clarifying that A&W followed up its original tweet with another one that said, “Is now a good time to mention that this is a joke?”
Michelle Obama and School Lunches - There was right-wing freakoutery over that.
Teletubbies - I think something here related to their gender identity or sexuality or something that was an “assault on our culture”…
The list is endless.
Jerry Falwell said in February 1999, ‘[Tinky Winky], whose voice is obviously that of a boy, has been found carrying a red purse. He is purple – the gay pride color; and his antenna is shaped like a triangle – the gay pride symbol.’
I bought my Jeep Cherokee (that I still have) in February 1999. It looked like it was dark metallic blue in the catalogue; but when it arrived at the dealership I found out it was dark metallic purple. (It’s ‘Deep Amethyst’, but I’m a guy, so…) So there I was driving a purple Jeep, with Jerry Falwell saying purple is gay. (I actually like the colour, and I’m glad for my mistake.)
Any masking will generally inflame the right.