You've Been Cancelled
There used to be rules. Or at least superstitions. Don’t mix art with politics. Don’t ask about the bedroom. Don’t talk religion at the table. Rock stars could self-destruct, presidents could lie, and the public politely pretended these were separate lanes. That world is gone. Now everything collapses into the same feed: your favorite song, a police blotter, a court filing, a hot take, a meme, a retraction that never travels as far as the accusation.
Take Lana Del Rey—an artist whose work has always lived in contradiction. A marriage headline becomes a moral referendum. Fans don’t just listen anymore; they adjudicate. Ryan Adams exists in a different freeze-frame entirely, his catalog permanently footnoted by allegations, apologies, and an unresolved question of what—if anything—comes after public reckoning. The music doesn’t vanish, but it now arrives with warning labels no one agrees how to read.
