I am about as tuned in to the contemporary music scene as you would expect.

Not at all. I have a general awareness of pop because it is difficult not to. But my passing knowledge of Taylor Swift, Adele, Katy Perry, and Lady Gaga is about as sophisticated as my knowledge of contemporary music gets.

But living on Twitter, as I do for my job, occasionally exposes me to controversies about which I never would have known otherwise.

The latest of these is the brou-ha-ha stirred up by an R&B artist named Ne-Yo. While to me he is not The One, he is apparently quite successful in his niche and a man with some cultural influence in circles other than mine.

He was on a podcast and the issue of alphabet ideology, and he dropped some common sense as a dad of a passel of kids. He said the common sense opinion out loud–encouraging young children to sterilize and mutilate themselves before they learn that a diet of M&Ms and Mac and Cheese is a bad idea. Kids just aren’t equipped to make life-changing decisions at a young age, and there is no reason he could see to approve of such practices.

This is what @NeYoCompound decided to apologize for.

Ne-Yo, you were absolutely right. You know it. We all know it.pic.twitter.com/rw0lgPf22m

— Billboard Chris 🇨🇦🇺🇸 (@BillboardChris) August 7, 2023

The alphabet mob exploded in outrage. So outraged that his publicist tweeted out the expected generic apology that one has come to expect from the cultural elite. It was your plain vanilla “I am not a bigot and want everybody to love me” apology that looks as cowardly and as insincere as you have come to expect.

The mob came with torches and pitchforks and the money-grubbers give in and endorse hormones and scalpels for children.

“After much reflection.” You just had to know that a committee of suits came up with something this lame.

The big surprise came next. After much “pouncing” of conservatives–well deserved, I might add–Ne-Yo did something wholly unexpected.

He said “Screw you” to his handlers and told the truth about what he thought, damn the consequences. He said the quiet part out loud: alphabet ideology is totally nuts.

BASED. @NeYoCompound walks back his apology and stands his ground against the Alphabet Mafia. We cannot remain silent while children are being chemically castrated a butchered. This is the way! Thank you Ne-Yo! pic.twitter.com/BZAvQKKcL1

— Gays Against Groomers (@againstgrmrs) August 7, 2023

How hard was that?

Very, if you listen to the handlers. Not at all if you listen to your heart.

The truth is that very few people actually believe that alphabet ideology is good for kids. A fairly large group of people will SAY they approve, but mostly what they mean is that they disapprove of conservatives who oppose it and they don’t want to face the consequences of saying what they really believe.

Sure, the hard Left believes this, just as they believe that singing about massacring White people in South Africa is all sweetness and light, burning down cities is perfectly normal and that living in a city characterized by squalor and crime is the next best thing to utopia.

For most people, though, approval of this destructive insanity is an affinity statement, not an expression of belief. Think of liberals who vote for Soros prosecutors and then move out of the city that is getting destroyed. They “own” the conservatives by electing an advocate for criminals and then skedaddle.

Stunning and brave.

What makes Ne-Yo’s latest statement of significance is the likelihood that others may follow, once it becomes clear that the consequences won’t be awful. And they likely won’t be. I doubt the average R&B listener is thinking much about transgender politics when they listen to music, and there is much money to be made catering to Ne-Yo’s fans.

The difference between artists like Ne-Yo and people who are on teams of some kind is that they are the product. NASCAR has plenty of drivers; Ne-Yo’s fans are Ne-Yo’s fans. He has cultural and financial power that a NASCAR driver doesn’t.

If others follow in his footsteps this may actually matter, in a way that most celebrity things don’t. He may make it alright to say the quiet part out loud.

Let’s hope so.