Perry has broken her end of the sexy-ditz contract. Sexy ditzes are supposed to be breezy, not tiresome. Carefree, not careworn. Childlike simplicity was one of Perry’s main assets, and one of the reasons children love her so much. The last thing we want to hear about from sexy ditzes is problems. I’m not saying you forever forfeit your right to discuss the Flint water crisis the minute you film a video wearing a whipped-cream bra, but as a pundit Katy Perry has about as much appeal as George Will does in a halter top. Perry calls her engaged new style “purposeful pop.” Here’s an example of what that means, from “Chained to the Rhythm”: “So comfortable, we live in a bubble-bubble / So comfortable, we cannot see the trouble-trouble.”

Marketing-wise, ditching the vast audience of normals in hopes of winning plaudits from a small cohort of the bristling woke is proving to be a loser for Perry. It’s hard to win with professional lunatics. Jezebel razzed her under the headline, “The More Katy Perry Talks about Being Woke, the More Asleep She Sounds,” expressing offense that, while Perry danced with drag queens on Saturday Night Live (hurrah!), she also danced with the black rap trio Migos, who stand suspected of homophobia (boo!). Being straight, white, and American means any aesthetic experimentation she does, such as wearing cornrows, is subject to denunciation as “cultural appropriation.” (Is Beyoncé culturally appropriating the look of white women when she appears in pin-straight hair? Just asking.)