The lights are going out on The Great White Way. Not the electric ones, but the creative lights. The early 20th century moniker — The Great White Way — sounds awfully privileged and systemically Caucasoid in these excruciatingly sensitive times. But long before Plague Year 2020, the lights were going out on Broadway as puritanical wokesters let loose the cockroaches of war to scurry about up and down the dark and empty the aisles.

Under the new rules of self-abasement and mandated cultural humiliation, the theatre world is following the lemmings of virtue over a creative cliff. TV land struggle sessions now rule the post-apocalyptic era.  Say anything like “I want my children to be judged on the content of their character not the color of their skin,” and you will be banished and punished.

In order to avoid the banishment in the creative world you must admit your sins of privilege, and struggle to rectify those sins.  Knowledgeable readers may know of the Maoist practice of struggle sessions.  Encapsulated here:

Struggle sessions were a form of public humiliation and torture used by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) at various times in the Mao era, particularly during the years immediately before and after the establishment of the People’s Republic of China and during the  Cultural Revolution. The aim of struggle sessions was to shape public opinion, humiliate, persecute, or execute political rivals and those deemed class enemies.

The victim of a struggle session was forced to admit various crimes before a crowd of people who would verbally and physically abuse the victim until they confessed. Struggle sessions were often held at the workplace of the accused, but also conducted in sports stadiums where large crowds would gather to ridicule and shame the victim.

Did you note the word, “execute” above?

The Colbert Audience educates Jon Stewart on SCIENCE!

Now this practice has been revived for public consumption in the United States on a daily basis and turned into a fine mass media art.

Studio audiences get to assault the heretic along with a vast TV audience. One of the latest heretics is Lin-Manuel Miranda; the poor lackey of the running dog cognoscenti gives an agonizing apology for not putting the required number of darker skinned actors in positions of visual prominence in the latest film adaptation of his musical. Read the self-abasement without retching if you can. Try not to despair over the death of creative freedom.

Are there no titans of art willing to defend this man? Did the mighty Stephen Spielberg come to Lin-Manual’s defense? Only the sound of crickets emanate from the House of Schindler and the Saved Ryan.

Who did come to Lin Manuel’s defense?  A little old lady.  Once upon a time the dancer and singer, Rita Moreno. Alas, Rita was later forced to recant her defense of her fellow artist. Sorry Rita, you too have to grovel at the loosed cockroaches of culture war.

Rita Moreno is even one of Spielberg’s own players in the new reimagining of the musical West Side Story.

Makes Paladin wonder if the Spielberg production is hastily trying square the circle of re-casting to suit current cultural demands? Gee, those players look mighty pale . . . Is it too late to reshoot sections, enhance the black elements and dial down the pallor?  Release date, December 2021 –way too late. And there’d be news stories on the re-shoot. Worse still, CGI isn’t gonna cut it.

But guaranteed, the producers are sweating the inevitable tsunami of woke. Word to the wise, don’t give in.  Be bold. Stand up for artistic integrity and weather the storm. This is a Spielberg production; you can do it.  After all, Bill Maher says so. And the ever hopeful Christian Toto asks, Is the Tide Turning Against Cancel Culture? Maybe it has, maybe it hasn’t.

Paladin is not so sure. Miranda’s success and Rita’s broken shield wall have fallen to the long knives of jealousy and will to power. Even Toni Morrison felt the need to hurt the playwright, going so far as to fund a Hate Play about Lin-Manuel and Hamilton. That’s a lot of effort, but the effort has its roots and justification in The Great White Way – Race and the Broadway Musical. Culturally relevant enough to get a second edition in 2020.

You can see the author’s readership and audience in the Maoist era struggle session above — pointing fingers and shouting. But today, our livid guardians of modern virtue are shouting in the dark, they’ve already turned out the lights.

Featured photo is a cropped screen grab from this video – “NYC Blackout Times Square 2003” – by fercastle.  Additional photo is “The 10th Panchen Lama during Struggle Session” 1964 and is available under CC BY-SA 3.0.