{"id":1169,"date":"2025-01-14T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-01-14T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/scenechange\/?p=1169"},"modified":"2025-01-07T21:19:59","modified_gmt":"2025-01-07T21:19:59","slug":"nonprofit-arts-organizations-if-you-cant-beat-em-join-em-really","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/scenechange\/2025\/01\/14\/nonprofit-arts-organizations-if-you-cant-beat-em-join-em-really\/","title":{"rendered":"Nonprofit Arts Organizations: If You Can\u2019t Beat \u2019Em, Join \u2019Em? Really?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

With an empowered anti-arts, anti-education, and anti-culture base running the country, this is the time to commit to your community, not fall into the trap of cancelling them.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Disconcerting? Maybe. New America wants to rename the rainbow \u2014 your task is not to agree to do so.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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It\u2019s all gone topsy-turvy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We live in New America now. Ironically, the group that wanted to \u201cMake America Great Again\u201d has moved the country in a completely different direction than ever. We have to live with that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have to live with that. At least for the moment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Attitudes swing like a pendulum do, but this isn\u2019t going to swing any time soon. The racist third of the country has become the aggrieved half of the country. Honestly aggrieved. If you listen to the people who \u201cwon\u201d the election, you\u2019ll find a huge cadre of folks who were losing their unwon, melanin-deprived superiority. And they got scared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Interestingly, at least to them, adultery, crime, lying, cheating, stealing, sexual assault, rape, double-dealing, and probably even murder mean nothing to them, at least among their leading candidates. They do not cancel their candidates<\/em><\/strong> as long as their candidates promise them what they want. They may be poor or rich, educated or not, White or not \u2014 that\u2019s immaterial to the conversation. What they are is angry. The fact is that they\u2019re as angry as they\u2019ve always been (Remember the \u201cangry White man\u201d trope of the 1990s, when Newt Gingrich took control of the House? Or \u201cJoe the Plumber?\u201d). There are just more of them now because they have the opportunity to consume media from one \u201csafe\u201d source and keep to that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the other side, there\u2019s a lot of cancellation going on. Not only does the left have a propensity to cancel people who do not pass a purity test<\/em><\/strong>, there is no end to that prison sentence. They\u2019re angry, too, but often they\u2019re angry at their own candidates. One false step? Support ends. For instance, if your candidate supports Israel over Palestine but agrees with you on every other topic? Cancelled. If they\u2019re speaking out for men\u2019s rights, but agree that women are treated inequitably? Cancelled. If they believe, generally, in affirmative action but hire a monumentally gifted White man as their chief of staff over any non-White candidate for the job? Cancelled. Support on the left is an all-or-nothing proposition. The result of cancellation? Not voting at all. It\u2019s as though the left believed the good-guy\/bad-guy Marvel universe existed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Heartbreaking as it may be, there are no good guys and bad guys.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

If aliens studied the people in this pig-shaped section of the planet (What, you never noticed that the United States lower 48 states resembles a pig?) on November 5, 2024, were they confused about which side embraced Puritan restrictiveness and which side stood for their own freedom? Not being or knowing an alien, it\u2019s hard to tell.
And now, the aftermath (or precursor, depending on what side of the timeline you inhabit). If you never believed that your community\u2019s most disadvantaged people could be helped by your largest nonprofit arts organizations \u2014 that your charities were intended to entertain or engage their audiences, which are comprised of donors, art lovers, and generally wealthy elitists \u2014 then you are double derelict in New America. And yet, many are choosing to eschew their responsibilities as charities and appeal only to those with means and breeding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They\u2019re willing to rename the colors of the rainbow if it makes New Americans happy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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They’re not bad people. But if you only want to entertain them, just become a commercial organization.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s not your job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet, there\u2019s a nonprofit theater company (denoted by X) whose mission is the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cX is passionately committed to enriching the cultural landscape of our region by producing professional theatre to the highest artistic standards and providing unique educational opportunities to diverse groups of people in a spirit of service, adventure, and excitement. Our work is inspired by a belief in the magic of theatre to expand the imagination, challenge the senses, provoke discussion, and revitalize in our audience an understanding of our common humanity. This belief drives the care with which we treat our artists, audiences, students, staff, and members of the greater community.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wait. What?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

How does that line up with IRS Section 501(C)(3)?<\/a> In fact, how is that charitable at all?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Tickets for their mainstage show have a list price of $114.00. Why so expensive? Because that\u2019s what the wealthy White people in their city can easily afford. After all, the city\u2019s reputation is one of filthy-rich old White pseudo-aristocrats in multi-million-dollar retirement castles. And there are 12,000 of those. Still\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n