Project 2025 Has Happened to Madonna. Will It Ruin Her Life?
How a concert attendee's "pornography without warning" lawsuit connects to Project 2025 (Scroll to the end to listen)
A couple of weeks ago, I went to the ballet. It was a performance of Vivaldi’s Les Saisons by the Malandain Ballet Biarritz.
The hour-long performance was moving, but I’m always a sucker for contemporary dance. This time, I didn’t tear up over the music or the dancers’ athletic grace, the lighting or the intimacy of the space.
No, I teared up because I could see female nipples through sheer tops (designed to match male nipples also displayed through sheer tops.) This kind of creative expression - where bodies are bodies used to create beauty through movement - is expression Republicans will attempt to suppress. For the Christo-fascists behind Project 2025, this performance could someday count as “pornography.”
I promise, I’m not going to devote another week to the Republican obsession with “porn” right now. I am devoting the balance of this week to Project 2025’s proposed weaponization of the Department of Justice. Republicans will be even more determined to dismantle the rule of law now that their god was convicted by a jury of his peers and is a felon thirty-four times over.
But for those who are already calling me “unhinged” and “hysterical” and “hyperbolic,” I cite this California lawsuit. It’s another insidious example of Project 2025: Happening NOW.
According to The Guardian, this lawsuit was filed last Wednesday in Los Angeles. While Madonna has faced a raft of lawsuits from disgruntled fans for starting her concerts late, this one takes things further. It attacks her artistic freedom of expression.
Plaintiff expressed his shock and horror over “topless females simulating sex acts” and sued Madonna for “pornography without warning.”
People can say plenty about Madonna, but she is a fierce warrior for creative freedom and artistic expression. She has spent her entire career storming the barricades of misogynists and prudes who insist that “women should know their place.”
While multiple news outlets have covered this lawsuit, no one has connected it to Republican attempts to ban books, halt drag shows, pass anti-”pornography” laws, and similar.
Numerous readers may say, “This guy was at a MADONNA concert. What did he expect? Did he think he wouldn’t see a bunch of naked or near-naked bodies and simulated sex that wouldn’t result in giving him a public hard-on?”
My point exactly. For a movement eager to limit freedom of expression, to foist its definition of “pornography” upon the masses, what better creator to pick than Madonna?
Yes, creators with enough money (like Madonna) can craft ironclad legal waivers for people to sign in advance of show attendance. Clever attorneys may thus keep Christo-fascist “porn-obsessed” Republicans at bay for a season. But if this lawsuit is successful, it will force creators to read the minds of each person who may see or experience their works. Many creators, even financially successful ones, may choose to blunt their creations’ edges rather than risk lawsuits and ongoing litigation.
What about the vast majority of creators who don’t have Madonna’s money, connections, and resources? What happens to them?
Most creators will stop creating, or they will change their creations to avoid the barest hint of controversy.
They won’t dance in see-through tops. They won’t write that steamy sex scene or make movies and stage productions like “Poor Things.” They won’t portray all forms of love or offend people into thinking beyond their own self-limiting boundaries. Many creators will wither and stop creating altogether.
As someone who escaped the limiting world Republicans want to force upon us, I will always fight for a creator’s right to show her nipples through her top. Or dance topless. Or naked. Or portray and celebrate sex.
We’re fighting for freedom of speech and expression, things that our Constitution guarantees. Every lawsuit like this one is an attack on our Constitutionally-guaranteed freedoms. Do not be silent.
In case you missed it, I’m a Project 2025 contributor at Resolute Square. My first contribution covers Project 2025’s threats to a free press and freedom of speech. Readers can find it HERE.
Check your voter registration or register to vote: I Will Vote
Support Democratic campaigns directly in competitive races: Blue24
Support earlyworm’s 2024 Giving Guide: earlyworm
Report a Project 2025 incident: Not On Our Watch
Mail postcards to swing-state voters: Postcards to Swing States
When I saw the news of that lawsuit, I didn't think of Project 2025; but I did wonder if some fundie had attended in order to launch this lawsuit.
As to the election, I suspect too many Americans aren't connecting this to the wider Republican party, in large part because of Donald Trump's image. He gives them cover for just about anything. Hopefully we're breaking through on reproductive health care, but it's a real problem. I'm not sure what to do about it, but I think Democrats need to attack 'Republicans' and not just Donald Trump.