At this year’s 67th Grammy Awards, Beyoncé won Album of the Year and Best Country Album for COWBOY CARTER. She not only holds the record for the most Grammy wins and nominations of any artist but also finally brought the upset of having been nominated for Album of the Year four times without a win to an end. Moreover, despite being snubbed by country radio and award shows like the CMA (Country Music Association), COWBOY CARTER crowned Beyoncé as the first Black artist to win Best Country Album at the Grammys.

That Beyoncé and her album deserved the accolades is undeniable, but there may be another explanation as to why she won. After continuously overlooking albums like BEYONCÉ, Lemonade, and RENAISSANCE, the Grammys finally honored the singer in a historical decision that represents more than just a personal win. This year is the first time a Black woman has won Album of the Year since Lauryn Hill did in 1999—and only the fourth time ever. The change following the Recording Academy’s efforts to diversify its membership has also been notable: 66% of its voting body joined in or after 2019, with women and people of color increasing by 27% and 65%, respectively. Some view the recognition of COWBOY CARTER, arguably not Beyoncé’s single greatest album, as a belated tribute to a genius. Beck’s triumph with his album Morning Phase over Beyoncé and Sam Smith in 2015 is often similarly interpreted as belated recognition on the part of the Academy. But interpretations like these can be applied broadly to almost any year for every award show and their voting patterns. So, what does all this mean when taken in the context of current events in 2025? Let’s look at a few scenes that have taken place over the past few years.

Scene one: In November 2024, Donald Trump’s victory is all but certain as soon as exit polls are announced. He becomes the first Republican candidate to win both the electoral vote and the popular vote since George W. Bush was re-elected in 2004. Support for Trump is higher across all 50 states compared to his 2020 loss. Simply put, he’s popular.

Scene two: Since the 2010s, US corporations have embraced Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) policies not just as a social agenda or during employee training but as a core principle of their businesses. At the same time, though, in recent years, backlash against DEI has grown. A turning point comes in July 2023 when the Supreme Court rules that race-based affirmative action in college admissions is unconstitutional. Major corporations like Google, Amazon, Meta, and McDonald’s go on to scale back or scrap DEI policies altogether in a change seen even outside the US.

Scene three: Consequences become more tangible in the video game industry as anti-DEI sentiment grows. The effect begins to be seen both in consumer reaction to titles as well as their commercial success. Anticipated titles from major studios like Ubisoft’s Star Wars Outlaws, Sony’s Concord, and Electronic Arts’ Dragon Age: The Veilguard face criticism for prioritizing DEI principles over consumer demand, leading to studio closures in the most extreme cases.

This collection of snapshots reflects a shift where opposition to political correctness—an opposition referred to as anti-wokeness—is no longer an outlier but rather indicative of a broader social shift. Just as it’s easy to assume that a video game’s success or failure hinges on consumer reception, one could also argue that corporate policies or executive orders are less causes, and more accurately symptoms, of these changes. And the music industry has realized this as well. Not even the most astronomically popular stars can alter the course of the bigger, more sweeping social current. Taylor Swift’s voter registration campaign attracted over 400,000 signups in a single day, and Cardi B and Billie Eilish fervently supported Kamala Harris, and the Democratic candidate still lost. And while that doesn’t mean celebrities aren’t influential, nor does it prove there are anti-woke sentiments, it does underscore the limitations of famous people to tangibly impact the outcome of a vote. But is music the only area that’s been affected? The film industry, at least, managed to get vaccinated early (Ricky Gervais).

Conversely and contrary to conventional wisdom, the marketplace doesn’t react immediately in response to an artist’s political stance or position—even when cancel culture is factored in. When a video of Morgan Wallen using a racial slur surfaced in 2021, his career briefly appeared to be plunged into crisis, yet here he is today, as much a streaming juggernaut as ever. Ye (aka Kanye West) can still sell out massive venues, even though his erratic behavior is now the stuff of legends. As a result, some artists may choose to adopt a more pragmatic stance. Victor Willis of the original Village People lineup previously demanded the Trump campaign stop using their hit songs “YMCA” and “Macho Man” during the 2020 election. And then, earlier this year, he performed at one of Trump’s inauguration events. Snoop Dogg, though not attending a government-sanctioned event, similarly performed at the clearly pro-Trump Crypto Ball.

Meanwhile, other artists have arrived at a different approach. Instead of entrusting their hopes to elections or politics, they instead spread messages of bipartisan values, place importance on tackling specific issues through practical action, and emphasize the necessity of active participation. Take Kendrick Lamar’s recent Super Bowl halftime show, for example. His 13-minute performance avoided the typical glitz and glamour, instead using metaphors to spotlight racial issues in the US. From a stage built like a PlayStation controller, to actor Samuel L. Jackson donning an Uncle Sam costume and Serena Williams dancing a crip walk, Lamar’s choice of social commentary confronted how Black artists and athletes are marginalized and pressured to dilute their cultural identities when working within the confines of American pop culture.

This stands in contrast to times when major sporting events have devolved into overt political protests by players or their spectators. Lamar avoided heavy-handed lecturing through his creative approach to encoding his meaning within his performance. He splashed the Great American Game in patriotic colors while implicitly posing questions to his audience. Whose game is it? What kind of patriotism is welcomed? By doing so, he successfully took the world’s biggest, most extravagant event and put on its most overtly political performance to date. What might be interpreted as a subtle and retributive uppercut to the corporate-sponsored event wasn’t in fact such a blow. Lamar was instead highlighting how mainstream music, with its ample imagination, can still captivate audiences while addressing social issues. Music still has the power to challenge and inspire.

What about Chappell Roan’s acceptance speech for Best New Artist at this year’s Grammys? When she took the stage, she skipped the typical thank-yous. Instead, she opened her notebook, radiating so much determination to make the most of the brief opportunity that everyone could feel her sense of urgency. “I told myself,” she said, “that if I ever won a Grammy and got to stand up here before the most powerful people in music, I would demand that labels in the industry profiting millions of dollars off of artists would offer a livable wage and healthcare, especially to developing artists.” She wasn’t virtue signaling being woke. She reflected on how she signed her first record deal when she was a minor, later being dropped unceremoniously and with no safety net after some early flops, and then struggled just to get health coverage during the pandemic by getting a job. She paid no mind when her hat fell off as she tried to balance her notes and her trophy in her hands, eventually placing her Grammy on the ground so she could continue flipping pages. Roan transformed what could’ve been a moment of personal glory into a call for collective accountability. When she closed with, “Labels, we got you, but do you got us?” Sabrina Carpenter and Doechii began to well up with tears, Roan’s words evidently striking a chord with their own experiences with adversity.

Now let’s bring this back to Beyoncé and COWBOY CARTER. What gives the Grammy Awards their authoritative prestige is the idea of peer recognition—that winners are selected through votes cast by fellow industry workers represented by the Recording Academy. This year, the presenters repeatedly emphasized how the winners were selected by a body of 13,000 peers, likely to highlight the fruits of the Academy’s previously mentioned efforts at reforming themselves. But there can be more happening behind things that get said than you might expect. “Wow, I really was not expecting this,” Beyoncé said as she started her acceptance speech for Best Country Album. “I’d like to thank all of the incredible country artists that accepted this.” She acknowledged her unprecedented journey as a Black woman and pop/R&B icon venturing into country music and thanked them for the inclusion she was afforded. Yet it all came against the backdrop of COWBOY CARTER being dismissed and outright rejected by the core country community, paralleling the larger culture of anti-DEI sentiment seen in other parts of society. Her response? ”I think sometimes ‘genre’ is a code word to keep us in our place as artists.”

Not every artist gets their shot to perform at the Super Bowl or accept a Grammy, and while the 13,000 members of the Academy often get dismissed as mere figureheads appointed by labels, radio stations, and other institutions, they can still challenge the historical biases and constraints that Kendrick Lamar symbolized with Uncle Sam. By honoring an album that transcends genre norms, the Academy collectively signaled that the music community celebrates its diversity and unity as its strength. And while they may not mention anti-wokeness directly, they do stand in contrast to it. Inclusion can win—not through the internal emails that the HR departments of major global companies send around championing their DEI policies, but through cultural achievements and influence that can’t be ignored.

Jane Fonda’s acceptance speech for the 2025 Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award ties this narrative together beautifully. “We actors, we don’t manufacture anything tangible. What we create is empathy,” she said. “Empathy is not weak or woke. And by the way, woke just means you give a damn about other people,” she continued. “And even if they’re of a different political persuasion, we need to call upon our empathy and not judge, but listen from our hearts, and welcome them into our tent, because we are gonna need a big tent to resist successfully what’s coming at us.” While the Golden Globes and SAG Awards this year featured barely any political commentary, Fonda’s words weren’t about surrender or turning a blind eye. Instead, they were a call for astute, sensible thinking and generosity. And they were spoken by someone who witnessed firsthand how Hollywood overcame McCarthyism in the 1950s.