My bitching about SXSW is nothing new but its cancellation this Spring is a dream come true! We taxpaying, non-asshole residents get to enjoy our city for a little while longer.
The writing was on the wall anyway. Nazi-sympathizer Jack Dorsey bailed, Apple wasn’t coming to show off new TV shows and I think some other major tech players withdrew. It’s a shame for all the bands but the days of SXSW being the gathering to get them discovered by a major record label ended over 20 years ago.
Local businesses may suffer and I can sympathize only a little. Firstly, you need a better plan than putting too many eggs in the SXSW basket, similar to all the corporations that got into bed with the Chinese Autocracy (which is out to screw the West back for the 19th Century). Secondly, I have lived here for 26 years. I don’t appreciate being gouged and/or told to piss off in order to impress industry people who still consider Austin “fly-over country.” An example, the world premiere of Jordan Peele’s Us was at SXSW a couple years back and it was closed to the public, only Hollywood bigshots were allowed. If that was the plan, go back to LA, don’t use Austin.
My adopted home is more resilient than it used to be, which is why I’m not worried in the long run. I think the last recession which really hit us in the gut super hard was the Reagan-Bush fallout. After 1993, everybody and their uncle have been gobbling up all the decent real estate.
Will this huge demonstration of Orange Foolius and the Trumpkins failing at a crisis it can’t lie its way out of cascade into other upcoming events I do enjoy? Brian Posehn at Cap City this late March? Moontower Comedy Fest in April? Chupacabracon VII in May? I’m not sure. If the coronavirus does, I will have to accept public safety over my personal desires. Better safe than sorry and given how much the Right defunded Science for Big Jesus, cutting back on large gatherings is about the only thing Liberal enclaves have left to fight this.