Pink Floyd’s ‘Woke’ 50th Anniversary Rainbow Controversy

On January 19 2023, popular Twitter account @TravisAkers tweeted the following screenshot, purportedly illustrating backlash aimed at rock band Pink Floyd over a 50th anniversary “rainbow” logo on Facebook:

Akers attached a collaged image with a Facebook post (“Pink Floyd updated their profile picture”) on the left. Five comments in total were shown (complete with visible account names), three of which appeared to have attracted a single “laugh react” from the individual who captured the screenshots.

One of the comments visible on the lower left side of the image perhaps hinted at a paucity of annoyed commenters. It vaguely asked about “the rainbow,” suggesting the claim was perhaps a reach:

What’s up with the rainbow[?]

Akers’ tweet was viewed more than 12 million times; it was also shared to Facebook by actor Wil Wheaton on the morning of January 20 2023. That evening, actor and commentator George Takei shared Akers’ screenshot, lamenting the “furor from the right” based on a secondhand claim:

Takei tweeted a few hours earlier, directing readers to an item on his website about the purported controversy. He published an identical tweet promoting the link on January 22 2023:

Media Bias/Fact Check maintained an entry for Takei’s Second Nexus, explaining that the site “sometimes is not factual”:

In review, Second Nexus reports news with a progressive left bias that utilizes moderately loaded emotional language in their headlines and articles … Many articles on Second Nexus source tweets and then provides opinionated commentary about the statements. When sourcing to other information they typically use credible sources such as the World Health Organization and National Journal. Editorially, most opinions come from a left perspective with support for the Environment, LGBT rights, and anti-conservative issues. In general, story selection almost always favors the left and sometimes is not factual.

Takei’s two links pointed to a January 20 2023 page on SecondNexus.com, “Conservatives Are Melting Down Over ‘Woke’ Rainbow In Pink Floyd’s ’50th Anniversary’ Profile Pic–And It’s Just Too Perfect.” While the headline teased “Conservatives … Melting Down,” the page itself primarily showcased commenters using obvious sarcasm to mock the purportedly offended people, claiming that “the sarcasm was sometimes difficult to discern from the actual outrage”:

“Can’t believe Pink Floyd have gone woke. From now on the only classic British artists I’m listening to are Queen, David Bowie, Elton John , George Michael, Judas Priest, Morissey, and Rickie Blackmore’s Rainbow […]”

None of the comments in Akers’ tweet appeared on the Second Nexus page, and most potentially sincere comments were mild at best. One such comment described the image as “pandering” and referencing June, LGBTQ Pride Month:

Wow even Pink Floyd is pandering now!? And it’s not even June!

Another comment illustrated how difficult it was to determine the intent of the commenter:

GO WOKE GO BROKE, SELLOUTS

On January 22 2023, the official Twitter account for Pink Floyd promoted a 50th anniversary box set. Comments referencing “outrage” were visible, but actual sincere objections were not as prominent — the first visible response tweet was a good example, as were other top responses:

Articles about the supposed “conservative outrage” over the Pink Floyd rainbow were shared to myriad subreddits, including r/Persecutionfetish:

That iteration featured (again) the same five comments. Other posts linked to articles about the alleged controversy, such as a NME piece about the same five comments in Akers’ screenshot:

A January 22 2023 post to r/entertainment also linked to music news coverage of the “controversy.” But the most popular comment on the thread challenged the claim, creating a skeptical subthread:

“Are “people” actually mad? Or is it 3 dummies on Facebook? These articles always highlight a couple clowns and act like there’s rioting and boycotts[.]”

“It’s 3 dummies on Facebook. Nobody else cares.”

“These articles just looking to bank off us reacting, cycle of hating – super annoying[.]”

“Journalism industry SLAMMED by redditor[.]”

“It’s three dummies and the media running with it as a chance to sow more disdain and hatred for others.”

“Yeah I feel like these ‘people’ don’t represent anything even remotely close to 0.001% of Pink Floyd’s fans, crazy how these entertainment websites all just literally copy and paste each other’s homework[.]”

Akers tweeted the screenshots on January 19 2023, not long after Pink Floyd’s Facebook page uploaded its new profile photograph. As of January 23 2023, that post was shared several thousands of times, and had accumulated thousands of comments.

By default, comments were ordered by “Most Relevant,” and reordering the comment section to “All [Comments]” should have revealed at least a few of the purportedly outraged comments. We were unable to locate any of the comments in the screenshots to verify their existence, but it was possible the virality of the screenshots led their authors to delete them.

However, none of the comments we saw represented genuine outrage. Several people commented to that effect in the most popular comments:

“Came for the entertainment. Blown away by the rush of folks coming in to stomp on the know-nothings. Leaving refreshed and inspired.”

“Like this if you’re super disappointed that the ‘idiot comments’ are not as abundant as you hoped.” [519 likes.]

” … yup its always been there. Haven’t really come across any comments crying about it. Was a rainbow through a prism if I remember right. But i just wanted to say, it probably feels A WHOLE LOT better than being woke and emotionally manipulated to be angry and offended at everything.”

“I’m not seeing nearly as many outraged comments as I was hoping to see.” [1.8K reactions.]

“CAN YOU ALL STOP MAKING FUN OF THE BOOMERS?!? I came here to read their ignorant comments but I can’t find them under all the ones that are making fun of them! ????” [8K likes.]

“Hi! Welcome to the mid-bottom of the comments. I haven’t seen any Boomflakes cry yet, but I bet on all the Punisher skulls it’s right around the corner!”

Commenters satirizing what they believed was sincere backlash were often castigated by fellow commenters due to an absence of actual objections:

“Good job Pink. You just lost another fan. I have been listening to this album for the past 50 years since I picked it up at my local record store for 50 cents. I just happened to never look at the album cover[.]”

“I think they should re-release the original album cover and get rid of that darn rainbow /s
Edit: ok this has been very amusing but I’m going crazy from the oblivious comments now. This was obviously sarcastic[.]”

Rumors of an “anti-woke backlash” on Pink Floyd’s 50th anniversary Facebook profile photograph spread virally after high-profile accounts on social media shared a total of five supposedly offended reactions. Sites such as Second Nexus gleefully declared a “meltdown” by “conservatives” took place in the comments — comments which were in actuality populated largely by people who were “disappointed” not to discover anti-gay sentiment when actually visiting the post. We were unable to locate the comments in question, nor could we find any clearly sincere “anti-woke” complaining on the thread.