There is a fascinating ritual in modern America that should be examined.
A celebrity says something political and millions of people who had never previously expressed an opinion on the subject suddenly discover their deep, burning expertise.
Take for example Bad Bunny.
A practically unknown entertainer in America criticized ICE, and within minutes he’s declared a cultural icon. And when attack on ICE is questioned, a legion of newly minted fans sprang into action.
They defended him as though they had grown up on his mixtapes.
Jimmy Kimmel concedes liberals are pretending to be Bad Bunny fans simply to oppose Trump.
Rare win. You don’t see Jimmy tell the truth very often.
“This week, almost every liberal I know suddenly really into Bad Bunny—people I’ve never heard say the words Bad or Bunny in their… pic.twitter.com/qJls2HYm2p
— Vigilant Fox 🦊 (@VigilantFox) February 10, 2026
Even Jimmy Kimmel recognized the hypocrisy, as he joked (seriously) that the majority of Leftists could not name a single song prior to learning his name from the media. And as for his performance, most of the viewers could not understand a word he sang.
That did not matter. He said something against the right target: ICE. And that was enough to trigger their tribal reflex.
I call it The Psychology of Stupidity. Not stupidity as measured by IQ tests, but stupidity as voluntary surrender of independent thought.
Bad Bunny was selected for success, likely by a cabal.
He won the first Grammy ever for a foreign language album. How did he get on the radar of the selection committee? It certainly wasn’t for his disgusting music.
Here are some of the lyrics to one of the songs he sang at the Super Bowl:
I’m gonna take them all to the VIP, the VIP, hey
Say hello to auntiе
Let’s take a selfiе, say “cheese”
Let the ones I already fucked smile
What got Bad Bunny his Grammy, and ultimately the right to perform at what should be one of the greatest venues for a performer? I’m guessing it was his hatred of ICE.
And what a Latino suck-up. His entire persona centers on Puerto Rico, while playing to South and Central Americans. In other words, excepting Puerto Ricans, Bad Bunny caters to those who have been allowed into America illegally. Mention enough Latin countries or references in your songs, and people in those countries will take notice.
The Left took notice. And, when the Left pushes an agenda, they will create the messengers they hope will reinforce a narrative. Thus, Bad Bunny, got the call. And like Manchurian candidates, Leftists all over America activated.
Already programmed to hate Immigration and Customs Enforcement, millions of lemmings supported Bad Bunny.
And that support meant they hate ICE without understanding what ICE actually does.
ICE is staffed by human beings enforcing laws passed by Congress under the Homeland Security Act of 2002, signed in 2003. It is not a rogue militia. It is a federal agency operating under statutory authority.
Yet a bloc of voters has be trained to despise the agency reflexively. Why? Because a cultural cue was issued. The celebrity signaled the tribe.
At the same time, political coalitions shift. Democrats once relied almost exclusively on overwhelming support from Black voters. Recent polling suggests modest but measurable erosion in that support among younger Black men and minority voters. Political strategy evolves accordingly. Immigration becomes not merely policy but demographic calculus.
Now let us examine what the data and scholarship say.
Identity Over Information
Social identity theory, developed by psychologist Henri Tajfel, demonstrates that individuals form strong attachments to group identity even when group divisions are arbitrary. In controlled experiments, participants assigned to random groups quickly favored their own group and discriminated against others.
The implications are profound. Humans prioritize belonging over accuracy. When a celebrity endorsed by your political tribe attacks an institution associated with the opposing tribe, the decision to support the celebrity is not analytical. It is protective.
This explains how someone can move from ignorance to fervor in seconds. The content of the speech is secondary. The tribal signal is primary.
Research from Yale Law School’s Cultural Cognition Project reinforces this. Studies show that individuals often adjust factual beliefs to align with the positions of their preferred political group.
In plain English, people will modify their understanding of facts to avoid conflict with their tribe.
That is not enlightenment. That is social survival instinct misapplied to civic life.
The Emotional Accelerator
Modern media amplifies this dynamic. Emotional content spreads faster than neutral content. A widely cited MIT study on misinformation demonstrated that emotionally charged stories travel further and faster on social media platforms than sober analysis.
Outrage is rocket fuel. Nuance is a bicycle.
When ICE is framed exclusively as an agent of cruelty rather than as a federal enforcement body with a defined mandate, moral outrage activates instantly. ICE’s responsibilities include combating human trafficking, drug smuggling, cybercrime, and immigration violations.
Here is a striking detail. Polling from Pew Research has shown that many Americans cannot accurately describe the functions of federal immigration agencies. Yet strong opinions abound.
In other words, conviction is not correlated with comprehension.
Psychologist Jonathan Haidt’s moral foundations research suggests that political groups emphasize different moral triggers. When immigration enforcement is framed as harm to vulnerable families, it activates the care and compassion instincts central to many progressive voters.
The policy debate becomes a morality play. The facts enter through the back door, if at all.
Celebrity as Political Shortcut
There is another layer. Americans increasingly distrust institutions while retaining cultural trust in entertainers. Gallup reports historically low levels of trust in Congress and other institutions. See
When institutional trust collapses, cultural figures fill the vacuum. The pop star becomes the political translator. The stage becomes the lecture hall.
Academic research published in journals such as Political Behavior indicates that celebrity endorsements disproportionately influence low information voters. The less someone knows about policy, the more likely they are to rely on celebrity cues.
That is a shortcut. It is also a vulnerability.
In blind policy experiments where party labels are removed, Americans often agree on major issues at significantly higher rates than they expect. Party cues drive division more than policy substance.
The celebrity statement is not persuasive because it is informed. It is persuasive because it is amplified by identity.
Demographic Arithmetic and Political Strategy
Now let us address the strategic question.
Historically, Black voters have supported Democratic presidential candidates at extremely high levels. Pew Research Center reported that in 2020 approximately 92 percent of Black voters supported the Democratic nominee.
However, recent polling indicates movement among certain demographic subsets, particularly younger Black men. Even modest shifts matter in close elections. Thus, the shift by Democrats to bring in a more solid voting bloc.
Demographic change is not a conspiracy theory. It is a measurable reality. The U.S. Census Bureau projects that by 2045 the United States will become majority minority. Political parties analyze this data carefully. Coalitions evolve. Appeals shift.
Political scientists have documented that when a party assumes guaranteed loyalty from a demographic bloc, policy responsiveness toward that bloc can decline over time.
The question is not whether demographic strategy exists. It always has. The question is whether celebrity activism is being used as emotional camouflage for electoral arithmetic.
The Crowd and the Individual
Gustave Le Bon wrote in 1895 about the psychology of crowds. He observed that individuals in crowds adopt heightened emotional states and diminished critical reasoning. Modern neuroscience supports aspects of his observation. Group belonging activates reward centers in the brain. By contrast, dissent activates threat responses.
Social media intensifies this. Algorithms prioritize engagement. Engagement often means outrage. Internal documents reported by major media outlets have revealed that platforms are aware of polarization effects driven by engagement-based ranking systems.
Research from Cambridge has shown that people are more likely to share political content that signals identity than content that provides new factual information.
And the reason Democrats and other Leftists offer constant lies is experiments demonstrate that when partisan cues are removed, support for certain immigration enforcement measures increases across ideological lines.
Deplatforming a single high-profile influencer can dramatically reduce the spread of specific narratives, underscoring the power of personality over principle. And this is why Democrats forced social media companies to silence the truth.
The Psychology of Stupidity is not about intelligence. It is about emotional synchronization.
The individual dissolves into the crowd. The fan replaces the citizen.
If you can be mobilized into moral outrage by a performer you did not know a week ago, what else can mobilize you without examination?
And if a federal agency can be reduced to a caricature in a halftime performance, what does that say about our civic literacy?
The issue is not whether one supports or opposes specific immigration policies. Reasonable people can disagree vigorously on enforcement priorities, border security, and humanitarian obligations. The issue is whether positions are adopted because they are reasoned or because they are signaled.
The Psychology of Stupidity is not confined to one party, though Democrats certainly hold a big majority. It is a human tendency. But in an era where cultural influencers rival elected officials in persuasive power, the danger is magnified.
Democracy requires citizens, not fans. Policy requires knowledge, not playlists. And until voters demand substance over spectacle, the halftime show will continue to write the script.
