SXSW is ending its partnerships with the U.S. Army and defense contractors after pro-Palestine protests this year. “After careful consideration, we are revising our sponsorship model,” the festival said after opening applications for 2025. “As a result, the U.S. Army, and companies who engage in weapons manufacturing, will not be sponsors of SXSW 2025.”
More than 60 artists and participants boycotted this year’s festival over SXSW’s ties to defense groups that supply Israeli weapons in the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. The U.S. Army was a “super-sponsor” of the 2024 festival, and Collins Aerospace, a company under defense conglomerate RTX Corporation (f.k.a. Raytheon), also participated. “A music festival should not include war profiteers,” said Squirrel Flower, one of the first artists to boycott. “I refuse to be complicit in this and withdraw my art and labor in protest.”
I’m not. The US Military is sneakily a very large commercial partner in Hollywood. They frequently loan out equipment, bases, personnel, and more to movies that depict the armed forces as good guys. Top Gun, Battleship, Goldeneye, Iron Man 1/2, The Day After Tomorrow, and the Transformers movies are all sponsored by the US Military. So it makes sense they’d be at a movie/culture festival. Not to mention it’s a target rich environment for their core demo: men between the ages of 18 and 25