>material no non-racist would be comfortable listening to

Traditional Folk is *filled* with uncomfortable content of all kinds that if you're "comfortable", you're not *really listening*. I think you're trying to project your own manner/style of listening/enjoying/etc. onto everyone else and assuming that others can't/don't take entirely differing arrays of experiences from the pursuit, not to mention implying that there must/should be only one way to study/interpret the music. There is far too much depth and complexity inherent and encapsulated within it for such restraints.