Joe, I agree. Completely. Folk music is whatever music folk like to sing and listen to. I just think it's largely a waste of time to argue about what's folk and what isn't and what music it's ok for folk to ask about and what music is out of limits. Quite selfishly, I would rather that we spend our time talking about music, rather than defending our right to talk about music. Maybe if we just ignore the Elsie-be's they'll sink back into the folklore?

On the other hand, of course, I will defend your right to talk about whatever it is you want to talk about (doesn't that paraphrase something some American said sometime about something?)