Thanks for all the responses.

Most of you appear to concur with my views so far although there seems to be one or two with alternative opinions.

As I say, I am not concerned with performers having strong views on any matter or even expressing them directly or otherwise through their music. What concerns me is that there often seems to be an expectation that they should have views on certain subjects and that they are duty bound to express these at every opportunity.

After all, not all folk musicians are even singers although they could obviously help "worthy" causes in some other way, e.g. performing at benefit or fund raising gigs etc, or by offering support to singers.

As for the "germans standing by" analogy, I'd suggest that all the population of Germany at that time had an equal responsibility to speak out in whatever way they could although, understandably, many would have been reluctant to do so through fear.
So, the same applies to the rest of us today if we encounter anything about which we feel particularly strongly. It's not the job of musicians to articulate our views any more so than the rest of us. Unless they choose to do so, that is.