I think a lot of the stories here are about that culture of offendedness, which someone - possibly Harvey Andrews - started a thread about a few months ago. Political Correctness (I mean in its overdone and most useless sense) may be one of the causes.
I think also part of the problem may lie in the culture of over identifying a song's sentiments with its singer. You can sing a song like "Sam Hall" or "Rosemary Lane" in which the singer portrays an unrepentant murderer and a pregnant waif respectively. For some reason, no one minds if you speak through these characters' mouths. However, I have no doubt that if I tried to tell the story from the point of view of an Al Quaida bomber, I would be instantly accused by many of "supporting terrorism" or "condoning murder". I do fear that a lot of people listen less critically than they might. I do not believe that performers should give too much ground to this tendency, because it could dilute dilute and corrupt the value of a performing culture.