My theory is that it’s iconoclasm ( Meaning the smashing of Icon).
Art and Religion are heavily intertwined. Humans have always been religious animals. Thousands of years ago, Religion was invented to explain the inexplicable. There is always a certain percentage of humans that are incapable of conceptualizing. So those had to have pictures made so they could ‘see’ what they couldn’t conceptualize. Art was invented.
As Humans became more sophisticated, so did their Religion, which meant their art had to become more advanced also. Stone age parallel processing.
Eventually religion progressed to the point where monotheism developed. Since there was now only one god, there was no need for depicting the various gods and therefore no need to help those non-conceptualizing humans tell them apart. Of the 3 surviving monotheisms, Islam forbids ALL representation of the human form, under the logic that if humans are created in the image of god, then showing an image of a human is the same as showing the image of god. Not sure about the Jews, but I think they have a similar prohibition. Christians never quite made up their minds. The heavy pagan influence on Christianity tended to create a LOT of art ( Icons) that was religious themed. At certain periods in the Christian history, these icons were destroyed in what can only be described as riotous moments.
Humanity is still a work in progress and Religion is slowly being replaced by politics as the major source of public involvement.
There are still a lot of people that have problems conceptualizing, only today there is no need for cave art. We have the MSM.
Which makes them the modern version of an Icon. So what Beck is doing is the 21st century version of iconoclasm. The public is in the process of breaking open the temples and smashing the Icons.
As evidence I offer Dan Rather.
Anyway, to paraphrase Mr. Marx; ‘that’s my theory and I’m sticking to it until another one comes along’.