That explains, not just this, but many other things - the absurd, indefensible statements that are still defended, the court cases, the denial of election losses, and probably more that don't come to mind after five seconds of thought.

This is also close to the authoritarian "make people say absurd things as a demonstration of power over them" playbook.

This is exactly what it is for. Fascism deploys hypocrisy very deliberately for exactly this reason. If you conform, it's a signal you will continue to conform to the admins policies. Push it until it's silly. People willing to look the fool, but remain loyal, are valuable to the admin.

They do this (at least at first) to pull people out of their staff who would slow them down or fight them. Then they expand the scope, where they hope to reach the entire population.