Censorship in Music It should not be up to the few to decide what is or is not good for the masses. People should be free to make their own choices about what music they listen to. To quote the Executive Director of ACLU of Louisiana, Joe Clark: "Our free society operates on the principle that each and every individual has the right to decide what music or other art forms he or she wants - or does not want - to see or hear..." (ACLU Press Release 1) Yet censorship of music goes on constantly, everyday, in many different ways. Some are merely protesting, usually by religious or other special interest groups, others are serious violations of civil liberties, and some are even by the music industry itself, merely by not allowing artists to make enough to get by, thus effectively forcing them out of the business. Take for example band Rage Against the Machine's recent Saturday Night Live performance. Steve Forbes was to be the host of the show, so RAtM decided to make their own statement about their feelings of Mr. Forbes, which is well within their rights. Two upside-down American flags were hung on the stage that the band was to perform on, but seconds before they were to perform the song "Bulls on Parade", SNL and NBC stagehands were sent in to take down the flags. The inverted flags, according to guitarist Tom Morello, stood for "our contention that American democracy is inverted when what passes for democracy is an electoral choice between two representatives of the privileged class. America's expression is inverted when you're free to say anything you want to say until it upsets a corporate sponsor. Finally this was our way of expressing our opinion of the show's host, Steve Forbes." (Massachusetts Music Industry Coalition Report, 1) The band had earlier tried to hang the flags during a rehearsal two days earlier, but the show's producers ordered the flags down, because Steve Forbes was on the show. They also told RAtM that some objectionable lyrics in "Bullet in The Head", their second song, were to be bleeped. They even went so far as to attempt to bleep them in the studio because Forbes' relatives were going to be there. After their first performance that night, the band was ordered to leave the building. Says Morello about the incident: "...should come to no surprise that GE, which owns NBC, would find "Bullet" particularly offensive. GE is a major manufacturer of US planes used to commit war crimes in the Gulf War..." (Massachusetts Music Industry Coalition Report, 2) Unfortunately, NBC was within it's own rights to do this, because the band was playing on private property and on a privately owned TV show. But who are these censors, these people who have the temerity to believe that if such lyrics would affect other people, it would not affect them? Why, these are normal, everyday human beings! These are the same kind of people one would see walking down the street any given day. So wait, what makes them so high above us that they have not only the ability, but a right and even an obligation to censor such things? Unfortunately for their case, and fortunately for the free musicians and listeners of the United States, nothing! Unfortunately for us, however, that does not stop them. Take for another example the string of attempted censorship of Marilyn Manson concerts in 1997. On February 5th of that year, a group called "Oklahomans for Families and Children" asked for cancellation. Governor Frank Keating is quoted as saying "...these people peddling garbage. It's further proof that society's moral values continue to crumble." (Religious Right vs. Marilyn Manson, 1) Only by filing a lawsuit against the city was Manson allowed to play. On the 7th of that month, one school went so far as to ban the Manson "look" from school! On the 8th, Omaha, Nebraska's Mayor, Hal Daub, warned parents to keep small children at home on the night of the concert. Now, let's take a look at the Governor, the Mayor, and the school administration. What do they have in common with the fans of the music? Everything! They're human beings, with a mind and a body and the same exact set of emotions as these people who have attempted to censor their music! Does that stop the censors? Read on, and find out. February 21st, Fitchburg MA: Religious organizations picketed the show for three weeks, then a city council meeting was called, during which two separate petitions are shown, asking for the show to be stopped. One member of the council accepted a check for $5,000 towards stopping it! Fortunately, the City Solicitor ruled that the show couldn't be canceled. It was an interesting month for the band, to be sure. March 4th, Anchorage Alaska: Anchorage Assembly member Cheryl Clementson is quoted as saying "There won't be any eating little animals on the stage, or oral sex, or anything else that they have claimed to do." (Religious Right vs. Marilyn Manson, 2) She then went on to urge parents to buy all the tickets they could so others couldn't get to them, as surely censorship as blatantly canceling the show itself! Yet, if one were to look at statements made by some of the venue managers, they wouldn't see the kind of evil, hateful band that these censors are dealing with, in fact, it would be quite the opposite. Ben Ruggles, manager of the Wallace Civic Center, in Fitchburg, says the band was cooperative, there were no problems, and he even went so far as to say he would be glad to act as a reference for the band in the future! Yet, this was the same exact town that the religious organizations were picketing in for weeks! For what purpose were they doing this? Do they hold grudges against friendly, cooperative bands? Nobody was picketing, say, the council member that took a $5,000 check, certainly a crime as bad as what they had assumed of the band! Censorship happens in many, many forms, not the least of which is merely bleeping out offensive words and phrases. The previously given case of parents being urged to buy up tickets is a good example. Another would be a recent case in Louisiana, in which police seized over 60 CDs, containing such obviously influential and negative music as "Jingle Bells" and "The Tarzan Soundtrack" after they were called because of a fight. A skating rink the incident happened in front of called The Skate Zone was closed down by the same officers called, under the assumption that the music had incited these boys to fight. They then performed a warrant-less search of the rink, taking approximately 60 CDs, and arrested the owner of the rink and his manager. The Sheriff of the town later claimed to have a warrant for their arrest, citing "Principal to Contributing to the Delinquency of Juveniles" as their charge. The pair were treated like real criminals, handcuffed, fingerprinted, et cetera, then transferred to holding cells where they were forced to stand for four hours! They were forced to take urine tests to search for drug usage. One of the pair, a woman, was forced to walk barefoot into the male restrooms, and urinated into a cup, then she was escorted her through a cell block in front of male inmates, who yelled sexually graphic statements at her to harass her. Yet this man believes he has the right to decide what is morally wrong or right music-wise? HE has the level of intelligence and morality needed to decide things like that for other people? The man shouldn't even be a police officer, much less making decisions like that. Censorship is not a recent phenomenon either. Take Jerry Lee Louis's 1957 song "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On." Sam Phillips, founder of Sun Records, received a phone call from a distributor one day about the song, because the man was worried about what people would think of was shaking! Phillips refused to delete the word 'it' from the line "shake it, baby". The record went on to be the third-best seller that year. Ironically enough, no objections were raised over the song "Great Balls of Fire." "Censorship is the most dangerous thing that God has ever let live or exist on this world," said Phillips, speaking at a press convention, "because when you start messing with the creative energies of people, you don't have much left in this world." (Taylor, 1) One of music's legends was also one of its most censored performers. Elvis Presley, rock legend, was often censored, on stage or on TV. "When he emerged out of this city, he frightened a lot of people and when he went to places like Jacksonville (Fla.) - they said you can sing but you can't move," said Ken Paulson, director of the First Amendment Center. "And that was a classic example of prior restraint of government. (Taylor, 2) On one of Elvis's performances on the Ed Sullivan show, they refused to film anything below his waist. Assumedly they were worried that him shaking his hips a little would corrupt a generation. Not like, say, a President that has an affair in the Oval Office. Not at all. Of course, there is still one more form of censorship that is yet to be mentioned, the kind that is most commonly practiced. The kind practiced by the major record labels, ironically enough. It's the kind where the artist can't afford to keep playing. It's the kind where the artist could make more money at 7-11. It's the kind that the major record labels thrive on. It's horrible contracts, it's songs being classified as 'works-for-hire', it's greed. Let's take an imaginary artist. We can call him "Bill". Bill gets a contract from a major record label, earning 2% royalties per CD. Now let's say Bill's new album comes out, and all 1,000,000 copies that are printed are sold for $15.00. None are stolen, all are sold at full price. Now, this is already an impossible scenario, but let's keep going. The total profits are now $15,000,000.00. Bill's royalties come out to approximately $300,000.00. Now, let us assume that Bill's band is a standard band, with four members. When split, the profits come out to $75,000 per member. Not bad, right? Now it's time for a reality check. Unfortunately, the band has to pay production costs. Let's assume this is going to be $5.00 a CD. Uh-oh, we just went down to $50,000 per member. Now, let's assume the record company gave them an advance. Say, $100,000.00 for the band, though most advances are quite a bit more. Uh-oh, the band's out of money! There's still concerts, promotions, et cetera, and the band has no money. Looks like they're going to be in debt to the record company. The unfortunate part of this whole tirade is NO band will ever get a 2% deal right off the bat, and no artist has ever sold everything produced without anything stolen or sold discounted. The record company, in this situation, earned $14,700,000.00. The record company has earned more money that they don't need, and the artist was better off working at a 7-11. 32,000 (approximately) new CDs are released each year. About 250 sell more than 10,000 copies. 30 go platinum. The situation I explained above is next to impossible, but the artist still loses out in the end. The artists may as well be working for free, but none of this makes it true censorship. The true censorship comes in when you consider what makes a record work. Is the album a hit in Europe, so there's pressure to make it work here? What famous promoter/artist/executive is the band's drummer related to? Does it sound enough like the current hit album to make it on the charts? THIS is where the true censorship! If your sound is different, new, strange, doesn't fit the current teeny-bopper style, you lose! This is why the record companies attempt to rid themselves of things like Napster, they can't have their artists reaching the consumers without their palms getting greased. Unfortunately, censorship, no matter how many people write papers or complain about it will always be an issue. It will always be a problem, it always has been, and it always will be, which is unfortunate, because to quote Sam Phillips again, "Music has done more to break down areas of censorship, racism, international understanding, more than all of the damn ambassadors put together, and I mean around the world!" (Taylor, 3) Stewart 1