Censorship Essay, Research Paper

CENSORSHIP

In today’s society, all types of music artists are

expressing their views, opinions and feelings in their

songs about what they see and what they know. This is on

of the great things about this country, the freedom to

express yourself. It is not fair, nor is it constitutional

that music should be censored in anyway. It is not only rap

music trying to be censored it is in all types of music.

They are taking away their rights and it isn’t fair. As

reported in the New York Times. “Wall-Mart CD standards are

Changing Pop Music”, Wal-Mart and other large department

stores sell CD’s by your favorite artists which are not what

your favorite artists originally created. Some retailers

refuse to carry CDs with “Parental Advisory Stickers”, a few

also go as far as to make it known to labels and artists

that if the CD comes to their shelves with a “dirty” word, a

“controversial” cover, or an “explicit” lyric it will not be

allowed on the shelves. Some of the artists include

Nirvana, Beck, John Mellencamp and the list goes on.

(Internet ultratnet) The most recent case involving Wal-Mart

and censorship, was the new Sheryl Crow album. A song on

the album which lashes the company for selling guns that end

up in the wrong hands as caused the company to ban the album

in stores. (Schruers 64) Delores Tucker, William Bennett,

Senator Joseph Lieberman, and Senator Sam Nunn held a press

conference in Washington D.C. The message: censor obscene

music and censor “pro-drug lyrics”. These censors announced

their plan to pressure major record companies to discontinue

production of what they called “obscene” music and music

which contains ” blatantly pro-drug lyrics. All of the CDs

targeted as “obscene” already carry RIAA Parental Advisory

Labels. Parents are already provided with the information

they need if they choose to monitor their children’s musical

selections. Discontinuing production of this music takes

the freedom of expression away form everyone- musicians and

fans of every age. (Internet ultranet) The increasing

controversy surrounding rap music, with its rough-edged

lyrics about sex and violence, has prompted two very

different responses from black oriented radio stations in

New York and Los Angeles. Two stations WBLS New York and

KACE in Los Angeles, have announced they wont play the

roughest and most offensive songs. A third station WPWR

opted for a different route, saying it would lose

credibility with its audience if it banned music that

reflects the language of urban life. “We’ve got to speak

their language” if the message of the record is “Don’t call

me a bitch” we have got to allow the artist to get the

message across. And sometimes it is necessary for the

artists to use language that grabs peoples attention. Inner

City Broadcasting one of the largest black owned

broadcasting firms in the country, announced that its

stations will not play music that is profane or advocates

violence, particularly against women or homosexuals. They

announced they would not air songs with the word’s “bitch”

and “ho” to refer to women. What we are doing, as

responsible broadcasters who are licensed to serve our

listeners, is simply exercising our best judgment, said

Pierre Sutton, Chairmen of Inner City. (Viles 90)What

bothers me is that they censor the music because they are

saying these words are portraying bad ideas, but they are

just singing about what is all around us and what we see.

It is not like saying theses lyrics are anything new. A

person or a child is going to hear them regardless of any

song with so called profanity in them. The people singing

are just telling the truth. I think a child has a better

chance of hearing profanity in there own home or school then

by hearing it in a song. The recent Gangsta rap hearings on

Capitol Hill bore all the elements of 1985’s dramatic

Parents Music Resource Center debate-heated testimony talk

of labeling explicit lyrics and plenty of music biz

attention. Led by Illinois Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun, the

Senate Juvenile Justice subcommittee met last month and

launched the first of what some predicted would be several

hearings to explore the effects of hard-core rap on

America’s youth. “The music industry has to take

responsibility to make certain that children are not

exposed to this stuff” said Moseley-Braun. Rep. Maxine

Waters, whose district includes part of South Central Los

Angeles, home to many gangsta rappers, said that these young

people referring to these rappers are being denied the

opportunity to say who they are. They have a message, and

they are forcing America to listen”. (Smith 22) You also

may remember when hard-core rapper Ice-T wrote the song cop

killer. He was just singing what he felt towards cops. He

did not mean that we should all go out and start killing

cops, (Light 20) I personally thought the song was very

rude and not very intelligent, but at the same time I don’t

think he should have been censored for it. Although there

is many groups being censored there many organizations

fighting against censorship. Randy Lee Payton and John

Woods co-founders of Rock Out Censorship and it’s newspaper,

the ROC, call their group” a national grass-roots anti-

censorship organization”. Woods and Payton started their

organization in 1989 and took up the battle against the

industry-watchdog group Parents Music Resource Center. What

started as a local organization soon branched out. ROC now

has chapters in 19 states, as well as in England and Canada,

and ROC has a circulation of 15,000 papers. By setting up

tables at rock shows, ROC has gathered a data base of almost

45,000 names, and it is still growing. Now ROC is fighting

bills like HB 2982, sponsored by Pennsylvania state

legislator T.J. Ronney, a Democrat which would criminalize

the sale of labeled records to minors. “The biggest

difference between now and 1989″, says Payton,” is now we

find ourselves fighting these supposed liberals. It is was

a lot more fun when we were fighting these religious kooks.

These other people are supposed to be on our side.” (Weisel

50. Another “Freedom Fighter” aganist music censorship is 71

year old Mary Morello, Mother of the guitarist Tom Morello

of Rage Against the Machine. Who act has also had their

share of censorship. Morello is the founder of Parents for

Rock and Rap, an anti-censorship organization that she runs

from her home. She started the group to opppose the Parents

Music Resource Center,(just like the founders of ROC) an

organization co-founed by Tipper Gore, wife of Vice

President Al Gor. That group was largely responsible for

the parental advisory labels used on tapes and CDs with

expilicit sexual or violoent lyrics. The label also

pressures record companies, radio stations and music stores

to stop playing or selling recordings considered detrimental

to children. ” Individuals and groups are attempting to

take away our first 1st Amendment rights”, she says. ” The

purpose of music is to be enjoyed, not censored. Young

people should be able to listen to any type of music they

like, regardless of their age. I always tell them that if

you want to keep listening to the music that you enjoy,

starting today you have to learn to fight back. If you

don’t fight for your own freedom, no one is going to give it

to you”. (Internet xnet). Morello believes and I agree,

speech and expression are being shackled in the U.S., and

she puts much of the blame on the current political climate.

” Cenosorship is coming down now harder then it has before.

” she says. ” Look at the Congress we have, trying to take

funds away from the National Endowment for the arts, trying

to kill public television. They must be living in the Dark

Ages.” (Internet xnet). After reaserching music censorship

and supporting anti-censorship organizations, I realize that

there is much wrok to be done to get free speech. There

will always be someone or some group to stand aganist what

you believe. I think the only way to really gain full

freedom of speech is to fight and not give up. I think that

the more people realize that rights are being violated, the

more people will support the anit-censorship groups. I

believe that people who do support these groups should

really get involved. It is the only way we can win.

Internet. http://www.ultranet.com/~crowleyn/alerts.html

Internet http://www.xnet.com/~paigeone/noevil/morello.html

Light, Alan. Rolling Stone, “Word form the Home Front”

May 27, 1993 p20

Schruers, Fred. Rolling Stone, “She really only wants to be with you”

November 14,1996 p64

Smith, Danyel. Rolling Stone, “House of Pain, the fight against gansta

rap hits Capitol Hill” April 7, 1994 p 22.

Thigpen, David. Rolling Stone ” Musicland stores refuse to sell some titles

to minors” September 16, 1993, p13

Viles, Peter. Broadcasting and Cable, “Three stations, two responses to

rap” December13, 1993 p90

Weisel, Al. Rolling Stone, “Freedom Rock” October 20, 1994 p50