Welcome to 1984?

[amdforlife]

MTV pretty much gets ahold of every type of music, why single rap out? I could be a little biased because I live in Riverside Co., which along w/ San Bernardino Co. sell more rap albums per person than any other county in america.

 

[geno]

<< genocide,as soon as MTV got a hold of it Rap lost it's soul >>


Go listen to anyone under the Rawkus label, and tell me there's no soul left. Listen to Guru and tell me there's no soul left. Listen to Common and tell me there's no soul in that. Like I said, 99% of the people here don't know what rap is because they've seen/heard nothing but what's on TV and you just helped prove that

 

[Linflas]

<< Forget how you feel about hip hop music for a moment. In fact, replace hip hop music with some other form of expression if you like - poetry, perhaps. >>


The whole point of this thread is not about whether or not rap is music or art rather whether it is any business of the government to regulate it. If I never heard another rap song or artist in my life I would be a happy man but irregardless of that personal bias the government has absolutely no business sticking their noses into rap and its lyrics and content anymore than they should be involved in computer game content.

 

[isildur]

Orwell depicted the ultimate totalitarian state. To speak of things Orwellian only implies that a particular action may be the first step on the slippery slope towards that type of society, not that we are anywhere close to it. If you do not believe the slippery slope is real just look at the amount of regulatory interference we accept in our daily lives that would have been unthinkable a generation or 2 previous. To me things like government threatening unspecified regulatory action against an industry is no different than a made guy coming into my place of business to sell me &quot;protection&quot;.

Indeed Orwell did - I can give credit to the &quot;slippery slope&quot; concept employed here, and I can agree with your application of it in principle. Of course, the title of this thread is &quot;Welcome to...,&quot; not, &quot;We're heading towards,&quot; thus my objection. What is proposed in the press release is not censorship, however, I agree that such labeling could then lead to censorship - i.e. you have catagorized the literature by gradations and may then institute censorial guidelines by those catagories.
However, I really don't think such a destination is likely to be in our future. Americans are more than willing to allow their civil liberties to be trampled, given that it either does not inconvenience them or that it increases their convenience. (The suspension of some civil liberties would/does/will result in safer, more stable communities, and that's all most people care about.) While many parents are more than willing to encourage censorship (many great literary works are still banned from high school reading lists/libraries) to &quot;safe guard&quot; their children, I just am not convinced that broad scale censorship of popular music would fly.

In truth, there are few people who are sincerely and totally opposed to censorship, regardless of their rhetoric. Viewpoint discrimination is a way of life in our country. Conservative schools disparage liberal writers and/or ban their books. Liberal schools disparage conservative writers and/or ban their material. The difference is perspective, not principle.

 

[Dean]

I get a serious kick out of people who revolve their real lives around types of music. This &quot;culture&quot; crap is for the birds, talk about being PROGRAMMED!!

All i can say is, once you hit your 30's, you'll look back at your younger days and say to yourself, &quot;What in the hell was i thinking?&quot;

 

[Stark]

I don't hate rap. The beastie boys are one of my favorite bands. Of course, they also play instruments and don't glorify hatred and violence.

The only reason black rappers are so big is because white record executives have decided to make them that way. They are marketing this stuff to kids to make big money. Most rap is cheap and easy to make. Take someone elses music, put lyrics about btches, killing, and livin large in whatever rhyming style in popular that week, mix with some paid airtime on radio and mtv and you have a hit.

Rap was big in the 80's, it went away, and now it's back. It will go away again.

 

[Stark]

<< the government has absolutely no business sticking their noses into rap and its lyrics and content anymore than they should be involved in computer game content. >>


The upcoming Final Fantasy movie and movies like Shrek are amazingly close to being video games. They're artistic. And they are subject to a rating system. If that is deemed acceptable, what's wrong with rating the soundtracks that accompany them?

 

[AndrewR]

Ok, someone answer this: If Congress imposed universal rating schemes for all music (or at least slapped restrictive ratings on certain albums -- I think the necessity of putting any rating on classical music is nonexistent), where is the problem? If you implicate the &quot;slippery slope&quot; problem, how do you explain the lack of a &quot;slippery slope&quot; problem with the movie industry, which has had ratings for years without any signs of more controlled regulation?

Sure, the hip hop industry would complain of discriminatory practices if they were singled out from all musical genres, and they would win a court battle on that point. However, if Congress does it to all, where is the problem? I fail to see any significant distinction between movies and music (other than the primary senses used).

 

[Linflas]

<< The upcoming Final Fantasy movie and movies like Shrek are amazingly close to being video games. They're artistic. And they are subject to a rating system. If that is deemed acceptable, what's wrong with rating the soundtracks that accompany them? >>


If done voluntarily by the producers nothing, if done in response to vague threats of government action then everything. Movie ratings are not based on law, they like the current TV ratings, were developed to stave off threats of government action against the studios. If a 17 year old views an R rated movie he is breaking no law nor is the movie theatre breaking any law. The movie theatre is most likely breaking a legal agreement they have made with the studios regarding the exhibition of the movie but that is a different matter entirely. To me it is no different than this board. There are rules we agreed to when signing up here. Posts are deleted, threads are locked, and people sometimes banned when they break these rules and I have no problem with that since we all agreed to these terms at the outset and don't own the servers hosting these boards. It would be another matter entirely if the government took any of those actions since it is prohibited by the Constitution.

 

[Stark]

How movie rating are decided:

HOW THE RATINGS ARE DECIDED

The ratings are decided by a full-time Rating Board located in Los Angeles. There are 8-13 members of the Board who serve for perods of varying length. They work for the Classification and Rating Administration, which is funded by fees charged to producers/distributors for the rating of their films. The MPAA President chooses the Chairman of the Rating Board, thereby insulating the Board from industry or other group pressure. No one in the movie industry has the authority or the power to push the Board in any direction or otherwise influence it. One of the highest accolades to be conferred on the rating system is that from its birth in 1968 to this hour, there has never been even the slightest jot of evidence that the rating system has ever deliberately fudged a decision or bowed to pressure. The Rating Board has always conducted itself at the highest level of integrity. That is a large, honorable, and valuable asset.

There are no special qualifications for Board membership, except the members must have a shared parenthood experience, must be possessed of an intelligent maturity, and most of all, have the capacity to put themselves in the role of most American parents so they can view a film and apply a rating that most parents would find suitable and helpful in aiding their decisions about their children's moviegoing.

No one is forced to submit a film to the Board for rating, but the vast majority of producers/distributors do in fact submit their films for ratings. Any producer/distributor who wants no part of any rating system is free to go to the market without any rating at all or with any description or symbol they choose as long as it is not confusingly similar to the G, PG, PG-13, R, and, NC-17. The ratin symbols are federally-registered certification marks of the MPAA and may not be self-applied.

MPAA

Well, that sounds to me like a good recipe for the music industry to avoid government interference. If they don't want to voluntarily set up such a system, the feds may have to.

 

[geno]

<< Rap was big in the 80's, it went away, and now it's back. It will go away again. >>


When did it go away? You might have stopped noticing it for a while - but hip hop has been very strong in the 90's

 

[djchemistry]

Regulating rap music is blatantly racist. Why hasn't congress done anything to legislate the satanic metaphors, suicidal scenarios, and animal ripping antics and lyrics of &quot;classic&quot; rock. Need I remind you that violence and murder in music is not a new topic. Also, these subjects have been covered in rap music since its NWA days (c. 1990). But Congress only concerns itself when these black artists start infiltrating white suburbia with the help of Eminem. Concerns about Gangsta rap have come up now and then, but no one still cared because white America was not becoming tainted by this black influence like it is now.

Rap was big in the 80's, it went away, and now it's back. It will go away again.

Actually, rap didn't go away. Pop artists just took it over for awhile (Vanilla Ice, MC Hammer, Kriss Kross). However, some of hiphop's best groups existed during this time, A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, Brand Nubian, EPMD, etc... I wish those poppy artists WOULD take over the mainstream aspect of rap so that the real artists could concentrate on what they're really about. As Snoop said in the early 90's, &quot;It's about staying true to what you do.&quot;

 

[Linflas]

<< Well, that sounds to me like a good recipe for the music industry to avoid government interference. If they don't want to voluntarily set up such a system, the feds may have to. >>


I think this is the only point we disagree on. I do not believe they have the legal authority to take such action without amending the Constitution. Since they do not have the authority they are in no position to be threatening such action. Until the spotlight was recently turned on this issue it was not a problem for a 16 year old to enter and view an R rated movie without being accompanied by an adult. When I was a kid we did it all the time. For the record I have never raped, pillaged, plundered, nor performed any such antisocial actions based on the sex and violence I viewed both on television or in the movies as an adolescent.

 

[dcane2000]

I think that I loathe rap as much as a person can. That doesn't mean that I agree with the government trying to regulate what I can and can not listen to. Frankly, that is somewhat frightening. Although I share part of Red Dawn's sentiment I still can't condone Big Brother.

 

[isildur]

For the record I have never raped, pillaged, plundered,

LOL

Regulating rap music is blatantly racist.

Wow, with dazzling rhetorical skills like this, you should be on Court TV!

Why hasn't congress done anything to legislate the satanic metaphors, suicidal scenarios, and animal ripping antics and lyrics of &quot;classic&quot; rock

Well, there were attempts to do just that and, if you hadn't noticed, NO ONE IS BUYING THESE RECORDS ANYMORE!

 

[PistachioByAzul]

Heh, I liked rap, but I see it for what it is, a fad.