Popular culture has in recent years become the new craze in town. The youth especially have no doubt been the most affected by rock ‘n’ roll culture as is commonly known and for a majority of reasons. The lyrics written and sang by the various artists as well as their videos depict high levels of irresponsibility, demeanor and ignorance that appeal to the youth by every means.
Perhaps one of the greatest insights into just how powerful music is was the scuffle at Gaiety Cinema, Manchester in Britain. According to the press, myriads of male teenagers tagged their girlfriends along dancing their way down the aisles went on on to find their way to the podium and turned fire hoses on to the manager as he tried to calm them down. After watching the film, they flocked the city streets causing commotion all over and turning the central business district into total chaos for all those caught unawares. As they traversed the densely populated town, they pounded a common rock ‘n’ roll rhythm of the time on buses and cars with their fists.(Moral Panic, page 228).This among other incidences all over the globe were the first warning signs of what the rock n’ roll culture would do to other innocent youth that would soon be enticed into joining their brothers and sisters.
The last few decades have seen a surge in drug and substance abuse, gang-related violence, sexual promiscuity and the occult. Inauguration of the Parent’s Music Resource Centre in 1985 was a particularly bold, sombre and sane move as it led to the Parental Advisory Warning labels on potentially harmful music and videos. Furthermore key distributors like Walmart refused to shelve stickered releases which beyond reasonable doubt affected sales of ‘explicit” content to the youth. Artistes now had to censor their material to get sales: another very wise move towards redeeming the already lost generation and their much younger siblings.
As for Action Bronson who in May 2015 was removed from the list of rappers meant to perform at the North by North East summer festival on grounds of producing music that promotes violent misogyny and glorifies gang raping and murder, everything that befell him was supposed to. The 2500 Torontonians who signed left an indelible mark, even literally, in world history for standing up against moral erosion in the name of pop culture and the entertainment industry. This is a sure way to confirm that censorship in the democratic society that now exists is possible and is a must.
Sluka in 1991 claimed pressure groups advocating for the New Right were well prepared to run anti-rock and pro-censorship campaigns in retaliation to mindless artistes, producers and script-writers whose points of view they were opposed to.(Moral Panics, page 232)
Pentagon together with local police helped protest against Body Count release forcing Time Warner’s Sire Records to change lyrics or find another label(Moral Panics, page 236).The title of the song is meant to encourage sexual promiscuity and depicts just what rappers were and still are willing to do for fame and the money at the expense of the youth. Although Ice T chose to change the label, it shows censorship in modern democracy has its place if only the fight is taken a notch higher and propelled by those in power.
The one thing about democracy is that your freedom begins where my rights end. As such crossing the line on any account and for whatever reason is an infringement of the very law democracy is built on. Citing freedom and the evolution of ideas as reason for instigating gang violence, drug and substance abuse, the occult and sexual promiscuity is a grave misunderstanding of the law. Everybody has their taste in music but music that fuels moral erosion is as bad as a rotten egg; it looks good ok on the outside but once you crack it open, there’s a whole new foul smell.
Pastor Fletcher Brothers of the ‘Rock deprogrammer’ abridged from Denselow put the icing on the cake by openly associating rock with all kinds of degenerate behavior including drug abuse, irresponsible abortion, criminal activities, sexual misconduct and devil-worship or the occult. He went on to further claim that this kind of music was unacceptable by all means and morality among the youth was at stake.(Moral Panics, page 232).The youth especially, with their ultra-modern devices, have access to vast contents of music that not only makes them vulnerable to slogans and verses sang there-in but also makes it easier to totally brainwash them into believing false ideologies and hogwash lifestyles. Such should be the driving force towards censoring explicit content. The more celebrities that come out promoting general public misconduct, the more reason censoring among other ‘filtration processes’ need to exist.
Otherwise this is a ticking time bomb that might be catastrophic to us all if not defused in time. More has to be done ensure the youth don’t get lost in delusional music and delinquent music. It rips the youth off the very freedom they yearn for daily. They become robots of sorts, only functioning at the behest of their idols that only promote drug use for five minutes on their videos and the average teen spends the whole night puffing and drinking having illicit unprotected sex. Sanity has to be restored one way or the other to the youth and censoring is a first step.
Metropolitan 