Music Censorship

Music Censorship

Although is clearly states in the first amendment that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people to peaceably assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances," censorship in America still exists in a big way. "Music censorship is the term used to describe the act of editing, altering, or preventing the listener from hearing the music as the artist created it in order to either deny certain information or to act as a moral gatekeeper of potentially harmful material"

(http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~barndollar/courses/spring98/students/fabfive/index.html).

The Censorship of music in the United Stated is documented as far back as 1954, when "Michigan congresswoman Ruth Thompson introduces a bill in the House that would ban mailing of any pornographic recording, punishable by five years imprisonment and a $ 5,000 fine" (http://ericnuzum.com/banned/fifties.html). Even Elvis Aaron Presley, ‘The King of rock-n-roll’ was once thought of as obscene. In 1957, when he appeared on the Ed Sullivan show for the third time, the cameramen were told to only film him from the waist up. "Elvis’s dancing was considered lewd" (http://ericnuzum.com/banned/fifties.html).

In 1964, "Indiana Governor Matthew Welsh asks the State Broadcasters Association to ban the song ‘Louie, Louie’ by the Kingsmen because he considers it to be pornographic." (http://ericnuzum.com/banned/fifties.html). This trend has continued all the way up to the nineties, and I’m sure it won’t stop any time soon. In the past ten years especially, music has been under attack by many law makers, prosecutors and critics of morality and good taste. One attack on this freedom comes from parental advisory stickers. These stickers are used as a form of censorship against an artist and their lyrics. If a label will produce an album, I don’t think there should be any reason that the consumer can’t decide for him or herself if lyrics contained in the album are found obscene or otherwise unsuitable. In order to begin the debate on whether or not parental advisory stickers serve as a form of censorship, one must consider what the word censor implies. The word censor means "the power to suppress publications or excise any matter in them thought to be immoral, seditious or otherwise undesirables"(Webster Dictionary 227).

The question of what constitutes "proper" language and obscenity has been greatly forced upon the music industry.