Perfect art from imperfect artists

13

Comments

  • I don't see her blaming workers, but retailers. Read again what she wrote. Hell, I'll quote it:
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    It is the sellers of these goods that drive the moving goods offshore. It is their competition with each other and stockholders desires for increasing profits that are the main drivers of sending manufacturing offshore.
    Many poorer customers have no choice but to buy products made in China.

    There's nothing about workers in there at all, only capitalists and customers, and the customers are being given a bye.
  • mousethief wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    How much you mind doing that may well depend on a comboination of factors such as: are they evading justice on an ongoing basis, Do they appear to think what they did was fine, are they continuing to try to offend ?

    So what if they do/are? I’m not donating money to their cause, I’m purchasing goods they have produced.

    LOL ... Many of my fellow Americans rush to a store like WalMart to purchase cheap stuff made in China, and then express anger that too many of our manufacturing jobs have been exported to "China" ... (!!!) ... and they feel uneasy at the rapid rise of China as an economic/military power to rival the USA (which rise to power WE are financing through our shopping habits) ... What was that prescient remark about, "The Capitalists will sell us the rope we will use to hang them ..." ... ??? ... My/your/our use of $$$ is ALWAYS an ethical/moral decision ...
    It is the sellers of these goods that drive the moving goods offshore. It is their competition with each other and stockholders desires for increasing profits that are the main drivers of sending manufacturing offshore.
    Many poorer customers have no choice but to buy products made in China.

    Yes and No ... Within my lifetime it USED to be possible to make a living, support a family, with a relatively low-skill manufacturing job in America ...

    There were many more workers organized in labor unions back then ...

    But the Feudal Overlords somehow convinced the workers that lower prices were better for them than higher wages, so the spiral downward began in earnest ... and here we are today ...

    You appear to be saying the same thing lilBuddha did, just in different words.

    No ... (S)he blames the workers for making poor but necessary economic choices that keep them in poverty ... I see it as a relentless class war of attrition being slowly won by the Overlords ...

    ‘the fuck? I blamed business. It is the pursuit of profit that engenders the poverty
  • mousethief wrote: »
    I don't see her blaming workers, but retailers. Read again what she wrote. Hell, I'll quote it:
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    It is the sellers of these goods that drive the moving goods offshore. It is their competition with each other and stockholders desires for increasing profits that are the main drivers of sending manufacturing offshore.
    Many poorer customers have no choice but to buy products made in China.

    There's nothing about workers in there at all, only capitalists and customers, and the customers are being given a bye.

    In our American "consumer" economy the vast majority of "customers" are "workers" ... The MORE a worker is paid, the MORE $$$ (s)he has to spend ... Unfortunately, the Feudal Overlords have convinced very many American worker/consumers otherwise ...
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    mousethief wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    How much you mind doing that may well depend on a comboination of factors such as: are they evading justice on an ongoing basis, Do they appear to think what they did was fine, are they continuing to try to offend ?

    So what if they do/are? I’m not donating money to their cause, I’m purchasing goods they have produced.

    LOL ... Many of my fellow Americans rush to a store like WalMart to purchase cheap stuff made in China, and then express anger that too many of our manufacturing jobs have been exported to "China" ... (!!!) ... and they feel uneasy at the rapid rise of China as an economic/military power to rival the USA (which rise to power WE are financing through our shopping habits) ... What was that prescient remark about, "The Capitalists will sell us the rope we will use to hang them ..." ... ??? ... My/your/our use of $$$ is ALWAYS an ethical/moral decision ...
    It is the sellers of these goods that drive the moving goods offshore. It is their competition with each other and stockholders desires for increasing profits that are the main drivers of sending manufacturing offshore.
    Many poorer customers have no choice but to buy products made in China.

    Yes and No ... Within my lifetime it USED to be possible to make a living, support a family, with a relatively low-skill manufacturing job in America ...

    There were many more workers organized in labor unions back then ...

    But the Feudal Overlords somehow convinced the workers that lower prices were better for them than higher wages, so the spiral downward began in earnest ... and here we are today ...

    You appear to be saying the same thing lilBuddha did, just in different words.

    No ... (S)he blames the workers for making poor but necessary economic choices that keep them in poverty ... I see it as a relentless class war of attrition being slowly won by the Overlords ...

    ‘the fuck? I blamed business. It is the pursuit of profit that engenders the poverty

    Ah ...
  • I was once employed by a friend whose business did not pursue profit. It did not end well.
  • I was once employed by a friend whose business did not pursue profit. It did not end well.

    "The LOVE of money is a root of all kinds of evil ... " -- environmental degradation, wage slavery, forced child labor, wage theft, etc. ...
  • I was once employed by a friend whose business did not pursue profit. It did not end well.

    "The LOVE of money is a root of all kinds of evil ... " -- environmental degradation, wage slavery, forced child labor, wage theft, etc. ...

    In this particular case, the absence of the pursuit led to bankruptcy, the loss of my friend's house and marriage*, and him owing me two months wages. A business has to make a profit or it goes under.

    *there were other factors at play in the loss of the marriage, but losing the family home while sitting in a pub didn't help.
  • I was once employed by a friend whose business did not pursue profit. It did not end well.
    If you follow the conversation, it is obvious that this is not about businesses making a profit, but about the pursuit of profit beyond keeping a business viable.

  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    I was once employed by a friend whose business did not pursue profit. It did not end well.
    If you follow the conversation, it is obvious that this is not about businesses making a profit, but about the pursuit of profit beyond keeping a business viable.

    It's the same thing. Companies have to react to or preempt what their competitors do to stay competitive.

    Now you could argue from a strictly nationalist or selfish viewpoint that companies outsourcing their production overseas is a bad thing because it takes jobs away from those who consume its products, but that's a limited viewpoint. A broader viewpoint says that outsourcing production to, for example, China, has lifted millions of Chinese people out of poverty and boosted the Chinese economy while producing consumer goods at much lower prices for the west.

    Now you might think that's a bad thing, but before you condemn it you might want to check where your possessions were made.
  • Now you might think that's a bad thing, but before you condemn it you might want to check where your possessions were made.

    The tu quoque argument here doesn't bite. If you can't buy a kettle that was purchased anywhere but China, or can't afford to buy a kettle that wasn't made in China, then having a Chinese-made kettle says nothing about your character and sure as hell doesn't negate any argument you make about the offshoring of jobs. In short, it's irrelevant.
  • mousethief wrote: »
    Now you might think that's a bad thing, but before you condemn it you might want to check where your possessions were made.

    The tu quoque argument here doesn't bite. If you can't buy a kettle that was purchased anywhere but China, or can't afford to buy a kettle that wasn't made in China, then having a Chinese-made kettle says nothing about your character and sure as hell doesn't negate any argument you make about the offshoring of jobs. In short, it's irrelevant.

    I'm not arguing that it says anything about a person's character. I'm saying that it tells you how the world is. And my point is that it isn't a bad thing unless you prioritise jobs for one group of people over jobs for another group of people.
  • I was once employed by a friend whose business did not pursue profit. It did not end well.

    "The LOVE of money is a root of all kinds of evil ... " -- environmental degradation, wage slavery, forced child labor, wage theft, etc. ...

    In this particular case, the absence of the pursuit led to bankruptcy, the loss of my friend's house and marriage*, and him owing me two months wages. A business has to make a profit or it goes under.

    No, it just has to not make a loss. There are plenty of companies limited by guarantee that operate on this basis.
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    I was once employed by a friend whose business did not pursue profit. It did not end well.
    If you follow the conversation, it is obvious that this is not about businesses making a profit, but about the pursuit of profit beyond keeping a business viable.

    It's the same thing. Companies have to react to or preempt what their competitors do to stay competitive.
    Companies just have to cover their expenses and pay the owners enough to live. Plenty of businesses do this without seeking to maximise profit and/or increase it. The world would survive just fine if every company took this model. Instead, the seek to maximise and grow their profits and adding investors only makes this worse.
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    Companies just have to cover their expenses and pay the owners enough to live. Plenty of businesses do this without seeking to maximise profit and/or increase it. The world would survive just fine if every company took this model. Instead, the seek to maximise and grow their profits and adding investors only makes this worse.

    I don't see any moral objection to companies paying their owners enough to get extremely wealthy, so long as they pay their taxes. After all, if I or one of the many other writers on the ship were to produce a bestseller that earned them millions in royalties and a big fat movie deal I don't think any of us would be desperately unhappy about it.

    What you're advocating, or appear to be, is something like the societies proposed by some of the collectivist groups that appeared during and after the English Civil War and which were crushed by Cromwell. I admit to a certain fondness for The Levellers (not the band) but am sane enough to know that it wasn't practical.

    And no, most emphatically the world would not survive just fine in the model you're proposing because a nation of small business simply wouldn't have the means for big projects like building railways, international commerce, advances in medicine, science, agriculture, and technology. They require speculative capital and for people to risk their capital there must be a reward.
  • I was once employed by a friend whose business did not pursue profit. It did not end well.

    "The LOVE of money is a root of all kinds of evil ... " -- environmental degradation, wage slavery, forced child labor, wage theft, etc. ...

    In this particular case, the absence of the pursuit led to bankruptcy, the loss of my friend's house and marriage*, and him owing me two months wages. A business has to make a profit or it goes under.

    *there were other factors at play in the loss of the marriage, but losing the family home while sitting in a pub didn't help.

    Yes ... And some families and even entire communities are torn asunder by greed pursued far beyond any reasonable need to make a decent living, yes ... ??? ... MANY families in America -- and entire communities -- are ripped apart by corporate avarice ... CEOs earning $10,000/hr., and then receiving multi-million$$$ bonuses for suppressing worker wages and benefits ... THAT is where the LOVE of $$$ destroys ...
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    Companies just have to cover their expenses and pay the owners enough to live. Plenty of businesses do this without seeking to maximise profit and/or increase it. The world would survive just fine if every company took this model. Instead, the seek to maximise and grow their profits and adding investors only makes this worse.

    I don't see any moral objection to companies paying their owners enough to get extremely wealthy, so long as they pay their taxes. After all, if I or one of the many other writers on the ship were to produce a bestseller that earned them millions in royalties and a big fat movie deal I don't think any of us would be desperately unhappy about it.

    What you're advocating, or appear to be, is something like the societies proposed by some of the collectivist groups that appeared during and after the English Civil War and which were crushed by Cromwell. I admit to a certain fondness for The Levellers (not the band) but am sane enough to know that it wasn't practical.

    And no, most emphatically the world would not survive just fine in the model you're proposing because a nation of small business simply wouldn't have the means for big projects like building railways, international commerce, advances in medicine, science, agriculture, and technology. They require speculative capital and for people to risk their capital there must be a reward.

    MANY of the large Capital investment projects you list above are for the benefit of the entire community, and so not uncommonly are funded BY the entire community -- through taxes, issuing bonds, etc. ... RATHER than by Robber*Barons ...
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    Companies just have to cover their expenses and pay the owners enough to live. Plenty of businesses do this without seeking to maximise profit and/or increase it. The world would survive just fine if every company took this model. Instead, the seek to maximise and grow their profits and adding investors only makes this worse.

    I don't see any moral objection to companies paying their owners enough to get extremely wealthy, so long as they pay their taxes. After all, if I or one of the many other writers on the ship were to produce a bestseller that earned them millions in royalties and a big fat movie deal I don't think any of us would be desperately unhappy about it.

    What you're advocating, or appear to be, is something like the societies proposed by some of the collectivist groups that appeared during and after the English Civil War and which were crushed by Cromwell. I admit to a certain fondness for The Levellers (not the band) but am sane enough to know that it wasn't practical.
    No. I'm not talking about limiting profit, just the differnce between the level of greed that creates inequities.
    And no, most emphatically the world would not survive just fine in the model you're proposing because a nation of small business simply wouldn't have the means for big projects like building railways, international commerce, advances in medicine, science, agriculture, and technology. They require speculative capital and for people to risk their capital there must be a reward.
    This is not correct. The government can handle large infrastructure projects, in most places they are involved to a significant degree anyway. And again, reward for risk si not the issue, but the focus on increasing that reward.


  • MANY of the large Capital investment projects you list above are for the benefit of the entire community, and so not uncommonly are funded BY the entire community -- through taxes, issuing bonds, etc. ... RATHER than by Robber*Barons ...

    The railways were built by private enterprise. International trade was founded by private enterprise. Telecommunications was created by private enterprise. Advances in technology were funded by private enterprise. And so on. The world as it is today was built by private enterprise with occasional government intervention, such as the US Interstate system.

    Yes, capitalism needs checks, but it doesn't need replacing.

  • MANY of the large Capital investment projects you list above are for the benefit of the entire community, and so not uncommonly are funded BY the entire community -- through taxes, issuing bonds, etc. ... RATHER than by Robber*Barons ...

    The railways were built by private enterprise. International trade was founded by private enterprise. Telecommunications was created by private enterprise. Advances in technology were funded by private enterprise. And so on. The world as it is today was built by private enterprise with occasional government intervention, such as the US Interstate system.

    Yes, capitalism needs checks, but it doesn't need replacing.

    The railways in America were built with massive government subsidies, not least including the *FREE* land they "own" ...

    Capitalism has become such a huge burden on The People in great part because it has become an "-ism" that is protected as if it is "The Truth" ... and so is ever harder to *check* ... (see, e.g.: "WalMart" ... the American Gun Industry ... Big Pharma ... etc. ...)

    Both Capital-ism and Marx-ism fail over time because both share an unrealistic notion of human nature ...

  • MANY of the large Capital investment projects you list above are for the benefit of the entire community, and so not uncommonly are funded BY the entire community -- through taxes, issuing bonds, etc. ... RATHER than by Robber*Barons ...

    The railways were built by private enterprise. International trade was founded by private enterprise. Telecommunications was created by private enterprise. Advances in technology were funded by private enterprise. And so on. The world as it is today was built by private enterprise with occasional government intervention, such as the US Interstate system.

    Yes, capitalism needs checks, but it doesn't need replacing.

    It's honestly a far more mixed picture than this, and you're glossing an awful lot of government intervention, university research and international collaboration.

    Longitude, penicillin, the structure of the atom, the internet, the web, space travel - even the railways were individually created by Act of Parliament. The world as it is today is built largely by public investment, with private enterprise exploiting and monetising the value given to it for nothing.
  • KwesiKwesi Shipmate
    Colin Smith: Yes, capitalism needs checks, but it doesn't need replacing.

    Doc Tor: It's honestly a far more mixed picture than this, and you're glossing an awful lot of government intervention, university research and international collaboration.

    IMO, as a supporter of the mixed economy, the problem lies in deciding what is best done collectively and what is best done by capitalist enterprises. The British state made a hash of trying to run British Leyland, for example, and private companies have proved hopeless and worse (corrupt?) in relation to their contractual roles in servicing the government's response to the Covid-19 crisis. More widely, I think capitalism does need replacing, but in the absence of a credible alternative we're pragmatically stuck with it. I agree that capitalism 'needs checks', but the role of corporate interest in corrupting the democratic political processes in a large number of states is making the necessary regulation increasingly difficult achieve.
  • HugalHugal Shipmate
    I kind of agree with Lilbudah. Too many big business are about making excessive profits. There are some who invest in research etc and some who put the cash in off shore accounts. Businesses need to make profit to survive. They also need to spend money to keep the economy going.
  • Kwesi wrote: »
    Colin Smith: Yes, capitalism needs checks, but it doesn't need replacing.

    Doc Tor: It's honestly a far more mixed picture than this, and you're glossing an awful lot of government intervention, university research and international collaboration.

    IMO, as a supporter of the mixed economy, the problem lies in deciding what is best done collectively and what is best done by capitalist enterprises.

    For the avoidance of doubt, this is also the socialist position. The idea that everything is owned or run by the state is not a socialist idea.
  • Doc Tor wrote: »
    Kwesi wrote: »
    Colin Smith: Yes, capitalism needs checks, but it doesn't need replacing.

    Doc Tor: It's honestly a far more mixed picture than this, and you're glossing an awful lot of government intervention, university research and international collaboration.

    IMO, as a supporter of the mixed economy, the problem lies in deciding what is best done collectively and what is best done by capitalist enterprises.

    For the avoidance of doubt, this is also the socialist position. The idea that everything is owned or run by the state is not a socialist idea.

    Capitalist enterprises vs nationalisation is a false dichotomy. There is plenty of scope for mutual societies and workers' co-operatives that is under-developed in many western countries. Part of the problem is that it's very easy for a mutual to become a capitalist enterprise but very hard to reverse the process. Another is that the law isn't really set up to support co-operative enterprises so they have to squeeze themselves into existing structures.
  • EnochEnoch Shipmate
    Doc Tor wrote: »
    It's honestly a far more mixed picture than this, and you're glossing an awful lot of government intervention, university research and international collaboration.

    Longitude, penicillin, the structure of the atom, the internet, the web, space travel - even the railways were individually created by Act of Parliament. The world as it is today is built largely by public investment, with private enterprise exploiting and monetising the value given to it for nothing.
    Up to a point Lord @Doc Tor. I'd agree with you that it's a more mixed picture. However, I'm afraid the examples you've chosen don't support your argument.

    First, penicillin, the structure of the atom, the internet, the web and space travel weren't created by Act of Parliament.

    Second, the reason why the railways were, isn't anything to do with government being involved in their creation. It's first that without a private Act of Parliament, a nineteenth century railway was automatically a public nuisance. The promoters and company would be perpetually liable to all those affected, irrespective of negligence. Second they needed compulsory powers to be able to buy the land for their tracks off recalcitrant landowners. And third, they needed a number of extra statutory powers to run a railway which there was no other way of getting.

    Until the First World War, it was very unusual for government or UK parastatals to seek or be given the power of compulsory purchase. Prior to then, private entities given statutory CPO powers had to pay an extra proportionate uplift, seen as compensation for the landowner for having his or her property taken irrespective of their wishes. It was only when the government started needing to buy land for various reasons to do with the war effort that the politicians changed the rules and dropped the CPO price to the ordinary land value.

  • Doc TorDoc Tor Admin
    edited August 2020
    Enoch wrote: »
    First, penicillin, the structure of the atom, the internet, the web and space travel weren't created by Act of Parliament.

    Pretty certain a hyphen is even more obvious than an Oxford comma. But you do you.
    Second, the reason why the railways were, isn't anything to do with government being involved in their creation. It's first that without a private Act of Parliament, a nineteenth century railway was automatically a public nuisance. The promoters and company would be perpetually liable to all those affected, irrespective of negligence. Second they needed compulsory powers to be able to buy the land for their tracks off recalcitrant landowners. And third, they needed a number of extra statutory powers to run a railway which there was no other way of getting.

    Until the First World War, it was very unusual for government or UK parastatals to seek or be given the power of compulsory purchase. Prior to then, private entities given statutory CPO powers had to pay an extra proportionate uplift, seen as compensation for the landowner for having his or her property taken irrespective of their wishes. It was only when the government started needing to buy land for various reasons to do with the war effort that the politicians changed the rules and dropped the CPO price to the ordinary land value.

    Given all that, why do you not think that the state had something to do with setting up railways? Because it strikes me you've taken two long paragraphs to state what I had in less than half a sentence.
  • EnochEnoch Shipmate
    Doc Tor wrote: »
    Given all that, why do you not think that the state had something to do with setting up railways? Because it strikes me you've taken two long paragraphs to state what I had in less than half a sentence.
    You gave me the strong impression that you were arguing that because the railways were constructed with the backing of private Acts of Parliament, that the state was in some way dynamically involved in commissioning them as some sort of public/private partnership.

    You may not have intended that but re-reading your post that I was commenting on, I'm still getting that impression.


  • The railways would not have been possible without parliamentary support and primary legislation. I leave it to the reader to decide whether this constituted being "dynamically involved in commissioning them as some sort of public/private partnership".
  • KwesiKwesi Shipmate
    I seem to recall that legislation relating to the development of the railways were the subject of Private rather than Public statutes, i.e. they were sought by private interests rather than being a product of government policy, and as such followed a legislative process different from public bills, which mostly involved bargains between the interests involved e.g. the railway companies, often backed by industrialists, coal producers and cotton manufacturers, for example, and landowners. The concept of public-private partnership doesn't really fit the bill!
  • Is it just me, or have we moved a long way from the OP and the question of what to do with art from less than perfect artists?
  • the example of medical research, especially drug research, is a very good one in the opposite direction. State funded, it could look at where the greatest public good and/or need lay, and address that. As it is, it's a matter of looking at the largest market and the most profitable patients, even if they may not be the largest group.

    In that case the person whose skills are at the centre has their attention directed by the party funding their efforts. Does that make the scientist evil or imperfect? What is a perfect scientist? By the same question, what is a perfect artist? Does the perfection merely have to be in personal morality, or is it in relation to the way in which their talent has been deployed?
  • KwesiKwesi Shipmate
    Nick TamenIs it just me, or have we moved a long way from the OP and the question of what to do with art from less than perfect artists?.

    No you are not! When I wrote my last post I was trying to figure out how the topic had me posting about the the origins of the British railway system and public-private partnerships. Help!...............
  • Doc Tor wrote: »
    The railways would not have been possible without parliamentary support and primary legislation. I leave it to the reader to decide whether this constituted being "dynamically involved in commissioning them as some sort of public/private partnership".

    I think there's a qualitative difference though between what happened in places where governments exercised sane control over the railways from the start - right down to planning where they should go, and what happened in Britain where it was more a case of "if you can persuade people to put the money up you can have an Act of Parliament" - which led to a British rail network where the government until WW1 could really not have been more hands off. Route duplication, bankruptcies, the lot.

    Obviously the period of Railway Mania and the antics of George Hudson was particularly egregious in terms of government "led" (ignored might be better) "do what you want if you can raise the money, here's your Act", but at the turn of the century the totally needless (albeit beautiful) duplicationary Great Central line was only just opening, Lynton was being joined with the main line at Barnstaple at a gauge of 1 foot 11.5 inches because it was cheaper, and some lunatics had just raised the money to build an entirely pointless (and permanently loss making) branch line from Thaxted to Elsenham.

    Whilst it is technically true that without government support there would be no British railway network, it's qualitatively different to virtually any other example of industrial support (I agree with the rest of your list). As a railway historian, I could wish the British government had been more involved frankly.
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    The person is not part of plumbing in the way that the person is very much part of a career in entertainment. And it is not about being allowed or not, that is a strawman.

    If I understand what you mean, you mean that the plumbing that a plumber does doesn't retain any of their character or attributes - plumbing done by a nice plumber looks the same as plumbing done by a nasty plumber.

    Whereas an actor, singer, or other entertainer is the product.

    If that's what you mean, then I think I agree, and also think that Mr. Haas is far more like the plumber than the singer or actor in relation to his work.
    I would not hire a plumper who had engaged in sexual misconduct either. The thing is, one would be unlikely to know. With a performer, one often does.

    What's a "plumper"??! That sounds very R-rated. I don't think I'd hire a plumper, either. Unless she's really attractive and is primarily interested in plumping my pillows.
  • According to the Urban Dictionary, a plumper is
    a fat yet very alluring female woman. Curvy. Plumper than the average lady (hence the name), but nonetheless very attractive.

    (This was probably the most G-rated of the various definitions given)
  • Seeing as the thread has resurfaced, and without naming those who deserve to be forgotten, I wonder if there is an added imperative to avoiding the works of abusers not based simply on moral disapproval but on potential injury to survivors. I can't imagine the impact on a survivor of clerical abuse who, despite everything, manages to attend Mass only to find their abuser's work and name right in front of them when the first hymn is announced. Even for survivors of other abusers it must contribute to the sense that the Church does not take the situation seriously.
  • KwesiKwesi Shipmate
    A Plumper at one time referred to a voter in a constituency that returned two MPs and each elector had two votes but could only place a single vote on any individual. Thus, if an elector had a strong preference for one candidate rather than effectively voting against him/her with a second choice he/she would simply use one of his/her votes, known as 'plumping' i.e. be a plumper. A party might put up only one candidate in such a constituency, encouraging its supporters to use only one of their votes and hope that a less partisan backer of another party might give that candidate their second vote- that was how Labour broke through in Dundee, for example.
  • CrœsosCrœsos Shipmate
    Seeing as the thread has resurfaced, and without naming those who deserve to be forgotten, I wonder if there is an added imperative to avoiding the works of abusers not based simply on moral disapproval but on potential injury to survivors.

    This can get complicated since a lot of art is a collective effort. For example, if a director or a lead actor in a film is abusive, some of their victims are likely people who also worked on the film. Do they get erased too?
  • Having read this thread in its entirety, I find myself wanting to make a few comments.

    Mention has been made of Gary Glitter and Lostprophets. You could also add in Jonathan King. We don't hear their music on the radio anymore and I would probably say "That's right!" But the reality is that this impacts more than the named artists/offenders. All the members of the Glitter Band (as one example) have lost potentially significant amounts of royalties (someone who played on Wizzard's Christmas hit described the regular royalties from this as his pension plan) . So a "simple" boycott is often not so simple after all. On balance, I'm still in favour of boycotting the music, but I do have sympathy for the innocent parties.

    The matter is slightly different for writers of worship songs, as there are usually no other innocent parties affected, so a boycott is perhaps easier to enforce. But that still leave the question of how far one should go. I can, for example, refuse to have those songs sung at the church. But should we campaign for the songs to be removed from all future hymn books?

    Another question I would want to ask is how far one should go in this kind of action. Is it simply for people who have committed heinous actions against children? What about other actions that might cause deep offence? Let me raise the example of Larry Norman. He was immensely popular and influential (and I had a number of his albums as a teenager) and yet the more I found about him, the less I liked. It wasn't just that he had had an affair with his best friend's wife and broken up their marriage; I became aware of some decidedly dubious business practices which greatly disadvantaged bands signed to "his" label and then it was revealed that he had had a child by an Australian woman - a child that he never acknowledged. All in all, I think he was a jerk. Quite when he became a jerk, I don't know. Was he always one or was it a gradual process, possibly caused by the unnatural Christian superstardom showered upon him? Does what we know of his life now mean that his music should be avoided?

    (I must admit I stopped listening to his music after a particularly disastrous appearance at the Greenbelt Festival (I think it was 1980). He was the headline performer and spent most of the first half of his gig rambling on about his particular theories and prejudices. In all that time, I think he performed one song. I was one of hundreds of people who walked out in the middle of the gig. I don't think that I have listened to any of his music since then.)
  • Norman was a jerk pretty much from the get-go. There is an interesting and informative bio that was published in the last couple of years that lays it out. Strangely the author did not interview Stonehill. Can't imagine why.
  • Quite apart from anything else it is hard to forgive him for the emotional blackmail of "I wish we'd all been ready".
  • I'm willing to forgive that in consideration of Nightmare #71.
  • RussRuss Shipmate
    On balance, I'm still in favour of boycotting the music, but I do have sympathy for the innocent parties.

    Dissociating yourself from the guilty is more important to you than not punishing the innocent ?
    Is this some kind of weird “thou shalt not touch or in any way engage with anything unclean, lest you also become unclean” purity thing?

    I don't think it's weird, but you're right - it definitely is a purity thing.

    Which is in essence a moral intuition - if you don't have that intuition then it will make no sense to you.

    If you do have that intuition, then no amount of argument is going to convince you that this is an aspect of the situation that you should just ignore. Although you may weigh it up against considerations based on your other intuitions.
  • KwesiKwesi Shipmate
    Apologies if this point has already been made, but ISTM that with the passage of time even the most egregious moral failings of artists are increasingly discounted when measured against the greatness of their genius. The evil which men do does not invariably live after them and the good interred with their bones.
  • CrœsosCrœsos Shipmate
    Kwesi wrote: »
    Apologies if this point has already been made, but ISTM that with the passage of time even the most egregious moral failings of artists are increasingly discounted when measured against the greatness of their genius. The evil which men do does not invariably live after them and the good interred with their bones.

    I think that this can largely be attributed to the fact that it's impossible to influence artists who are already dead. Nothing done today will convince Walt Disney (the person, not the corporation) to engage in fairer labor practices. To the extent boycotting is supposed to change things for the better, that window has been closed in the case of artists who are dead or retired.
  • Russ wrote: »
    Dissociating yourself from the guilty is more important to you than not punishing the innocent ?

    The point is that there seems to be no clear course of action that doesn't have unfortunate consequences.

    To take Glitter as an example:

    Option A
    Support the boycott Gary Glitter's music on the radio because of what he did. Consequence - the musicians involved in producing that music don't get royalties that could mean a lot to them.

    Option B
    Carry on having Glitter's music on the radio. Consequence - Glitter still earns money from something that led directly to his abuse of vulnerable children. It will also cause huge offence to the families and friends of those who were abused.

    What would you do?

    For myself, I am happy to not hear Glitter on the radio and that the (far too many) 1970s compilation CDs I own don't have any of his hits on them. But I recognise that this adversely impacts the musicians.

    (Not long after coming to Canada, I was wandering round a store and I heard a piece of music in the background. Initially, I thought "I haven't heard this in years." It took me a few seconds to work out why - it was "Everyone's Gone To The Moon" by Jonathan King - which again never gets played in the UK these days).
  • stetsonstetson Shipmate
    @Rufus T Firefly

    The reply to your Option A conundrum would be that the fortunes of any given performer ebb and flow all the time as a matter of course.

    Okay, so a bunch of people stop listening to Glitter because he's now a convicted sex-offendor, and a few innocent studio musicians lose their "pension plan". Too bad for them, but the same thing happened to the musicians who worked with the Bee Gees in the 1970s, after everyone in the 80s decided that disco sucked.

    Those musicians all signed contracts that guaranteed them a percentage of royalties till they die. I'm sure none of them were promised that those royalties would amount to a certain dollar amount in raw numbers.

    That said, I personally don't join in those sort of retroactive boycotts, for reasons I won't get into now. But the financial fate of the studio musicians and technicians is pretty much at the bottom of my list of concerns.
  • CrœsosCrœsos Shipmate
    The point is that there seems to be no clear course of action that doesn't have unfortunate consequences.

    To take Glitter as an example:

    Option A
    Support the boycott Gary Glitter's music on the radio because of what he did. Consequence - the musicians involved in producing that music don't get royalties that could mean a lot to them.

    Option B
    Carry on having Glitter's music on the radio. Consequence - Glitter still earns money from something that led directly to his abuse of vulnerable children. It will also cause huge offence to the families and friends of those who were abused.

    What would you do?

    For myself, I am happy to not hear Glitter on the radio and that the (far too many) 1970s compilation CDs I own don't have any of his hits on them. But I recognise that this adversely impacts the musicians.

    Well, it adversely impacts some musicians and positively affects others. It's not like radio stations are deciding between playing a Gary Glitter song and 2-3 minutes of dead air, they're choosing between playing Glitter and playing some other musician(s) who have not been publicly identified as sex offender(s).
  • This particular case, the band that backed Gary Glitter were a band before they started working with him and continued as musicians without -link. One played for XTC and the Stranglers, others tour in their own bands.
  • stetsonstetson Shipmate
    (Not long after coming to Canada, I was wandering round a store and I heard a piece of music in the background. Initially, I thought "I haven't heard this in years." It took me a few seconds to work out why - it was "Everyone's Gone To The Moon" by Jonathan King - which again never gets played in the UK these days).

    Except for EGTTM, which turned up on the radio with relative frequency, I don't think Jonathan King was very well known in Canada, and even that one song probably just got his name recognized as a one-hit wonder.

    But I do remember an interview he did with a government-produced magazine in Alberta, early 80s some time. The purpose of the magazine was to keep kids away from drugs, and King was billed as a Rock Star Who Hates Drugs.

    In the interview, which like much else in the magazine was subtly slanted against drug use, King dumped on North American youth culture, saying it was more conformist than what you'd see in the UK. Not sure if he presented any evidence that that has translated into a lower rate of drug-use.

    He must have had some connection with the people running the publication, because he turned up at least one other time, with an interview promoting Australia.

    Other than that, the guy didn't seem to have much of a profile in Canada. I was still living there through the duration of his first abuse scandal in the early 2000s, and it wasn't a big deal. Gary Glitter around the same time caused more of a stir, maybe because his Rock And Roll Part II song was well-known to sports fans.

  • RussRuss Shipmate
    Glitter still earns money from something that led directly to his abuse of vulnerable children. It will also cause huge offence to the families and friends of those who were abused.

    I question the "led directly". Being a performer does not lead anyone to commit crimes. (You might argue that the cult of celebrity is a bad thing because it can lead "celebrities" to think they're above right and wrong, but that's a bit different. )

    Why not say that he was born in Banbury and his upbringing there led directly to his crimes, so we should all boycott Banbury and treat with suspicion anyone from there ?

    Why are you tainted by his crime if you listen to a tune that he wrote but not by living in the place that he lived ?

    I also question the idea that if person A commits a wrong against person B then B has the right to be mortally offended if anyone else treats A as a whole person - a person with talents and weaknesses, who has done good things and bad. Justice is that he should pay the price for the bad and receive the recognition for the good. And responded to as an ordinary human being for all the in-between.

    It's human to want to dissociate oneself from evil. But that doesn't mean that every act that is driven by that want is rational or just.
Sign In or Register to comment.