I’m not suggesting it’s related, but David Crosby tweeted yesterday that he’s looking for someone who can put him in contact with Swift. He says he badly wants to talk with her.
The First Amendment applies only to government abridgments of free speech; it has no application when a private business chooses to regulate speech on its platform (e.g., Twitter banning Donald Trump for violating its policies).
In that connection, Neil Young and those of us who agree with him concerning Spotify do not have the power to censor Joe Rogan. All we have is the power to boycott a private business that has policies with which we disagree … and that is as American as apple pie. See generally:
https://www.oah.org/tah/issues/2017/may/the-american-tradition-of-consumer-politics/
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I have listened to Rogan infrequently. In my experience, Rogan talks to people with varying ideas on wide ranging subjects. He does not proselytize or necessarily agree with his guests.
This not to defend Rogan; his contract with Spotify is widely reported at $200M and he can quit and disappear luxuriously anytime, thank you. And I don’t give a whit about him or any other celebrity.
But what has me typing these words is to express my utter frustration with the current popular idea that if someone disagrees with us,(we who know The Truth) they must be deleted, shut up, cancelled, ostracized, ruined, etc, etc.
If we look back over the course of this pandemic, many ideas that were the triggers for cancellation are now shown to be at least worthy of intelligent consideration if not newly accepted Truth.
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@RonP: If someone started spewing racist and anti-Semitic hate speech on the PS Audio Forum, Paul and/or Elk would delete the offending posts and ban the poster from further activity on the Forum. Is that censorship and ‘cancel culture’? In a sense, yes, but I would argue that such policing of the platform is necessary and proper for the greater good (not mention that it would be consistent with the published Forum rules).
As far as Joe Rogan, Spotify and the Covid-19 pandemic are concerned, here is the open letter from 270+/- members of the global scientific and medical communities, which I find compelling:
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If someone spewed racist or anti-Semitic speech on this forum, they should be banned. This is not the place.
But if you read racist or anti-Semitic remarks on this or any other forum, would you think those remarks might be worthy of your consideration? Could they change your mind?
Not sure what you are getting at … but for the record, no, I would not give racist or anti-Semitic remarks any consideration.
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I respectfully assert that you missed my point, with regard to trying to offer some perspective.
That’s OK, I respect your opinion and recognize and support one’s power to “vote” with their wallets in the literal marketplace as well as the marketplace of ideas.
Cheers.
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This would be delicious.
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Of course not, Bootzy. You’re an intelligent person. You got my point exactly.
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This is quite a conundrum. I have a young friend (not Neil, haha) who thinks we just don’t “get it” regarding Rogan - he’s just presenting ideas, in his opinion. (In partial response to Ron), I mentioned that I guess I have a lower opinion of the average Joe listener than he does. I suppose everyone has the right to be stupid (IMO). Though when that proud choice of ignore-ance results in the deaths of others, it’s another deal. It’s fine if they choose to die themselves, but they have a tendency to infect others. (“Well, in my defense, I was only intending to kill that one guy, but when I emptied my clip in that room full of people, there was…collateral damage, yer honor.”)
At any rate, it has me trying to come up with something in the way of an analogy.
Let’s say the Tic Tacs turn out to be malevolent, and start randomly killing (oh, let’s just say for the sake of argument) 2,400 Americans a day. Every day and a half, a 9/11 toll. I bet people would be upset. Clever scientists devise a treatment that causes you to be much less likely to be spotted by them or die from their death rays.
Someone famous recently paid a ton of money (you can’t leave out the money) chooses to give airtime to, in the name of free speech, folks who say, “Hey, the Tic Tacs are just culling humans, and no one can tell me I don’t have the right to be culled and take some others with me - to, in the words of the great Ebeneezer Scrooge, ‘decrease the surplus population’. Don’t believe the scientsts! The treatments cause XYZ Horrible Things” etc.
Maybe some of you can help refine this admittedly rough analogy🤠
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I just want people to do more good and cause less harm.
I know everyone has their own opinions of what “good” is and what “harm” is, and by degrees, but come on. We have a murder of crows who get paid a crap ton of money to spew things they KNOW are wrong and harmful and deadly, just because they make more money doing it. They don’t care.
Just makes me sick and sad.
Anyway, Qobuz is cool, right?
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Qobuz is Delicious! (the Elken Modifier) As is “murder of crows”. Ron’s going to call you out for using fancy words in a minute. I honestly don’t know what has happened to Free Speech in this country…
His people can easily contact her people without going through Twitter. He is posturing for some reason.
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One could argue that Neil and Joni are posturing as well, as my friend sort of inferred, but I don’t know any of them personally. Though I mentioned that they are from a long ago time before it was socially acceptable to “sell out”.
Your limerence for me is becoming ever more diaphanous.
Had to look that up:
" Limerence is a state of infatuation or obsession with another person that involves an all-consuming passion and intrusive thoughts.
“It is often a result of not being present either through trauma or certain childhood development issues,” explains psychosexual therapist Cate Mackenzie. “Alternatively, you may experience it when you are run down, if you haven’t had enough sleep for example, and are lacking serotonin.”
I am at 5.5 weeks with The 'Cron now, so I am feeling a bit run down.
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“It will be particularly intriguing if a musician with true firepower objects. Taylor Swift could end Joe Rogan with a single tweet.”
Maybe Taylor Swift should date Joe Rogan, break up with him, then write a song about him!
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Ha!! That was excellent!
It’s too bad this can’t be an open and uncensored discussion.
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I am not aware of any prior restraints on speech on the PS Audio Forum. Nor has there been censorship of any posts in this thread (at least, I am not aware of any). I say, ‘say what you want to say.’
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