Spotify Removes R. Kelly From Playlists: Will LGBTQ Hate Content & Conduct Be Removed Too?
R. Kelly has had Rumors and allegations for years about his sexual misconduct but now that the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements are gaining momentum the music industry is starting to take notice. Subscription-based music streamer Spotify said today the R&B star’s songs no longer will be featured on its playlists.
The move comes as Spotify puts into place its new ‘œpublic hate content and hateful conduct policy,’ in which the company reserves the right to remove ‘œcontent that expressly and principally promotes, advocates, or incites hatred or violence against a group or individual based on characteristics, including, race, religion, gender identity, sex, ethnicity, nationality, sexual orientation, veteran status, or disability.’ Read its full policy statement below.
Spotify now says it will make decisions on the matter in consultation with groups of experts, including The Southern Poverty Law Center, The Anti-Defamation League, Color Of Change, Showing Up for Racial Justice, GLAAD, Muslim Advocates, and the International Network Against Cyber Hate. It will be interesting to see in upcoming months if Spotify will de-playlist some of the anti-LGBTQ artists in terms of conduct or lyrics.
Here are a few of the questions on a community.spotify.com post where you can vote for certain questions or ideas:
R. Kelly was recently known for partnering with Lady Gaga who is a strong advocate for the #MeToo movement and has worked with recovering artists such as Kesha. Some of the Lyrics in the song (giving consent) are:
“You can’t have my heart and you won’t use my mind but
Do what you want with my body
Do what you want with my body”
The Lady Gaga duet may not be removed from Spotify but how far will they go with what some are calling music censorship:
“I could understand if it’s in the lyrics such as racist, abusive, violent, or homophobic slurs but the man has not been convicted. At what point do we start taking down everyones music and where do we draw the line??” Stacy Wright from Houston, Texas.
50 Cent has jumped to the defense of R. Kelly and XXXTentacion following the removal of their music from Spotify’s curated playlists. The streaming site announced on Thursday that they have removed the musicians’ tracks from all editorial or algorithmic playlists including Rap Caviar, Discover Weekly or New Music Friday following a hate content and hateful conduct policy. Their music is still available to stream on the platform.
50 Cent has some opinions on Spotify’s decision and took to Twitter to express them. On Thursday he tweeted, “Spotify is wrong for what there doing to artist like R Kelly and xxxtentacion. There not even convicted of any thing.”
R Kelly is facing numerous recent allegations of sexual misconduct including relations with underage girls, assault and being the leader of a so-called ‘œsex cult.’ A #MuteRKelly campaign has been gaining momentum with such A-listers as Shonda Rhimes, Ava DuVernay and Viola Davis. Last week Lifetime announced a movie and documentary series focusing on his history of alleged sexual abuse.
Since breaking out in the early 1990s, Kelly has amassed 14 top 10 albums, including six No. 1s. He also has scored two No. 1 pop singles amid 10 that reached the top 10, though none since 2003. He also has three Grammy Awards ‘” all for the song ‘œI Believe I Can Fly,’ which is from the 1996 movie Space Jam.
Here is Spotify’s statement announcing its new policy:
We have tens of millions of tracks on Spotify, growing by approximately 20,000 recordings a day. Nothing makes us more excited than discovering and sharing that music. One of the most amazing things about all that music is the range of genres, cultures, experiences, and stories embodied in it. We love that our platform is home to so much diversity because we believe in openness, tolerance, respect, and freedom of expression, and we want to promote those values through music on our platform.
However, we do not tolerate hate content on Spotify ‘“ content that expressly and principally promotes, advocates, or incites hatred or violence against a group or individual based on characteristics, including, race, religion, gender identity, sex, ethnicity, nationality, sexual orientation, veteran status, or disability.
Today, we are announcing our policy on Hate Content and Hateful Conduct. ‘¦ [H]ere are the basics:
When we are alerted to content that violates our policy, we may remove it (in consultation with rights holders) or refrain from promoting or playlisting it on our service. It’s important to us that our values are reflected in all the work that we do, whether it’s distribution, promotion, or content creation.
At the same time, however, it’s important to remember that cultural standards and sensitivities vary widely. There will always be content that is acceptable in some circumstances, but is offensive in others, and we will always look at the entire context.
To help us identify hate content, we have partnered with rights advocacy groups, including The Southern Poverty Law Center, The Anti-Defamation League, Color Of Change, Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ), GLAAD, Muslim Advocates, and the International Network Against Cyber Hate. We also built an internal content monitoring tool, Spotify AudioWatch, which identifies content on our platform that has been flagged as hate content on specific international registers. And we listen to our users ‘“ if you think something is hate content, please let us know and we will review it carefully against our policy.
We’ve also thought long and hard about how to handle content that is not hate content itself, but is principally made by artists or other creators who have demonstrated hateful conduct personally. We work with and support artists in different ways ‘“ we make their music available on Spotify and help connect them to new and existing fans, we program and promote their music, and we collaborate with them to create content. While we don’t believe in censoring content because of an artist’s or creator’s behavior, we want our editorial decisions ‘“ what we choose to program ‘“ to reflect our values. So, in some circumstances, when an artist or creator does something that is especially harmful or hateful (for example, violence against children and sexual violence), it may affect the ways we work with or support that artist or creator.
This is our first iteration of this new policy. These are complicated issues, and we’re going to continue to revise our Policy on Hate Content and Hateful Conduct. We’ll make some mistakes, we’ll learn from them, and we’ll always listen to you as we work to keep building the Spotify platform.
What artists or songs with anti-LGBTQ lyrics would you like to see removed from Spotify?
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