Censorship!

[Nanissimov]

I was pressed to start this post after going on youtube to hear an old song i havn't heard in a while, Purple Pills by d12 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7eViKPSkZU . Its a great song, but little did i know there was a censored MTV/RADIO version http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uuq6HgKgEFQ&feature=related . I was like S*I* what's the point of putting this out? It's not even the real song! So here's some questions i'd like to ask and here you'r opinions

#1) Should they have made an MTV version or not just showed it, because it's not even the real song anymore, there's a diffrence between bleeping and ALTERING THE ENTIRE SONG

#2) Are you affected by censorship like this,

#3) Do you have any other extreme acts of censorship like this

#4) Overall whats your opinion on censorship?

 

[emeraldrafael]

I rmemeber hearing Hollywood Undead's Undead song on the radio once, and it seemed like half the song was cut out.

And on the alice in chains man in a box, they say buried in my spit, and not buried in my shit like it should be.

 

[Radeonx]

I think that it is dumb, but I can see why songs are censored.
Playing songs around a 5 year old that say "fuck" 350 times can get kind of bad, especially when that same 5 year old walks into his class and starts blurting out expletives.

 

[Nanissimov]

I think that it is dumb, but I can see why songs are censored.
Playing songs around a 5 year old that say "fuck" 350 times can get kind of bad, especially when that same 5 year old walks into his class and starts blurting out expletives.

I see what youre saying but listen to the link i gave you with the MTV version, they say "Womens with there asses hanging out" and profanties like that...

 

[Radeonx]

I think that it is dumb, but I can see why songs are censored.
Playing songs around a 5 year old that say "fuck" 350 times can get kind of bad, especially when that same 5 year old walks into his class and starts blurting out expletives.

I see what youre saying but listen to the link i gave you with the MTV version, they say "Womens with there asses hanging out" and profanties like that...

So? Fuck, ****, shit and the like are generally considered more taboo.

 

[TonyVonTonyus]

Censorship is bad for 2 reasons:

1:The person trying to portray a point intended it to be portrayed in a certain way and when you censor him or her you demean their point.

2:You imply that 1eople are too stupid to know what's good for them (I.E. The state of California's view of minors)2:Imply people will break down upon hearing or seeing something "offensive" or "obscene" 3:Imply people do not have the brain capacity to learn how to disengage themselves from viewing such things, disengaging in ways such as: walking out of the theatre, using a remote or turning a dial on a radio.

 

[Ilikemilkshake]

Songs have radio edits all the time.
Im not really affected by them as i dont ever listen to the radio but i understand why radio edits exist.

I think its okay for radio edits to exist, because some people dont like swearing, and if you're listening to the radio before 9pm, i think its kind of accepted that swearing or any other explicit material shouldnt be played.

Radio edits arent really censorship though, unless they banned the playing of the original (after 9pm)

But yeah, censorship pisses me off, as most of the time its just a knee jerk reaction to some perceived youth corrupting force. But removing the word shit from a song so it can be played on mtv doesnt really count as censorship imo

 

[Nanissimov]

Songs have radio edits all the time.
Im not really affected by them as i dont ever listen to the radio but i understand why radio edits exist.

I think its okay for radio edits to exist, because some people dont like swearing, and if you're listening to the radio before 9pm, i think its kind of accepted that swearing or any other explicit material shouldnt be played.

Radio edits arent really censorship though, unless they banned the playing of the original (after 9pm)

But yeah, censorship pisses me off, as most of the time its just a knee jerk reaction to some perceived youth corrupting force. But removing the word shit from a song so it can be played on mtv doesnt really count as censorship imo

Yes i see what youre saying, but editing whole parts of the song & bleeping half of someones part out isn't really editing, its deleating

 

[Asuka Soryu]

I hate censoring, like how: "Let's Get Stupid", became, "Let's Get Started" and how, "Fuck You" became, "Forget you".

But I will admit, I kinda like, "Down With The Sickness" without the mental part.

 

[Dags90]

I've heard some pretty ridiculous edits of Lil' Wayne's Lollipop on the radio before. I've also heard inconsistent editing of Third Eye Blind's Semi-Charmed Life. The song is pretty much about getting high on crystal meth and having sex, it's amazing they play it on the radio at all.

There's also a station here which edits out any rap verses in modern pop songs regardless of content. "But not too black" I guess.

 

[MisterGobbles]

Songs like "Fuck You" by Cee Lo Green and "Let's Get Retarded" by the Black Eyed Peas have had altered versions with completely different titles released as singles because of censorship. It's nothing new. People are just pussies. It really only applies to the radio, though, because of FCC regulations. People who want the original version can just buy the CD or listen to it on the internet.

Plus, there are radio edits of songs made all the time that have nothing to do with censorship; they just want to make the song shorter so they can play more songs. Again, if you want the original version, there are options available to you.

What I really don't like is this shit about Wal-Mart only selling censored versions of CDs, and just flat out not selling them if there isn't a censored version available. I don't buy my music at Wal-Mart very often anymore, but back in the day that was where I got my music, and there was plenty of popular albums that I had to settle for the clean version of.

 

[viranimus]

Well in most cases its just pandering to the ignorant and easily offended. However in the cited reference of Eminem personally I think Purple hills > Purple Pills.

 

[Ilikemilkshake]

Songs have radio edits all the time.
Im not really affected by them as i dont ever listen to the radio but i understand why radio edits exist.

I think its okay for radio edits to exist, because some people dont like swearing, and if you're listening to the radio before 9pm, i think its kind of accepted that swearing or any other explicit material shouldnt be played.

Radio edits arent really censorship though, unless they banned the playing of the original (after 9pm)

But yeah, censorship pisses me off, as most of the time its just a knee jerk reaction to some perceived youth corrupting force. But removing the word shit from a song so it can be played on mtv doesnt really count as censorship imo

Yes i see what youre saying, but editing whole parts of the song & bleeping half of someones part out isn't really editing, its deleating

Spoiler

<youtube=zUzd9KyIDrM>

in that song, the line 'Where the fuck are you?' is repeated, but in that version is edited so its just 'where the - are you?' and until i bought the album, i didnt even realise the word fuck was supposed to be there. which was a suprise.

like was said, its just a fact that radio edits are played during the day.
It might be an issue with the label but im sure if the artist was reaaaally against it they could just not have their song played at all during the day.

but yeah, having a song changed is annoying, but isnt the end of the world.
It could be worse, you could be in Australia and unable to play a bunch of games because of their stupid censorship.
or even worse, you could be somewhere in the middle east and not get to listen to any music or games from outside your country

 

[WouldYouKindly]

Almost makes me enjoy that none of the music I like gets played on the radio or MTV. Though some times the record companies are fucking retarded and scramble the audio when the swears come in.

 

[MightyMole]

Censorship honestly isn't a huge deal to me. As long as it doesn't interfere with the message/ artistic vision of the creator who cares? For instance, I played Indigo Prophecy and in the American Version, they censored part of the sex scene so it didn't show that woman's breast. When I played it at the time I didn't really notice. I didn't even know it was censored until later when I read people being pissed off because they didn't get to see her nipple in game... It honestly wasn't a huge deal.

I also find "Forget You" to be much more catchy than "Fuck You".

To me, censorship is less about explicits and more about information. You can bleep out/ change the words to songs, scripts all you want, but don't censor my information. Though for some news networks, their bias does that enough.

 

[Astoria]

I remember hearing censored versions of Pink's songs Cuz I Can and Leave Me Alone. Rather than simply bleeping out the swearing they repeated other parts of the song and it just sounded stupid. What's wrong with just beeping it? And I don't really see the point of censorship anymore, there's still 5 and 6 year olds running around swearing more than most teenagers do.

 

[BonsaiK]

I was pressed to start this post after going on youtube to hear an old song i havn't heard in a while, Purple Pills by d12 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7eViKPSkZU . Its a great song, but little did i know there was a censored MTV/RADIO version http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uuq6HgKgEFQ&feature=related . I was like S*I* what's the point of putting this out? It's not even the real song! So here's some questions i'd like to ask and here you'r opinions

#1) Should they have made an MTV version or not just showed it, because it's not even the real song anymore, there's a diffrence between bleeping and ALTERING THE ENTIRE SONG

#2) Are you affected by censorship like this,

#3) Do you have any other extreme acts of censorship like this

#4) Overall whats your opinion on censorship?

Okay, here's the industry perspective on this. Are you ready?

1. Videos are first and foremost, advertisements. They are arguably art too but they are certainly without a doubt advertising, that is their function and reason for existence - to entice you to buy the song. A version of the song with huge chunks of it ripped out still serves that function, and in a way it presents an added allure because a side-effect of all that censorship is it makes people want to buy the full version so they can check out how the artist actually intended it to sound. That's why a lot of rap songs are very heavily butchered - a cut-down version is more playable in more places thanks to less profanity and it only makes the hardcore audience want the real deal even more.

2. Not that particular kind, no. What annoys me is when the full version gets censored. You'd be amazed what sometimes gets changed in the final product.

3. The example that you linked, examples similar to that - well, just about any commercially-aimed rap song these days has a radio edit like that. It's nothing new.

4. Don't like it, wish we didn't have to pander to the proccupations of the lowest common denominator "won't somebody think of the children" wowser all the time, but it's a sad fact that these people have power. You have power too, though. Word of advice, next time you hear a full non-censored song on the radio or TV and you really appreciate it, ring up the station and tell them that you appreciate it that they left the swearing in. Or if they're chopping out the words, ring them up and complain that you want the real deal, not the butchered version. Negative complaints about swearing can be easily thwarted if the station can also prove that they got plenty of positive feedback from people who like explicit lyrics.