mtv self-censorship

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― Siegbran (eofor), Friday, 21 March 2003 13:18 (twenty-three years ago)

MTV is sooo cutting edge ..

― dave225 (Dave225), Friday, 21 March 2003 13:53 (twenty-three years ago)

Yeah, we all know that "talking" about "stuff" will just offend somebody, and gosh-darnit, we don't want to do that. Nosireebob.

― Lord Custos Epsilon (Lord Custos Epsilon), Friday, 21 March 2003 13:57 (twenty-three years ago)

There's a Radiohead song called "Invasion"??

???

― Evan (Evan), Friday, 21 March 2003 14:25 (twenty-three years ago)

B-52s videos??
MTV must really think highly of its audience's intelligence.

― Jazzbo (jmcgaw), Friday, 21 March 2003 14:56 (twenty-three years ago)

Paul Hardcastle "19"

heh

― Jody Beth Rosen (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 21 March 2003 14:57 (twenty-three years ago)

what a moron - when was the last time '19' was shown on MTV anyway?

i'm surprised they havent omitted Massive Attack as well - Audio Bullys should also be banned as its clearly a slur on the Dubya gang

― stevem (blueski), Friday, 21 March 2003 15:42 (twenty-three years ago)

I'd just like to repeat.... B-52s videos.

― Aaron W (Aaron W), Friday, 21 March 2003 15:55 (twenty-three years ago)

I don't see any problem with this memo. I'm sure whoever was writing it was aware of how silly some of it sounded, but nonetheless, to someone who has relatives in Baghdad or in the US military, seeing a "B-52s" video might cause unecessary anxiety--not a productive kind either. I think if you watch MTV you'll find that their coverage of both antiwar protestors and Iraqi civilians is more sympathetic and more comprehensive than the coverage on the alleged "news" networks like CNN, MSNBC, etc.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Friday, 21 March 2003 16:04 (twenty-three years ago)

Also, this:

deals fairly with each opposing view. It cannot be one-sided. Both sides of the argument need to be dealt with, and dealt with fairly.

When was the last time you saw an "opposing view" on Fox News or even CNN, except a brief clip of some teenagers burning American flags?

― Amateurist (amateurist), Friday, 21 March 2003 16:05 (twenty-three years ago)

why would seeing the word 'B52s' on the screen for 4 seconds on MTV make people with relatives in the military feel any worse than them seeing it in print and on plenty of other TV ALL THE TIME? its an absolutely absurd

― stevem (blueski), Friday, 21 March 2003 16:07 (twenty-three years ago)

might cause unecessary anxiety--not a productive kind either

what IS a productive kind of un-necessary anxiety? am confused.

― stevem (blueski), Friday, 21 March 2003 16:15 (twenty-three years ago)

Um, I just meant that some people might think MTV is trying to stifle real dialogue on the war by blocking out these videos, but I was pointing out that I don't think showing a B-52's video would do anyone any particularly exceptional good to counter the possible anxiety it might produce.

"You have reached the department of redundancy department, please leave two messages after the tone."

― Amateurist (amateurist), Friday, 21 March 2003 16:23 (twenty-three years ago)

I think the reason they don't want to cause any anxiety for viewers is cuz they're afraid they might change the channel and miss the advertising. It's not HORRIBLE, but is very funny.

― Aaron W (Aaron W), Friday, 21 March 2003 16:28 (twenty-three years ago)

You're probably right. "Dance this Mess Around" and "Love Shack" would definitely give me an anxiety attack if I had loved ones over there. C'mon!

― Jazzbo (jmcgaw), Friday, 21 March 2003 16:30 (twenty-three years ago)

I just think MTV doesn't want to lend the appearance of being flippant about a conflict in which many lives are at stake. Playing a video by "The B-52s" as those very planes are heading to Baghdad with a payload of bombs would seem flippant.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Friday, 21 March 2003 16:32 (twenty-three years ago)

The sad thing is that B-52s are on the verge of another comeback. Or were, last week.

― Horace Mann (Horace Mann), Friday, 21 March 2003 16:51 (twenty-three years ago)

well the only place you see the B52s now is VH-1 Classic anyway, obviously its the visual element of videos like Primal Scream's 'Kill All Hippies' that could possibly unsettle those in a difficult position (relatives of soldiers etc.) - but even then its not that relevant given how MTV is now driven to showing only the latest videos. MTV2 and the other offshoots still get too few viewers for this to really be a prime concern i'd say.

― stevem (blueski), Friday, 21 March 2003 17:12 (twenty-three years ago)

MTV only shows about 15 videos a day anyway, and thats just the same 5 videos shown 3 times

― stevem (blueski), Friday, 21 March 2003 17:12 (twenty-three years ago)

is there no way we could get coldplay added to this list ?

― kieron, Friday, 21 March 2003 17:20 (twenty-three years ago)

the word "parachutes" definitely reminds me of war. as does the word "yellow", come to think of it. um, and "clocks" remind me of military looming deadlines.

― kieron, Friday, 21 March 2003 17:21 (twenty-three years ago)

during passing mention of "war protests" CNN looped a long overhead shot of sombebody beating the shit out of somebody else in San Francisco. the camera pulled back a bit at the end of the loop and you could see that the people involved weren't close to any march, no one was holding placards.... as the loop REPEATED, Aaron Brown, officially the Dimmest Bulb on TV, mused that he had no idea what the altercation was about, but with a distastful catch in his throat he said wanted to reiterate that "we feel... strongly that Americans deserve to have their voices heard...." Free reign to beat the shit out of people as long as it's on-camera! Nice! Aaron Brown said he supported me, officer! Yeah, war sux!

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Friday, 21 March 2003 17:22 (twenty-three years ago)

separately it may also be worth caution with bands whose albums involve words like "rush" as in ("rush to war") "blood" (what gets spilt) and "head" which is an abbreviation for war leaders

― kieron, Friday, 21 March 2003 17:24 (twenty-three years ago)

Yeah, two images of protests on CNN this morning: (1) some people fighting each other in San Francisco (the provocateur actually looked to me to be a pro-war demonstrator, but who knows--the anchor also made a token comment like "we don't know what's going on here," but didn't suggest the possibility); (2) some idiot anarchist teenagers burning flags in Seattle. No mention that peaceful demonstrators had blocked Lake Shore Drive in Chicago (ahem, a bigger city that the two just mentioned).

I shouldn't be surprised by this, but it's obvious that there is a concerted effort to show demonstrators in the worst possible light. No wonder wide stretches of middle America have misapprehensions about people opposing the war.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Friday, 21 March 2003 17:39 (twenty-three years ago)

Really, I have bloodlust for those vile CNN anchors and commentators.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Friday, 21 March 2003 17:39 (twenty-three years ago)

What makes you think it's middle America that has these misaprehensions?

― dave225 (Dave225), Friday, 21 March 2003 17:42 (twenty-three years ago)

OK, I take that phrase back since it doesn't really mean much. Whoever it is I hear on talk shows and in the media etc. who seem to have misapprehensions about protestors. I can see where they are getting that impression.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Friday, 21 March 2003 17:45 (twenty-three years ago)

My trouble with many of the protesters is their assertion that this is about oil or anti-muslim racism... I think the war is bullshit and the salesjob for it is condescending.. But the war is bout a personal vendetta against Saddam, and it's about "When the USA tells you to say Uncle, you better fuckin' say Uncle." (and maybe a little bit about freedom for the Iraqis, if that happens to work out.) ..If all we wanted was their oil, we would have traded them our old weapons for it.

― dave225 (Dave225), Friday, 21 March 2003 18:02 (twenty-three years ago)

/soapbox.

Anyway, it would do the public good to see the video for "corruption"

― dave225 (Dave225), Friday, 21 March 2003 18:03 (twenty-three years ago)

what about the 1,000 people arrested in San Francisco? they mentioned it all of once on CNN last night.

1,000 PEOPLE ARRESTED

― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Friday, 21 March 2003 18:06 (twenty-three years ago)

http://www.examiner.com/news/default.jsp?story=n.protestmain.0321w

― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Friday, 21 March 2003 18:11 (twenty-three years ago)

this morning's SF Chronicle reported 1400 arrested.

― jl, Friday, 21 March 2003 19:19 (twenty-three years ago)

This is just like the Clearchannel thread, except the memo is way less ridiculous. I dunno, if I ran MTV and there were a war on I would, yes, make the assumption that anyone watching MTV is on some level taking a pointed break from news coverage, and cut out incidental references to war, especially ones that weren't built to operate in this current context. (For the same reasons that sub-network reruns of sitcoms are such an important and inviolable thing in times like these: after two hours of Peter Jennings I need to know someone's got a bad episode of Friends running somewhere.)

And yeah, I think it's terrific just to see that their directives for when they are covering the war are still casting two equal and opposed positions, pro-war vs. anti-war. This is not the case in the U.S. media, where coverage leans toward "there is a war on" plus "there is unfortunate unrest in major U.S. cities."

― nabisco (nabisco), Friday, 21 March 2003 19:54 (twenty-three years ago)

In Philadelphia where they're testing these little pager-size devices that monitor what media you're listening to (radio or TV), they found that top 40 radio listening skyrocketed when Bush spoke early this week (the speech where he gave the 48-hour deadline). Radio and MTV do escapism well. It's a need of the market; why not fill it as long as people have the option to switch to news if they want?

― teeny (teeny), Friday, 21 March 2003 20:25 (twenty-three years ago)

For what it's worth, MTV2-US just played System of a Down's "Boom!" -- one of the songs that this memo "recommends" not playing.

"The ITC Programme Code requires us not to broadcast material which offends against good taste or is offensive to public feeling." Anybody know how seriously offenses against this code are taken?

― j.lu (j.lu), Saturday, 22 March 2003 00:40 (twenty-three years ago)

Don't y'all think it's pretty nice that MTV's gone all post-ironic on our ass'?

― of heaven, Saturday, 22 March 2003 01:03 (twenty-three years ago)

www.brain-terminal.com

― JP Albin (John Paul Albin), Saturday, 22 March 2003 05:11 (twenty-three years ago)

frankie goes to hollywoods 'two tribes' pulled from theoretical airplay!!

― r5g, Saturday, 22 March 2003 23:08 (twenty-three years ago)

Haha, is ILX a high profile publication?

― Siegbran (eofor), Monday, 31 March 2003 10:41 (twenty-three years ago)

Is Svenja Geissmar gonna be pissed at that!

Someone's leaked his email about not leaking emails.

― mei (mei), Monday, 31 March 2003 10:49 (twenty-three years ago)

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