From: j.stokes@student.anu.edu.au (Jason Stokes) Subject: [ARIA-censorship] Triple-J on ARIA censorship Newsgroups: aus.censorship,aus.music It seems that I'm becoming a regular poster on this topic, hence the standard header. Triple-J ran a story on the ARIA and their new cennsorship code this morning. It's quite illuminating. I've belted out this transcript (this is almost certainly copyright of our national public broadcaster, but hell, they keep telling us it's *our* ABC, right?) From Rachel Kerr's comments it looks like Triple-J is starting to get edgey about these developments. And they should be; it was only last week that Arnold Frollows played some free-the-marijauna style reggae compilations on his new music segment - now *that* will surely not be allowed any more. Jason Stokes: j.stokes@student.anu.edu.au Ph: (06) 291 93 84 (home) --------------------------------------- Triple-J Report 27 past ten now on the morning show - Jenny Aldershaw here with you! Good morning. Hope it's going well for you. Well when are song lyrics too explicit and offensive? That's the debate the Australian Record Industry Association or ARIA has been having with both federal and state governments since late last year. Finally compromise has been achieved and ARIA has introduced its own code of conduct - which means you'll find a bunch of new stickers on CDs in record shops across the country. Rachel Kerr has the story. [music - "Express Yourself"] I'm expressing with my full capabilities And now I'm living in correctional facilities 'Cos some don't agree with how I do this I get get strait - meditate like a buddist I'm dropping flavour my behaviour is heredity But my technique is very necessary Rachel Kerr: Censorship is a dirty word in this country. And recently all Australians were reminded by prime minister John Howard that we all enjoy free speech. But that's highly debatable when it comes to the argument that the Australian music industry is having with the government over swear words and drug references in songs. ARIA - the industry body which represents Australian music - has been under a lot of pressure from both federal and state governments to get tough on explicit and potentially offensive language in song lyrics. ARIA was given the choice to self-regulate, or have legislation written for them. And what they've produced is a code of practice with three levels of labelling. The first is a black warning notice which indicates the recording contains explicit language. And that covers the kind of words that can be heard in pubs and playgrounds across the country - and includes mild drug references. The next level of classification carrys a red sticker - warning it's not recommended for under eighteens. ARIA's Emmanuel Candi explains just how explicit and offensive lyrics have to be to earn this classification. Candi: It's a fair whack of explicit words combined with violence or drug use. Kerr: Can you give me some examples please? Candi: [vaguely] Buy some drugs, give it to somebody else... isn't it great... we all should use drugs and... go kill someone or whatever. That.. that's going to get you into the next category. Now, this is the category that we've had a big argument about, because the pressure was on to have it banned for people under eighteen, and we went back out and we consulted, and we could... the overwhelming response was, that's wrong, it should just carry a higher a warning, it shouldn't be banned, and there were a couple of reasons. One, it's always been the case, two, the retailers said on a practical level have you ever tried to tell the difference between an eighteen year old and a ah... which in itself is not a great excuse. Three, this only applies to the sale of the physical product of the CD or cassette - you can still turn on the radio and hear the song. In fact Triple J's name came up a lot in all that, and Regurgitator, and bands like that... Kerr: [interrupting] I'm gonna ask you, where does regurgitator come in this argument? "I sucked a lot of cock to get where I am" - would that be not recommended for under eighteens? Candi: If it was coming out now, rather than before the new system, [it] probably would have spilled over into the higher category. Kerr: And would that mean under eighteens couldn't buy it without proving some identity? Candi: Under the system proposed by the Attorney-Generals that would have been the case, but under our system, which we've now got through and they've said we can have a year to trial it, you can still buy it if you're under eighteen it just carries a warning that it's not recommended for people under eighteen - now, at a retail level there is a long standing practice, retail practice, that even with a general warning, if it is a particularly young person or a particularly young teenager they'll probably won't sell it to them anyway without... mum or dad coming in or the older brother coming in and saying, no it's cool we want him to listen to it. Kerr: So in other words there's a great onus now on parents to be responsible for, you know, moral guardians for their children's musical habits and tastes. Candi: Always has been, and we've always said at the end of the day the government's not there to do everything that a parent should do and nor is a record company. Kerr: That's the second level of classification, what about the third, how serious does that get and are we talking about banned material? We're talking about censorship at last. Candi: Yeah we are talking about censorship, I've had a lot of trouble convincing the record companies we have to live with this, it's the level which says the record company won't release a particular CD or cassette because the material on it is so abhorrent that it's beyond the pale for a reasonable standard. Kerr: We're talking about pedophilia, necrophilia, bestiality, the kinds of things that are banned anyway right now. Candi: Yep. It matches what happens with books and movies. So, there are a whole lot of movies and books I understand that are refused classification, they can't be sold in Australia, they can't be circulated and it's a criminal offense to do so. But in addition to that there just aren't that many recordings that we know of or that we can recall that could ever fit that category. There's been one recently, Cannibal Corpse, one that had a... I think the song that tipped it over was the one where the person deliberately drives into a family, head on crash, and then has sex and eats the bodies or something. [fade into [presumably] cannibal corpse song but doesn't get to the part where the vocalist shouts his lyrics in such a gutteral roar that every lyric is completely incomprehensible] Kerr: Now as you've heard this is a self imposed code of conduct which is reliant on the compliance of retailers and parents. And it *is* only a twelve month trial. After that Attorneys-General from across the country will determine just how successful it's been. The speculation from across the music industry is that the government could well end up writing its own censorship code. Candi: If that happened, either immediately or over time, we could end up with state variations - which makes the idea of free trade amongst the states in this federation a mockery - but also makes marking records a complete nightmare because in some states you might be able to sell it, in other states you can't, and if somebody takes copies across the border it'll end up being the record company's problem even though they might not have sold them blah blah blah. So, like the defamation laws which have cause immense difficulties in this country for many years and they're trying to standardise that, we'd be going back in time rather [than] forward. Kerr: Just a few months ago our prime minister John Howard said that we were a country that enjoyed free speech; that obviously doesn't extend to musicians and songwriters. Candi: Yeah I think it's hard to reconcile that general statement that the pall of censorship or whatever was said has been lifted... I think he made it in regard to a different matter or different context but it's hard to reconcile any form of censorship with a general statement that there is no censorship. Kerr: How do you see something like this new classification system affecting something like our radio station, Triple-J? Obviously we monitor what we play and we don't play what we consider to be incredibly offensive stuff, but we do have drug references because this is the music that is there, that is being presented to us. And swear words because that is part of the lexicon. What will happen to Triple-J if the government comes in with a really hard and fast code saying no explicit material or drug references to under eighteens? Candi: Well that's a really interesting question because during all this I've picked up quite a bit of flavour of the thinking in regard to radio from government. If this code is not taken is being successful after twelve months they will legislate and when the legislate they will do... my prediction is that they will incorporate radio, and radio will be - particularly Triple-J - which is being watched very carefully by the Attorneys-General - will cop it. Now, I think that would be a disaster, but it has come up, it's come up in every conversation that I've had. And there are a couple of ministers out there who think that Triple-J is really over the top and they can't understand why it's on there. Now we've always said to them, well mate, it's a very good radio network and it's serving an important role and I think you oughta let them do what they do. But I've picked up a certain flavour in political land that Triple-J is offending somebody, but not us. Emmanuel Candi head of ARIA there speaking to Rachel Kerr. He's the head of the Australian record industry association, he was talking about a new code of conduct regarding explicit and so-called offensvie language in music and on radio. Interesting stuff. 24 minutes away from eleven now on Triple-J - here's Regurgitator. [music - Regurgitator, "I sucked a lot of cock to get where I am." It reminds me of Candi's role in this.] I sucked a lot of cock to get where I am I only want to be the best that I can My mouth is stained, I can't complain Just keep on rinsing out again and again whaooa.. yeah yeah yeah Take a look at me, tell me what do you see? I've got all I want I'm on top of the heap, now they suck up to me I sucked more cock You can get what you need, just get down on your knees You sucked a lot of cock to get you are Your smile is stretching but you're gonna go far Your life is pain, you can't complain Just keep on rinsing out again and again I know... I sucked a lot of cock to get where I am I know... I only want to be the best that I can I know....
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