20181213.0430

On 8 December 2018, Maria Anglin's "Baby, It's #MeToo Outside" appeared in the online San Antonio Express-News. The article reports the origins and arrival at prominence of the song "Baby, It's Cold Outside" prior to noting the current cultural disapproval surrounding the piece--manifesting in the song being pulled from a number of radio stations, including local channels. The lack of context for the song is cited as a reason it rings badly in contemporary ears, and remarks about comparative obscenity and lewdness are made. So is the note that context and subtext affect text before the piece closes seemingly unsatisfyingly.
I write "unsatisfyingly" because the concluding comment, "You know what else brings change? Those buttons on the car radio," seems overly flip and at odds with the sound points in the preceding few paragraphs. For instance, Anglin is correct to note that censorship is problematic at best. She is also correct to note that more people are more likely to be held to account for their words and the resultant actions. For radio stations--private enterprises in the main--to decide that they will not play songs they find problematic seems to be an acceptance of the accountability and responsibility Anglin notes--and then decries in the "You don't like it? Change the channel" comment with which she ends her piece. Why it is a problem for people and the corporations we are told count as being people to watch their mouths and mind their language--things we teach our children to do as a matter of course--eludes me; why speakers should not adjust their messages based upon the needs and desires of their audiences is unclear. Yet it seems to be--at the same time that people lament both "overly sensitive" people and a decline in civility.
The issue comes up entirely too often for my taste. I've written on it before, so I'll not rehash my comments; I do not think I need to do so. But I will tweak the comments to suit the current situation, to wit: a radio station deciding it is not in its best interests to play a particular song because it recognizes that song does not sit well with its listeners is prudence, not censorship. It is not being forced to pull the song; it is choosing to do so, and if it is choosing to do so because it recognizes that its listeners will not approve, so that its customers--advertisers--will not want to do business with it, then that's fine. Motive matters to some extent, as the whole argument about the song itself remarks, but it matters less than effect, as we see every time someone is slain accidentally. Whether the death is intended or not, the person is dead; while a lack of intent may make it not murder, as such, the person is still dead. And the same is true with words that, in themselves, do little harm but in the context that has become conduce to more than can be accounted--and more than merits something so blithe as "change the channel if you don't like it."