WA law

[Valerie Nozick <VNOZICK@EAGLE.WESLEYAN.EDU>]

Meredith writes:
>Interestingly, I notice there hasn't been much chatter on the music lists I'm
>on about the impending law going into effect in Washington State in June making
>it a felony for record stores to sell "objectionable" music to minors.  What 
>will be deemed objectionable is literally going to be up to the musical tastes 
>of the judges who deal with the individual cases.  This is censorship, folks, 
>pure and simple- people out there from Washington, what's going on to combat
>this despicable law???

thanks for telling me about this...i hadn't heard anything about it (must be
all the finals this past week)  it seems to me that every 2 years or so there
is some group that is trying to ban the sale of 'bad' records (shame they don't
try to ban poorly made records--would be nice to live in a world without skinny
puppy or ten inch nails.  :-)   ), and luckily, these laws never seem to be
successful.  not to belittle this situation--without doubt censorship of music
is a terrible thing--but i guess i've become a bit numb to it.  

>If you just look at lyrics to decide what kids under 18 are allowed to buy,
>Tori's long gone- never mind Kate!!!  

here's why i've been able to become numb about it.  i highly doubt that they
would bother looking at artists such as kate and tori.  usually these laws are
attempts to get rid of artists that are perceived as being bad influences on
teenagers, such as two live crew, lots of rap & heavy metal.  but rarely
do they bother with artists such as kate.  kate, tori and the like are
perceived more as 'adult' artists -- how many 12 year olds do you know who are
kate fans (meant theoretically--please don't e-mail me saying 'but i'm one'. 
yeah, yeah, i was a kate fan when i was young, but i wasn't the type of kid who
you worried about.)  it's easy to attack teenagers -- they don't vote, they are
blamed by most of society for causing trouble recklessly, they can be brushed
off as suffering from a lack of 'maturity'.  but it's not as easy to attack
music listened to primarily by adults.  the politicians can't attack their
constituents, oh no.  so i'm not really concerned about this law being applied
to kate and tori.  not to say that i'm not concerned about the law.  censorship
is wrong in almost any instance, but i'm not concerned about it because of kate
and tori.


>I hope enough record stores get nailed
>with this to completely block up the legal system, and do it so badly that
>people realize just what a stupid thing it is and repeal it as soon as
>possible.  

i hope that you're not saying that it is reasonable to repeal a law just
because the legal system gets blocked up as a result of violations of it.  i
also hope that people repeal the law, but i hope it's because people still
believe in the right of free speech -- nowadays this law seems to be in
jeopardy all too often.

>Sorry to rant, I'm just wondering if people are aware of what's going on in our
>country.  I welcome clarifications on this matter from people who live in the
>area- my information is solely from a Boston Globe article from a week or so 
>ago.

sorry also for ranting.  

i think i'll go back to studying now...
 

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      Valerie Nozick            "And if I die today, I'll be the happy phantom"
vnozick@eagle.wesleyan.edu                           --Tori Amos

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