By Zoe Walsh
Introduction
A song that is now considered a hymn to nonviolence and peace was banned from several schools and churches when it first aired on the radio. It was called anti-religious, communist, and unpatriotic. It was banned from playing on the radio after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
That song, of course, is “Imagine” by John Lennon. It is hard to imagine now how a song calling for peace and unity beyond religious affiliation, nationality and ethnicity could ever be controversial. Music, however, has always been political. It is a tool for the people’s resistance, in whatever cause they may believe in. A good song can be electrifyingly unifying amongst the people, and that terrifies institutions of power.
The act of censoring music is not a new one. Music’s potential for social change has led to many governments and groups attempting to censor songs and albums to try and squash dissent. These efforts, however, usually fuel the social and political movements they try to silence, turning music into a powerful symbol of people’s protest.
The Role of Music in Political and Social Movements
Music is undeniably one of the most important aspects of any culture around the world. Music is used to express sadness, joy, love, protest and more. In the United States of America, slaves would often sing songs to not only connect with their community but to escape oppression as well. Religious and working songs were common ways to pass time and unite amongst themselves. The song “Bella Ciao” is in a similar strain of working song, sung by working women in the fields. Both American slave songs and Italian worker songs later morphed into resistance songs–in America for the civil rights movement, and in Italy for an anti-fascist movement. Noah Adams of NPR writes that “‘We Shall Overcome’ began as a folk song, a work song. Slaves in the fields would sing, ‘I’ll be all right someday.’ It became known in the churches,” (Adams, 2013). Later, the song was an anthem for the civil rights campaign. Pummarol Magazine writes of a similar trend happened to “Bella Ciao”, saying “The old Italian folk song, which had its origins in the brutal work conditions of the mondine transformed into a song of resistance as Italians fought off the Fascist Party,” (Piemonte, 2020).
The anti-apartheid movement in South Africa is another case study of music being used to unite the people. According to the article “Pop Music and Resistance in Apartheid South Africa”, John Shoup states that “not until 1986 with the release of Paul Simon’s album Graceland that popular South African music gained a large following outside southern Africa. With the music came the politics and a greater, wider understanding of conditions in the country,” (1997). This increased attention led to worldwide notice of music artists and figures being jailed by the South African government. Songs originating from South Africa by the resistance were mainly sung in English, due to the Afrikaner legislation requiring their language to be taught and used in most public spaces. The native Africans saw “this as a way to prevent them from qualifying for better jobs as well as a method to restrict their contact with the outside world where English was quickly becoming the dominant world language,” (Shoup, 1997). This popularization of English in songs led the way for native African artists to become stars worldwide, using their music as a dissenting voice of the injustices of apartheid.
Songs and the artists who sing them use music as a collective voice. Popular songs can draw attention to social issues and concerts can be played to benefit causes. Music can become campaign songs or anthems. It connects with one’s community and other cultures as well. It is undeniable that music is a vehicle for people’s power.
History of Music Censorship
Since music is such a popular apparatus for protest, it is often subject to censorship by governments, organizations and sometimes other social movements. China is a country that has banned songs, both national and international ones from entertainment venues. According to CNN, “interim rules outlined by the country’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism, karaoke must not endanger national unity, sovereignty or territorial integrity, incite ethnic hatred or undermine ethnic unity, promote cults or superstition or violate the state’s religious policies,” (Deng and Woodyatt, 2021). Censoring is a slippery slope when it comes to the individual citizen’s freedom. China has not just banned certain songs–they have also restricted access to the internet and control the media. Internet stations are expected “to comply with the government, each individual site privately employs up to 1,000 censors. Additionally, approximately 20,000-50,000 Internet police and Internet monitors, as well as an estimated 250,000-300,000 ‘50 cent party members’ at all levels of government-central, provincial, and local-participate in this huge effort,” (King et al., 2013). Extreme censorship is due to the government being afraid of collective action of the people via protest. The fine line between government and authoritarian blur when censorship occurs.
Soviet rule also brought the censorship of music, theater, television and more. The Cold War era brought the banning of Western influences on Soviet Russia. Music was just one influence banned by the government because “they recognized the mass appeal of jazz and strove to purge this music from the USSR, perceiving jazz as associated with their Cold War enemies, chiefly the United States,” (Tsipursky, 2016). Jazz music was extremely popular amongst the younger generation and in banning it the government sought to diminish cosmopolitan ideals. Foreign dances were also banned, such as the tango, foxtrot and Charleston. Wanting to construct a patriotic and Communist (although one could argue it was more authoritarian than Communist in nature) country, the Ministry of Culture held state-sponsored entertainment. These included not just music clubs, but parks, educational institutions and libraries as well. Isolationist legislation of the state-sponsored clubs made sure “the repertoire for variety bands included an admixture of Russian classics, ballroom music, folk tunes, and mass-oriented patriotic and ideological Soviet songs. They also played a Sovietized version of jazz cleansed of allegedly decadent elements,” (Tsipursky, 2016). This suppression of foreign music and wider culture led to famous jazz stars within the Soviet Union actually being arrested and sent to prison camps, all for the crime of playing music that people danced to.
Nazi Germany was also notorious for its restrictions on music. John Street writes how “the Nazis too used popular songs for propagandist purposes. Before the war, for example, the Horst-Wessel Song was made compulsory in school and Nazi Youth training manuals specified the use of songs at key points in the daily ritual,” (2003). State controlled patriotism is one of the hallmarks of fascism. Militant nationalism leads to an easier time defining the ‘us versus them’ narrative, which is then used to dehumanize the outgroup. Nazis also called jazz music and swing music ‘degenerate’, similar to the Soviet Union. This was further used to persecute the Jewish people and other outgroups, who were the so-called degenerates.
Clearly, the censorship of music has been seen throughout history as a tool of authoritarian and fascist regimes. Both the promotion of patriotic songs and the banning of foreign and ‘degenerate’ songs, imprisoning the artists who make this music, and controlling the media are important principles to a fascist government. Keene State College says that “Control of mass media and undermining “truth”, disdain for intellectuals and the arts not aligned with the fascist narrative, [and an] obsession with national security, crime and punishment, and fostering a sense of the nation under attack,” are all characteristics of fascism. Therefore, it is important to vehemently oppose any form of censorship–music or not, to prevent the first baby steps of authoritarianism and fascism.
The Paradox of Censorship
“The state’s behaviour may be premised on a set of assumptions about what the music represents, and indeed by censoring it, the state – as a self-fulfilling prophecy – may have invested it with a status it would otherwise have lacked,” quotes John Street in “‘Fight the Power’: The Politics of Music and the Music of Politics” (2003). In other words, by restricting music, the government might actually be giving the song more power.
Returning back to the Soviet Union, where foreign music was banned, we see the creation of “bone music”. Old x-rays, usually foraged from hospital dumpsters, were used to create contraband music. Recording lathes were “like a gramophone in reverse, a device which you can use to write the grooves of music onto plastic,” (NPR, 2019). These x-rays were then cut up crudely into records, and turned into an illegal music track. A small taste of music was so important to citizens that they risked severe punishment. NPR also states that “this was a time when music mattered so much that people would risk public censure, they would risk imprisonment,” (2019). It is clear to see how much music truly matters in society.
Tibet, which is under China’s rule, has also used music within their struggle for autonomy. 13 Tibetan nuns who were imprisoned for peacefully protesting Chinese rule secretly recorded an album on a tape cassette, which was then smuggled out of the prison. While already in prison, the nuns were resentenced, with the sentencing document saying “the judges conclude that the 14 nuns had ‘recorded reactionary Tibetan independence’ songs in an attitude of counter-revolutionary arrogance’ and with ‘the aim of countering the revolution,’” (International Campaign for Tibet, 2006). Their recording was successful. People all around the world heard their struggle, and their families knew they were alive. Unfortunately, many of the nuns later died due to maltreatment from prison guards. However, their musical impact is still seen in the world today. Campaigns for Tibet exist all over, struggling to create their own country. The nun’s album can even be listened to on Free Tibet’s website, showcasing their ultimate resilience and love of music that got them through the worst of times.
Fela Kuti is another example of music being censored, and yet rising in popularity all the while. He was a Nigerian born musician and often called the founder of the Afrobeats music. He studied classical music at a college in London, and created a band that experimented with the first Afrobeats sounds. According to Britannica Encyclopedia, “following his 1969 tour of the United States, where he was influenced by the politics of Malcolm X, the Black Panthers, and other militants, Kuti’s music became increasingly politicized,” (2019). Kuti often played in different venues and nightclubs which were frequently raided by the Nigerian military government, who he actively spoke out against. It is frequently thought that said government raided these clubs in an attempt to jail Kuti, with fraudulent charges like currency smuggling and murder by the government. His politicized songs like “the song “Zombie” mocked the blind obedience of soldiers to their superiors and became an anthem for those opposing the authoritarian government. However, the government’s response was brutal, leading to the infamous raid on Fela’s Kalakuta Republic commune and the destruction of his recording studio,” (Music Origins Project). Despite this, he carried on his activism, eventually passing down the torch to his son Fema Kuti.
Nazi Germany is obviously the poster child of fascism, and as mentioned before, the Third Reich also censored music strongly. These bans and restrictions were highly unpopular with the German youth, who were disillusioned by an economic depression and the authoritarianism of the government. Urban youth subcultures based around the forbidden music were common, with examples like the “Swing Youth” and the “Edelweiss Pirates”. According to Ralph Willet, the Edelweiss Pirates “liked to cycle or hitch to weekend meetings in the countryside where they sang new lyrics to commercial hits and protest versions of folk and hiking songs,” (1989). The Swing Youth were the “the Pirates’ affluent, grammar school-educated, middle-class counterparts,” but not as overtly political as the former (Willet, 1989). The Swing Youth usually hosted private parties listening to forbidden jazz records or copies of jazz broadcasts, which were then demonized by the Nazi party. Many of the youth also formed up bands to play these types of music, with “ the style of their wartime jam sessions… in the Harlequin album, ‘Swing Under the Nazis 1941-44’ in which all tracks (studio and live) were recorded clandestinely,” (Willet, 1989). Some members of these bands were caught and sent to war camps for playing or sending out newsletters about swing/jazz music. Their love for music kept them playing, dancing and listening, however. One anonymous youth was interviewed saying “everything for us was this world of great longing, Western life, democracy – everything was connected – and connected through jazz,” (Ritzel, 1985).
Conclusion
Music is simultaneously a mirror of society and a microphone for its people seeking liberation, unity and peace. All across the world, from spiritual songs of slaves to prison chants of Tibetan nuns, music echoes both the struggle and the hope of people. History has seen time and time again that attempts to censor the power of music have backfired, often empowering movements and voices instead. Artists become icons, music becomes movements, and songs become symbols, demonstrating the enduring power of any message within. Whether smuggled out of prison on a cassette tape, recorded onto old x-rays or listened to in dark clubs, censored music consistently transcends its silencing. Ultimately, music not only reflects resistance, it fuels it–reminding us that the most powerful voice is song.
References
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