I am not one for censorship, I get annoyed by the language warnings on Triple J (try another station for f*** sake), so why did I find myself nodding along this week with UK Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron’s initiative to give YouTube music vids an age-appropriateness rating?
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Cameron is proposing that, from October, all music videos will be subject to the same classification system as films in an attempt to protect kids from “graphic content” and be given a rating of 12, 15 or 18.
I don’t even have teens yet, but I do have a four and seven year old, both boys, and one of the main ways we share music together is via YouTube. It’s just too easy. You think of a song you want, or an earworm that you need to get rid of, and it’s there -- a global jukebox that rarely fails you.
My two kids are so used to it that when I suggest we put on some music they amble over to the computer and stare at the screen like those freaky blonde kids in Village of the Damned. I have to remind them that music is a primarily auditory experience not a sub-section of Screen Time.
Generally, it’s a lot of One Direction – and a little rockier when I get a say – but when my eldest came home singing Wrecking Ball, we booted up YouTube and although I knew what to expect I figured they might take it for the silliness it is.
But then came the questions. Why is that lady sitting nude on top of a big ball? Why is she licking a hammer? And rather insightfully from my eldest, Why don’t boys in videos run around in their underwear?
Why indeed?
I get that Rihanna and Miley are not making these videos – or even their music – for my under tens, but they are making pop(ular) music that is infiltrating the playground and the airwaves and is readily available online.
Nicky Minaj’s “Ananconda” video dropped this week and, given the furore surrounding the cover artwork online, I would have had to have my head stuck up my own butt to realise it would be NSFK, but if I hadn’t known, maybe a practical warning would help. Things like:
- may contain excessive twerking.
- some scenes seek to sexualise everyday household tools.
- or, should be watched with a parent or guardian, who can explain that women do not always strut, parade and present their arses to men.
How different is “Anaconda” really to Rihanna’s “Pour it Up” offering a while back? More jungle, less water? What is Miley Cyrus’s “Adore You” other than a three-minute long bean flick?
The raunchy music vid is not a new plague out to wreak havoc on the younger generation (“won’t somebody please think of the children”), but over the course of a few pop songs via YouTube it is almost numbing the amount of female grinding, juddering and pole caressing that is going on.
I’ll leave the “empowering vs degrading” debate for another day mainly because I can tell you that my kids can’t tell the difference, not at their age, they are just seeing a wave of young women performers presenting themselves a lot more naked than their male counterparts.
We, the parents, are the ultimate filter, society is not to blame, but is the music industry keen to take a look at the current state of music vids? Of course not, it is it locked in a battle of one-upmanship that started with a flash of breast in Duran Duran’s Girls on Filmand whose natural evolution, in a world of readily available porn, is the butt-vibrating antics of Minaj and co. But while risqué music videos have existed as long as the medium it seems they are now deployed less for shock factor than a lack of creativity. We live in a world where it is easier to make a video not suitable for work than it is to make it not suitable for twerk.
Sex clearly still sells, it always has, and I don’t even necessarily think that Cameron’s warning labels will work, or that they are really enforceable, but I do applaud him for at least having a go. I know as a teen if you said I couldn’t watch something, do something or take something I would redouble my efforts to do just that, but as a parent YouTube videos are a minefield for the young and some guidance might be useful. It is simply more difficult to police a channel that is 24-7 sex fed straight into your home than it is to put the kids to bed before a 9pm watershed when the uncut vids would come out.
Cameron’s system should be viewed more as an information system than a ratings one, designed not to demonise videos, or make them more attractive due to their salaciousness, but a guide to help you tell whether the younger pop fans should be listening with or without pictures.
Because I fear that despite my best curatorial efforts my two boys are going to be going through life getting the message that female buns are only their to appeal to their anacondas, to paraphrase Ms Minaj.
dailylife.com.au