Separating the art from the artist

[Swift]

I'm a Michael Jackson fan. Nowhere near as big as my teenage years where I was somewhat of an obsessive and worshipped the man himself. I still listen to his music (all the albums, multiple releases of singles) but could easily go months without throwing one on. My musical tastes have changed and as I hit adulthood I realised he was a flawed and strange man and not the god I imagined. But I'm still a fan.

I never believed the child abuse allegations before. At the time I didn't want to believe them, but even after reading about them recently I thought they were money grabbing attempts. The reviews of the documentary set to air tonight and tomorrow however have stated that the two men's stories come across as very believable and I fear there's going to be a major backlash against Jackson and his music.

I'm not a fan of this cancel culture nonsense currently going on (besides, how do you "cancel out" someone as famous and influential as Michael Jackson?) I think it's up to us as individuals to weigh up how we feel about artists and their art and make our own choices as to how we engage with them. With that in mind, how do you handle it when your favourite artists have been accused/found guilty of heinous crimes? I currently have no problem enjoying Woody Allen films, would have no problem watching a Chris Benoit match and have absolutely zero issue with seeing lecherous fools like Kevin Spacey (who I feel has been judged incredibly harshly) on my screen. It's surprising in the #metoo stuff that rock stars haven't been mentioned much because it's almost certain that every major star has behaved inappropriately with teenage boys/girls, from the Beatles to the Who, Bowie to Prince.

I don't want to defend Jackson but the man isn't around to refute any allegations and so accusers will always have the last word. However I'm bracing myself for the horrible realisation that I may believe he's guilty too and I'm struggling with how to deal with that. If tomorrow your favourite artist was accused of horrific crimes, would you still be able to enjoy them as an artist?

(And yes, before the resident outrage brigade jumps in, I realise that my struggle in these matters is trifling compared to any victim's actual abuse suffered)

[OSJ]

Eh, we've kind of been down this road before, I assume if we are as tasteful as last time that Phil will have no problem leaving the thread alone. This sort of came up before in a discussion of H.P. Lovecraft, a prissy, New England racist twat who behaved as though he lived in the 1700s, not the early half of the twentieth century. I find his views nothing short of appalling and was one of the loudest voices in the campaign to remove his likeness from the World Fantasy Award. That said, I've always thought that his dozen or so real outstanding stories hold up with anyones. My bro, JT is black, and has even more to be appalled about when it comes to HPL. I don't want to put words in his mouth, but I think that we both reached the same conclusion, HPL was a vastly influential writer whose best works we enjoy, even though we couldn't be bothered to cross a room to meet him unless it were to punch him in the face. 

As to horrible behavior by various celebrities? I'm not a Michael Jackson guy, never have been. I found him a vastly talented man who didn't do the kind of thing that I like to listen to. As far as his behaviors, the dude was flat-out strange and this is coming from a guy who considers Roy Wood, Lux Interior, and David Bowie to be the Holy Trinity, so for me to label someone "strange", they really need to be a couple of sandwiches short of a picnic. Let's use an example that's closer to heart for me: Miles Davis. Has there ever been such a brilliant musician who was such a POS as a human being? I'd be hard-pressed to think of any. 

Chris Benoit? Met him on several occasions and would have told you that a more respectful, humble and polite gentleman did not exist within the framework of wrestling. I was of course completely wrong, and there are examples of Benoit behaving in a psychotic manner going all the way back to Stampede. Yeah, all those diving head-butts didn't help anything, but Chris Benoit was wired in a very dark different way going back years and years. That said, he was in a number of my favorite matches and while I'm not real bif on re-watching a bunch of stuff, I have no problem watching his matches. 

Separate the art from the artist, kids! You'll be much happier if you can do so.

[Control]

Hey there was just an article being circulated about "cancel culture" that essentially argued that it's a side-effect of a lack of real justice. I think the argument went: if these people actually suffered for the shit they did, you could enjoy what the produced, since they were actually held accountable. However, cuz they keep escaping accountability, we feel the need to punish ourselves, by denying ourselves the shit they made that was actually good and brought us joy.

Here it is

[Brian Fowler]

Here's my somewhat hypocritical self-justification on a similar issue.

Chris Brown has a history of domestic violence against women. So did John Lennon. I don't particularly care for Brown's music. Lennon is one of my top three all-time musicians. It's easy to boycott Brown. But I think the big difference is this:

John Lennon was murdered nearly a year before I was born. If I bought a Chris Brown record, Chris Brown gets money from me. When I buy a John Lennon record, he's dead and gets no royalties. In fact, some of the money likely ends up in the pocket of at least one of his victims.

I literally can only name two R Kelly songs, but I have a couple MJ albums on vinyl. I didn't buy a Michael Jackson album as an adult until after he died, then I almost immediately bought his Number 1's comp CD.

He's dead, you aren't enabling him anymore. When you buy R Kelly music (or stream it) you are contributing to his legal defense fund.

[Eivion]

I have to thank you for this thread, Swiftian. I've been having similar issues ever since I heard about this documentary coming last month. Fowler's approach is probably what I come closest to agreeing with.

Edited March 4, 2019 by Eivion

[Guest Stefanie Without Stefanie]

I think it's easier for folks to say they can separate the art from the artist if they aren't directly impacted by the affects of the artist's behavior. I'm not judging when I say that, mind you, I just think when there's a more personal impact people take it a little more seriously.

Personally, I feel there is so much good art in this world that if I feel uncomfortable listening to a song or watching a movie, I have plenty of replacements available. I also don't think it's my place to judge what someone else's standards should or shouldn't be, aside from "don't be a jerk, especially to marginalized communities".

[Matt D]

3 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

Here's my somewhat hypocritical self-justification on a similar issue.

Chris Brown has a history of domestic violence against women. So did John Lennon. I don't particularly care for Brown's music. Lennon is one of my top three all-time musicians. It's easy to boycott Brown. But I think the big difference is this:

John Lennon was murdered nearly a year before I was born. If I bought a Chris Brown record, Chris Brown gets money from me. When I buy a John Lennon record, he's dead and gets no royalties. In fact, some of the money likely ends up in the pocket of at least one of his victims.

I literally can only name two R Kelly songs, but I have a couple MJ albums on vinyl. I didn't buy a Michael Jackson album as an adult until after he died, then I almost immediately bought his Number 1's comp CD.

He's dead, you aren't enabling him anymore. When you buy R Kelly music (or stream it) you are contributing to his legal defense fund.

Just talking about wrestling, it's easier for me to separate with 80s Invader I matches that I never saw until 30-40 years later as opposed to Benoit matches that I lived through and enjoyed at the time. That's not a one-to-one situation obviously, but the personal connection is a human thing too.

[Brian Fowler]

It's funny. I watch old WCW shows fairly often, and sometimes Benoit will come on and I won't care at all and others it'll hit me like a ton of bricks and I'll fast forward.

[Matt D]

11 minutes ago, Brian Fowler said:

It's funny. I watch old WCW shows fairly often, and sometimes Benoit will come on and I won't care at all and others it'll hit me like a ton of bricks and I'll fast forward.

But to specify further, an Invader I match is a historical relic to me and a Benoit match isn't.

Edited March 4, 2019 by Matt D

[AxB]

Any time you have a terrible person who makes great art, the question of separating the art from the artist comes up. When a really great person makes terrible art, not so much. "Why are you listening to this awful music? That bloke can't sing at all!" "Yeah, but he's a really nice guy". Doesn't happen, does it?

Of course, there are instances of bad people making bad art and still finding a loyal audience. But that's just mindless self indulgence, really.

[OSJ]

2 hours ago, AxB said:

Any time you have a terrible person who makes great art, the question of separating the art from the artist comes up. When a really great person makes terrible art, not so much. "Why are you listening to this awful music? That bloke can't sing at all!" "Yeah, but he's a really nice guy". Doesn't happen, does it?

Of course, there are instances of bad people making bad art and still finding a loyal audience. But that's just mindless self indulgence, really.

Actually, your first paragraph could be describing Rob Zombie or Lord David Sutch.   (and yes, I have albums by both, they're quite a lot of fun even if they can't carry a tune in a bucket.)

[John E. Dynamite]

Funny, I was planning on watching Knife in the Water later this week and my first step was to make sure I pirated the hell out of it.

[Contentious C]

On 3/4/2019 at 7:57 AM, AxB said:

Of course, there are instances of bad people making bad art and still finding a loyal audience. But that's just mindless self indulgence, really.

I think the shorter descriptive term is "juggalos".

[Mike Campbell]

A bunch of us lived through this when the whole Benoit thing happened. I've always had the same opinion, which is basically "You do you."  If you can watch the matches, or listen to the music, and be able to make that separation, more power to you. If you can't, like Brian sometimes feels like with Benoit, that's perfectly fine too. But nobody is wrong.

[odessasteps]

I used to say, at least for comics, I had a Venn diagram that included

Good Guy, Good Book, Bad Guy, Bad Book

So, if you had GG-BB, did you want to buy a book you did not like but was done by a good person to support them? And was someone enough of a bad person to stop you buying an enjoyable book? 

[Tabe]

I went through a stretch where I couldn't watch Benoit stuff.  Now I can, no problem.  I could easily watch House of Cards again, no problem.  For the most part, I am able to separate art/artist.

[Coletti]

Artists, musicians, performers, athletes - there are literally millions upon millions from the beginning until now that can be recognized and appreciated in place of somebody who turned out to be a piece of shit. I'm not necessarily going to jump down people's throats for liking what these pieces of shit put out, but the idea that we can't - or shouldn't - leave them in the past is completely false.

[Technico Support]

I guess I'm really into cancel culture   I haven't watched WWE since Trump was elected.  My rule was "I won't watch them again until Trump is out or Vince is out, which ever comes first."  But hearing how bad their creative has been, if Vince is still there after Trump is voted out, led off in shackles, or finally suffers a KFC-induced coronary, I still may wait until The Old Man calls it quits.

I also can't watch Benoit matches knowing he killed his wife and kid.  I absolutely can't separate the art from the artist.

[Contentious C]

"Billie Jean" is my jam.  I don't think I could name 5 truly better pop songs.  And, if I did, I wonder how many of those would be Jackson 5 songs (yes, it really is turtles all the way down there, Pop Jackson being someone who'd give Miles Davis a run for his money in the "OK, so someone can be 100% a dick" department).

And anyone who tried to tell me that Chinatown or The Usual Suspects (another double whammy) aren't objectively great films is just being a contrarian sonofabitch.

But here's another problem with this whole 'canceling' deal: selection bias.

Justice or lack thereof aside, we make a big deal about trying to shun these clowns, asshats, jokers, and fools because they're the ones we know about.

We don't live in that world where all the things we touch made it through that sort of quality control.  Should we live in that world?  We better damn well try.  But we don't, and any flavor of uxorious fascination should give us pause.

Edited March 6, 2019 by Contentious C

[odessasteps]

My general attitude is: you are perfectly within in your rights to boycott/shun/... but (except in reasonable situations) you should not prevent others from making their own decisions.

That is generally about censoring historical artefacts/documents themselves due to changing cultural mores, but applies to their creators too.

Edited March 6, 2019 by odessasteps

[Coletti]

Purely out of curiosity, but what kind of censored documents and artifacts are you thinking about?

[odessasteps]

Just from my own personal experiences in my areas of study, things like the wartime WB/MGM/Disney cartoons or Golden Age comics, due to what we now call cultural insensitivity or offensiveness. 

As I think I have said here before, I would prefer things like that be available along with contemporary analysis to explain the cultural context rather than being locked away and unable to be seen/examined or put out in a censored format to lessen any potential backlash. That’s when you get things like some of the 40s Tom and Jerry cartoons either redrawn or redubbed to remove “Mammy Two Shoes” .

Not to say everything should be available unfettered or unfiltered; just not hidden behind some moralistic locked door. 

(Comparison of original vs redone versions)

Edited March 6, 2019 by odessasteps

[Bustronaut]

God forbid old dudes can't watch offensive shit from their childhoods

[Coletti]

I'd argue that "what we now call cultural insensitivity or offensiveness" was always insensitive and offensive, especially to the folks mocked and degraded. 

[John from Cincinnati]

1 hour ago, odessasteps said:

That is generally about censoring historical artefacts/documents themselves due to changing cultural mores, but applies to their creators too.

What kind of artifacts are we talking about?