What now, Spotify?
In a Spotify all-hands company meeting on Wednesday, Spotify CEO Daniel Ek defended keeping transphobic content from hugely popular podcaster Joe Rogan on the audio platform, who earlier this year signed an exclusive licensing deal with the company likely worth tens of millions of dollars.https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/xg8jq4/spotify-joe-rogan-transphobic
The Vice article that the above quote refers to is—quite the opposite of Spotify—very transparent about things. Funny, that; Spotify don't seem to like the prefix 'trans': trans people; transparency.
Spotify have tried to appear decent by deleting some of Joe Rogan's podcast episodes, notably those with the extremely damaging ultra-right-wing conspiracy nut Alex Jones and at least a couple of other far-right-wingers.
So, what is considered transphobic in Joe Rogan's recent podcast history?
The specific episode of the Joe Rogan Experience Ek was referring to was from July, in which Rogan interviewed Abigail Shrier, author of the book Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters, according to one of the sources. From the opening moments of that podcast, Shrier associates transgender youth with those with autism; Shrier and Rogan spend parts of the episode explaining that young people are being pressured into transitioning by YouTube and other media.
"You realize that people are not looking at this objectively," Rogan said in the podcast. "They are activists and they have this agenda, and the agenda is very ideologically driven that anybody who even thinks they might be trans should be trans, are trans, and the more trans people the better."
In the book, Shrier invalidates the lived experience of trans people by comparing transitioning to adolescent phenomena like eating disorders, self-harm, or the occult, according to Men's Health. She also described wanting to transition as a "contagion" with the potential to infect other children, an entirely scientifically baseless idea, Men's Health noted.
In other words: Joe Rogan subscribes to the idea that trans people 'have this agenda' that is 'ideologically driven' and 'the more trans people the better'.
This is not only shit: it's damaging shit.
Remember: Spotify has most likely paid Joe Rogan tens of millions of US Dollars to exclusively host him on their platform.
Result: it's clear that Rogan is not only transphobic but also gives way to Abigail Shrier, an anti-intellectual person who believes gender dysphoria to be a disease. There you go. Simple to see.
What does Daniel Ek, CEO of Spotify, think of this?
"Others have concerns specifically over a recent episode," Ek said. "And Joe Rogan and the episode in question have been reviewed extensively. The fact that we aren't changing our position doesn't mean we aren't listening. It just means we made a different judgment call."
Let me rephrase what Daniel Ek is saying:
'The fact that we aren't changing our position means that we support Joe Rogan in broadcasting his anti-intellectual, abusive, and damaging stance. Trans people are constantly at threat. We amplify Rogan with both money, technology, and advertisements.'
To Spotify, 'listening' means acting without ethics or morals. It's quite the illusory stance to make considering how listening is what, ultimately, makes them money.
What if we play by Spotify's rules?
"At Spotify, we are strongly committed to the LGBTQ+ community and diversity in all of its forms," a Spotify spokesperson told Motherboard. "All employees are respected and we believe that everyone has a right to be heard. We have a number of forums for open and transparent discussion and we encourage rigorous debate on topics across the company. All content on Spotify is subject to our long-standing content guidelines. Our diverse team of experts reviewed the content in question and determined that it did not meet the criteria for removal from our platform."
What does Spotify's content guidelines have to say about this?
Hate content is content that expressly and principally promotes, advocates, or incites hatred or violence against a group or individual based on characteristics, including, race, religion, gender identity, sex, ethnicity, nationality, sexual orientation, veteran status, or disability. We do not permit hate content on Spotify. When we are alerted to content that violates this standard, we will remove it from the platform. If you believe a piece of content violates our hate content policy, complete the form here and we will carefully review it against our policy. We are also continuing to develop and implement content monitoring technology which identifies content on our service that has been flagged as hate content on specific international registers.
Repeated violations of our prohibited content policies can result in losing access to the Spotify platform.
https://artists.spotify.com/faq/music#what-content-is-prohibited-on-spotify
Let's break this down by asking what hate is. Here is one of Merriam-Webster's definitions of hate:
intense hostility and aversion usually deriving from fear, anger, or sense of injury @MerriamWebster https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hate
- Hostility: deep-seated ill will
- Aversion: a feeling of repugnance toward something with a desire to avoid or turn from it
Wait: one aggrievance surely isn't enough to say somebody's hateful, right? Sadly, Joe Rogan has been transphobic in the recent past:
Joe Rogan has given people like this access to his gigantic audience, and Rogan rarely challenges his guests on their views, allowing them to launder their bad ideas on his show. Data & Society researcher Becca Lewis has argued that Rogan giving a platform to these people has led his audience down more extremist rabbit holes on YouTube. Lewis describes Rogan as a libertarian influencer "with mainstream appeal."
In another recent episode, Rogan explained a joke he made in 2016 about Caitlyn Jenner's transition, describing Jenner as "he" and using her deadname "Bruce." Rogan also mischaracterized the reason for Jenner's transition, saying it may have been because she was around her daughters Kylie Jenner and Kendall Jenner, that he describes as "crazy bitches."
"He's a homophobic, transphobic ass," Jenner told TMZ this week. "I've been gender disphoric my entire life."
As recently as August 31, in what he said was the first episode of the podcast for Spotify, Rogan joked that the Democratic party "just want to talk shit and make sure everyone is trans." He followed that up by saying "I don't mean that trans people, I'm with you." He also said that "my only pushback is about trans people competing as females in fighting." Rogan is a UFC commentator, and was referring to his long standing objection to trans women fighting other women in MMA.
Obviously, Joe Rogan has displayed hate against trans people. What will Spotify do about this?
If you ask Daniel Ek, they 'make a different judgement call', which shows Spotify for what they are. This is from their own guidelines:
Repeated violations of our prohibited content policies can result in losing access to the Spotify platform.
This is not about making a 'judgement call'; this is a company that acts like it works via ethics and does not; this is a capitalist company that hurts both the people who make them money—musicians—and the people who pay money to Spotify.
Remember, just 1.5 years ago, Spotify tried to reduce royalty payouts to artists by a third of what they made until then.
I hope more material leaks from Spotify on this, simply because:
At the meeting, Ek also told employees not to leak to the media, noting "If we can't have open, confidential debates, we will have to move those discussions to closed doors."
Do you work at Spotify? We'd love to hear from you. Using a non-work phone or computer, you can contact Joseph Cox securely on Signal on +44 20 8133 5190, Wickr on josephcox, OTR chat on jfcox@jabber.ccc.de, or email joseph.cox@vice.com.
Posted from my blog with SteemPress : https://niklasblog.com/?p=25336