They’re doing something significant, and they’re doing something that can make a difference, simply by drawing attention to what Spotify has become: a content publisher whose main incentive to act responsibly will come from public scrutiny.
Those questions are, in the case of musicians asking to pull their music from Spotify to protest vaccine misinformation, answerable.
So why, the boycotter must be asked, draw the line here? We also live in a world in which individuals rarely ever wield more power than institutions. We live in a world of compromise and wickedness, built of systems guided not by virtue but by profit.
(Preview clips were removed by YouTube for violating the site’s community guidelines, but the three-hour-long episode remains live on Spotify.The questions that arise in the face of any boycott effort-whether against an unethical retailer, a disgraced performer, or an exploitative employer-can be paralyzing. But as the pandemic rolled around, the Swedish streaming company found themselves with a new dilemma on their hands, as Rogan began using his podcast to amplify conspiracy theories about the virus, whether publicizing the views of anti-vaxxer guests, endorsing treatments such as ivermectin that have been widely disproven to be effective against Covid, or in the most recent instance, hosting Malone, who used the episode to promote the notion that hospitals are being financially incentivized to falsify Covid mortalities and compared U.S. At the time, many music fans (and, indeed, Spotify employees) questioned the decision, given Rogan’s history of racist remarks, transphobic jokes, and misogyny. But how did the controversy begin?įirst, there was the deal Spotify signed with Rogan in 2020, in which the company reportedly paid over $100 million for exclusive rights to his hit podcast The Joe Rogan Experience.
“I stand in solidarity with Neil Young and the global scientific and medical communities on this issue.” It comes after growing concern from medical professionals in the wake of a particularly controversial episode of Rogan’s podcast in December featuring the vaccine skeptic and right-wing media star Dr. “Irresponsible people are spreading lies that are costing people their lives,” she wrote in a statement posted to her website. Both artists have now removed their music from the platform, accusing Spotify of allowing Covid misinformation to spread by continuing to stream Joe Rogan’s controversial podcast. On Friday, the legendary singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell announced she would be joining fellow musician Neil Young in his protest against Spotify.
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