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'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

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Re: 'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

#151

Post by [deleted] »

TacticalCoder wrote: post #124
nabla9 wrote: post #13

It makes perfect sense. Music industry is a economics of superstars. https://www.jstor.org/stable/1803469 Very few stars get huge profits and after that it's long slim tail. Talent or high work ethic is not enough for success, "getting discovered" aka someone likes you and invests the initial money and effort is another factor. If personal effort is not enough and the artist has nothing else, selling your ass for an…

> ... very high percentage of HN crowd would immediately say yes The most powerful world in the dictionary is "no". As an entirely self-made / self-taught person I know the power of that word. That you consider it a "pretty darn reasonable transaction" tells about your ethics and morality, not about the ethics and morality of a "very high percentage of HN crowd". Regarding fame/money, here's Ruyard Kipling's take on…

[deleted]

Re: 'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

#152

Post by Jochim »

enriquto wrote: post #98
Jochim wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Either way it usually has nothing to do with the job. Should we really be accepting of managers hiring/promoting people based on how likely they are to fuck them?

No, of course. But it still is an open door to many people who wouldn't be there otherwise. I'm not giving any assessment whether this is good or bad.

What is the point of discussing something like this other than to determine whether it was good or bad?

Re: 'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

#153

Post by lostgame »

known wrote: post #141

It's there in IT industry also; Girls silently suffer / quit jobs :(

While it is there, being female and in both industries myself I have to say that it's like comparing a cup of water to a bucket in terms of the sheer amount of sexual abuse that goes on in the music industry. And I say that as a victim of IT workplace sexual assault, and I unfortunately did exactly as you posted. :(

The music industry is harrowing. It's not to discount the very real trauma myself and others have gone through in the IT workplace - it sucks, it's shitty and it shouldn't be. However, the last decade especially, I've noticed IT has gotten progressively and better at this, and if women in my workplace or previous two were seriously mistreated everyone would be shocked and people would be immediately fired.

I don't have a lot of time to list off the horror stories right now, but pretty much everything you've heard about abuse in Hollywood is true, and it's much worse than you've heard.

I guess the abuse is just so much more systematic, established, and regular in the music industry, and; despite #metoo - it is unfortunately not progressing or evolving in the way that I have personally witnessed the IT industry do over the last decade. It just seems like more people have been exposed.

There's some bad apples in IT but tbh very often you do hear about them, and it destroys companies and careers.

The good apples in the music industry are the exception, not the rule, and in IT that playing field is incredibly more even.

Re: 'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

#154

Post by nabla9 »

beckman466 wrote: post #89
nabla9 wrote: post #13

It makes perfect sense. Music industry is a economics of superstars. https://www.jstor.org/stable/1803469 Very few stars get huge profits and after that it's long slim tail. Talent or high work ethic is not enough for success, "getting discovered" aka someone likes you and invests the initial money and effort is another factor. If personal effort is not enough and the artist has nothing else, selling your ass for an…

> I mean, if Jeff Besos would come to you and say: I invest into your startup $100M if I can fuck you into the ass tree times, very high percentage of HN crowd would immediately say yes. Ew. This comment is atrocious and shows your privilege. It sounds like you haven't listened to many stories of women experiencing systemic abuse, misogyny and humiliation (and who experience most of this abuse in the music industry).…

These two things don't compare:

a) People in position of power demanding sexual favors from people so that they can get on with their work or get small rewards.

b) Competitive entertainers prostituting themselves for rare opportunities to become wealthy celebrities. Exchanges of sex for extreme rewards.

Equating how people prostitute themselves for celebrity status and high income to the abuse that some background dancer gets every day is wrong.

I understand that people live and understand things trough celebrities, but that's not where the real problems are.

Re: 'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

#155

Post by zajio1am »

rectang wrote: post #90
thn-gap wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thousands of employees devote already 1/3 of their life doing a work they despise just so they can avoid starving. Getting literally fucked to save 40 years of bad work doesn't sound too bad.

Except that most sexual assault victims just get literally fucked and don't save 40 years of bad work. People generally perceive winner-take-all economies like the music industry through this same fallacious lens: they assume that the star experience is the norm and ignore the long tail. The music industry is a high-profile but economically tiny; it is not representative of the wider economy, and the star experience…

> Except that most sexual assault victims just get literally fucked and don't save 40 years of bad work.

But sexual assault is offtopic in this thread. OP discussed voluntary exchange and not sexual assault.

Re: 'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

#156

Post by tomp »

ceejayoz wrote: post #127
leesalminen wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was referring to the hypothetical utopia of “making sure people don't go hungry”, which is something that has never happened before in human history. But thanks for assuming negative intent.

The world produces enough food to feed everyone. Doubly true if you scope things to the developed world. Triply true if you scope it to the USA only. "No one starves" is just as reasonable a minimum standard to strive for as "no one gets raped". Yes, there are serious implementation details, but there's a big societal will factor at play too.

You’re making a strawman argument. The difference is between “being a local singer vs being a superstar”, not “being hungry vs fed”.

Re: 'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

#157

Post by fishe »

beckman466 wrote: post #89
nabla9 wrote: post #13

It makes perfect sense. Music industry is a economics of superstars. https://www.jstor.org/stable/1803469 Very few stars get huge profits and after that it's long slim tail. Talent or high work ethic is not enough for success, "getting discovered" aka someone likes you and invests the initial money and effort is another factor. If personal effort is not enough and the artist has nothing else, selling your ass for an…

> I mean, if Jeff Besos would come to you and say: I invest into your startup $100M if I can fuck you into the ass tree times, very high percentage of HN crowd would immediately say yes. Ew. This comment is atrocious and shows your privilege. It sounds like you haven't listened to many stories of women experiencing systemic abuse, misogyny and humiliation (and who experience most of this abuse in the music industry).…

Don't equate sex work (which is what is in op's example) with rape. It simultaneously denigrates sex workers while trivializing victims of sexual violence.

Re: 'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

#158

Post by steverb »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #145
shakow wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The big question is will internet free the good artists that were gatekeeped I don't think so. What they need the most is publicity, and this is not magically granted by internet. Just take a look at e.g. Spotify; I'm sure there are hundreds of extremely gifted artists sitting down at barely a few dozens listenings, just because no one found them.

Spotify charges $1/song/month as a listing fee. I bet a majority of Spotify artists pay more to Spotify than they receive.

I've never had to pay spotify a monthly fee to list a song. I've had to pay some one time costs to get the song listed (via a distributor), but I've never had to pay a maintenance fee of any sort.

And I assure you, the stuff I've put up does not make enough money to cover any fees (20 listens a month).

Re: 'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

#159

Post by ceejayoz »

tomp wrote: post #156
ceejayoz wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The world produces enough food to feed everyone. Doubly true if you scope things to the developed world. Triply true if you scope it to the USA only. "No one starves" is just as reasonable a minimum standard to strive for as "no one gets raped". Yes, there are serious implementation details, but there's a big societal will factor at play too.

You’re making a strawman argument. The difference is between “being a local singer vs being a superstar”, not “being hungry vs fed”.

This thread stems from a comment that stated:

> The fact that you wouldn’t even consider it shows that you haven’t gone hungry for a while.

Re: 'Sexual favours were the norm in music industry'

#160

Post by zajio1am »

wiz21c wrote: post #123
leesalminen wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me your comment is illustrating your privilege. Prostituting oneself three times to be financially set for life could be a perfectly acceptable trade off for millions of people. The fact that you wouldn’t even consider it shows that you haven’t gone hungry for a while.

ain't sure what you mean by acceptable. All of this discussion comes to one question : do you have a choice or not. You have a choice to run a start up and make any sacrifice you think necessary. You don't have a choice to eat something when you're hungry. If you don't have a choice, then you're a victim. (and yes, not everyone has a choice, not everyone just has to work more to get the choice, many people, at some p…

It is not that you have only two options:

1) Get $100M and anal sex from Bezos

2) Be hungry

You can take third option, do not take Bezos's offer, do not make startup and instead do same basic work. So in this case you have choice.

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