LogFAQs > #979991270

New songs should be added to the spreadsheet (up to post #183, should anyone post more songs between the time I started this post and the time it actually got posted) and it should now have separate tabs so you can quickly skim by Nominator, Artist, or Song Title. Thank you all again.

redrocket posted...

I just want to say, dont lose hope. This place could still stick around for years to come. No one really knows that its going away.

Good advice, but from my perspective, it's basically already dead. I'm too old and bitter to coach my language in newspeak to avoid being censored by idiots who want to prevent people from being able to discuss actual issues. This topic series was always a safe place where I could work out my thoughts and feelings without constraints... and now that there are constraints, I feel unwelcome in what was once my home. And because everything is political in some way & the "no politics" rule is so incredibly, intentionally vague there's no telling where the line is.

For example, let's take a quick glance at that "Minnie the Moocher" nomination. A classic song about a homeless woman who falls into drug addiction, loses her grip on reality, and probably dies tragically. (At best, the "Poor Min" outro is lamenting the inevitability of a tragic demise, so we'll say "pretty well damned" even if she's legally defined as alive by the end of the song). It's not a political song, however you cannot engage with it without at least thinking about politics; about the way America has historically treated its homeless population, the inability for drug addicts to access the help they need, and the fact that tragedies like Min's continue to happen to this very day.

Now, I'm not saying that I want to discuss these politics. These are complicated issues and I do not have the education, nor life experience, to offer any real insight. However, we've gone from "I am not discussing the real world issues this song brings up because I am ill-suited to the task, but I do like that the song is inspiring me to reflect on things" to "I am not discussing the real world issues this song brings up because I don't want my topic locked". And crucially, I don't think anyone knows where the actual line for moderation is, because Fandom is intentionally leaving it so broad that it can mean anything our corporate overlords want it to mean.

And, I really must stress this, Minnie the Moocher is not even close to being the most political song in the topic. But politics are so fundamentally baked into everything we see and hear that "no politics" is basically the same as "no music". And I'm not sure I even want to hang around a dystopian shithole where we all have to only interact with media in the most absolutely banal, base level ways because capitalism decided thinking was bad for business.