Former Mumford & Sons star Winston Marshall slammed artists who removed their music from Spotify in protest over Joe Rogan, suggesting they're facilitating "bottom-up authoritarianism" by censoring themselves before they've even been censored.
Following allegations made against Joe Rogan of spreading "COVID misinformation" on his Spotify podcast, a number of artists have chosen to remove their music from the platform in protest.
While some have supported their actions, many have warned that it is a dangerous precedent to set. The latest artist to speak out on the issue is former Mumford & Sons banjo player Winston Marshall.
On Thursday, Winston Marshall published an essay in Barri Weiss' Substack, Common Sense, in which he weighed in on the controversy surrounding Joe Rogan and censorship.
Marshall began the piece by recounting the state of music in the Soviet Union, and how in the height of the Cold War bands were required to have at least 80 percent of their music written by a member of the state-sanctioned Union of Composers.
He goes on to suggest that the "top-down authoritarian dystopia" of the past has been replaced by "bottom-up authoritarianism," in which artists censor themselves, or even "lateral censorship," where artists censor other artists.
While a number of artists have removed their music from Spotify in protest against the platform's handling of Joe Rogan, it was Canadian legend Neil Young who spearheaded the effort. Marshall criticized Young for leaving Spotify, while maintaining a presence on other platforms.
"You can still stream his songs on Apple (ignore their forced Uyghur labor in Xinjiang)," he wrote, "and on Amazon (but don't read about the company's infamous working conditions in James Bloodworth's book 'Hired.')"
"Keep on rocking in the free world, Neil," Marshall added, referencing Young's hit song in which he rails against the US government.
Marshall admitted that while Spotify is a private company and thus has "no obligation to platform anybody," he finds it unsettling that the artistic climate is changing.
"How can any artist possibly create without free speech?" he asked. "How are they supposed to be artists if they’re scared that making a mistake or taking a risk that another artist doesn’t like will get them kicked off the very platform that allows them to share their art in the first place?"
Citing the fact that the Biden administration recently came out in favor of censoring content they deem to go against public health measures, Marshall suggested that, "Maybe a return to Soviet-style censorship is well on its way. But this time supported by artists in favor of orthodox establishment thought."
Marshall himself knows all too well the consequences of speaking one's mind as an artist. In 2021, he left the band Mumford & Sons, of which he'd been a member for 14 yers, after Antifa and left-wing media smeared him for his support of journalist Andy Ngo.
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