The Give Away Myth: What They Don’t Want You To Know

by NDK Creative Artist

In his piece BIG PICTURE: Just what is entertainment worth?, Patrick Goldstein of the Los Angeles Times perpetrated a common mainstream media and music industry myth, throwing the credibility of his entire article into question when he falsely states: “That’s why Prince gave away millions of copies of his latest CD, because the real money for him was in concert tickets.”

I’ve already pointed out that this is untrue and Prince did not give away his album but licensed it in a groundbreaking strategic move, but The Give Away Myth is a line the media companies are following in order to continue the idea that artists cannot make money independent of the major companies. The complicit media are happy to serve their large budget owners, clients and help them preserve their business. Prince, in fact, licensed the album to the newspaper for a princely sum. It was not a give-away at all.

If you look back through history, really look, and study you will find that the oppression of those who create, the manipulation of them, and the constant attempts to refuse to pay them, even from popes and the papacy is well-known and documented. Rarely has a fair exchange been made, unless it served some other agenda.

“I see little of more importance to the future of our country and of civilization than full recognition of the place of the artist. If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him.”– John F. Kennedy

Yes, JFK was right, but it really is Mankind that needs to achieve this recognition. That recognition has not occurred in a true and honest fashion. Rather, the economic Elite have subverted the arts to their own ends and now use art & entertainment as a vehicle to push harmful ideas and products through the artifice of product placement not only in movies, and television to fuel desire but in the lyrics of songs and flash-in-the-pan one-hit-wonders, whose purpose in society is simply to generate attention from a generation raised on the benefits of retail therapy rather than the consideration and examination of their own behavior, habits and attitudes.

The predominant harmful ideas pushed through American art & entertainment are that violence is the solution to every problem; and this is a uniquely American Mythology that is perpetuated because it makes it okay to raise warriors, who fuel the massive military-industrial-mediaplex (the MIMP). It puts the idea into every American mind that violence is a normal and acceptable part of every day life. This makes every American who buys into their national mythology mad. They think they are a superpower, with a divine right to dominate the world, and this is at odds with the words that founded their nation and brought great hope to the world. That the history of America’s founding has been so warped and twisted in the space of a few hundred years is to be well-marked, and its corruption needs to be undone, if we are to have real security in the world so we can combat far larger problems that affect all mankind and of which America happens to be the worst offender to date.

So this duplicitous society has got to stop being duplicitous. The place to set this straight first, is in the art & entertainment industry itself, for the creative industry sets the tone, and defines the health and wellbeing of society, inspires the people who make up that society, and ensures its forward progress when its messages, the ideas contained within its works of art, literature, song, image and music actually have something worthwhile to say that ultimately has a good effect on society. Liberate the art & entertainment industry and the changes that will result throughout civilization will be sweeping and fast. Fail to do this and the ability of the arts to spread beneficial ideas rapidly will be severely curtailed and this “civilization” will continue to flounder until it beaches and gasps its last breath like a dying whale that has lost its course and ability to navigate.

“We demand zero tolerance of violence against journalists and press freedom. But today more subtle threats to freedom of expression come from within media as a result of media concentration, globalization and a culture of greed within the industry.” — International Federation of Journalists, May 2001

The creative industry today is little more than a glove puppet for the economic Elite. Thus, what they and their minions have to say about it is not to be trusted. The arts need to be free, and in a fascist society such as America has become, it is not, so we need to move the arts beyond the reach of nations and corporate or organized religious influence, once and for all.

Return for a moment to our discussion of Elbert Hubbard’s words in the fourth part of the Hollywood Writer’s Strike regarding Whitman, who co-authored The Good Gray Poet defending and espousing artistic freedom and whose “prose comments on the role of the poet in shaping both America’s and humanity’s destinies, and the importance of democracy as an element in the formation of character.” His name now celebrates his existence on billboards, signposts, stores and street signs, and thus supports and contributes to the economies of his home town and others, who continue to make money from his life and his work long after he is dead.

Reflect for long moments if you are able, upon how much artists give in life and in their death, that which is yet to be fully accounted for by any society on this good earth and in this current mad affair with materialism and consumerism we call ‘civilization.’

After all these hundreds of years, after all the successes and fortunes made from the work of artists living and dead, our so-called civilization will go on failing to pay attention, thinking it knows better, when it obviously does not.

A Few Words (you know I’m not a man of few words by now, don’t you)

If our ‘civilization’ did know so much and operate so well, then it would not have poisoned our atmosphere and oceans. We would not, after “the wars to end all wars” still engage in war. We would be demonstrating just how smart we are. Instead our economies are in a shambles, hovering on the brink of utter collapse, with increasing debt, increasing poor, a dying middle class, and a super-wealthy upper class.

In life creatives are so often derided for their strange ways and dedication to nothing more than the intangible and presently imaginary (which may truly be prescient), but in death it seems we are doomed to achieve the value and recognition we were not afforded in life so we might have lived more reasonable lives.

And when we’re not being ripped off in death, we’re being ripped off in life!

Where is the justice and fairness in this? How does this make our society great, grand or anything else other than indifferent and duplicitous?

In death our names and our reputations fuel economies, driving tourism internationally and inspiring local pride and entrepreneurship, and are celebrated, often by many copycats; Elvis impersonator anyone? Been to Shakespeare’s Theater? It seems that everybody’s got one, but he didn’t own the real one, The Globe! Think about this—he wasn’t valued enough by the British to reconstruct a replica of his playhouse, an American however, did!

Yes, it thrives trading on the name of a man dead and gone over 400 years! What a strength of brand created from nothing more than what?

A few words.

(photograph by Gordon Jackman)

What are a few words worth?

Fifty Million English Pounds are being invested. You know why? It’s a sure thing. More money. From who? An artist: a writer, a poet, a playwright whose brand is 400+ years strong. £50,000,000! It’s nothing. Because the return on this over the next 1000 years is going to be tremendous, providing the Thames doesn’t flood.

So is it really true that “the value of art & entertainment is not known“? Oh, puh-leeze! (Rhymes with sleaze, and weasel!)

Van Gogh, a painter of immense talent, died a pauper, only to be “discovered” and now his works tour the world to all the prestigious museums, there to be seen by millions who pay millions, and this is just? This is fair? This is economic democracy? Makes me want to puke in disgust at the injustice this really is.

History is replete with similar stories of this sort of injustice, and while things have most certainly improved in the last couple of hundred years—there are artists who are now able to create and benefit from their acts of creation, where before the life of poverty was the norm—but today this opportunity is bottlenecked by an industry which has a different agenda that does not serve humanity and who now say “We have a problem, we don’t know the worth of art and entertainment, any more” even as they do deals and tell their shareholders they’ll be making $500,000,000 - $1,000,000,000 and more from internet media business!

Just who do they think their words are fooling? The “stupid writers” whose very heart and soul loves what words do? Pfft!

In a land where “words mean nothing,” and “words are cheap” is it any wonder these executives don’t want to pay for what they know is as meaningless as the drivel that comes out of their mouths? Been to see the art and architecture of Egypt - all that’s left of a once mighty civilization? The Louvre? Or the Vatican where the main tourist attraction is the art? Pfft! HYPOCRISY!

Artists, creative individuals made all this possible and even in death they serve civilization, mankind and all humanity—whether they like it or not.

I call this what it is: discrimination. It is discrimination because it has an adverse impact on those who are discriminated against. It is a huge argument for sweeping art & entertainment industry reform and that is, in part, what we see happening in this the 21st Century. It is Creative Artist Discrimination, or as the acronym alludes: CAD-like behavior.

Where do we go now?

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If you'd rather we did all the hard work, you're in luck. Here's a list of articles that are related to this one:

• The Creative Artist as Global Activist — Applauding Trent Reznor’s Example
• Foundation Principles — The Declaration of Creative Independence and the Code of a Creative Artist
• Shall we Shovel the Last bit of Dirt into the Traditional Music Industry’s Grave?
• The Points of the Creative Artists’ Code: Twenty-one - Never throw your work away
• The Hollywood Writer’s Strike: Why do I want it to go on longer?