Dancehall Music Is Exempt From YouTube’s New Anti-Harassment Policy
YouTube has announced that it will no longer allow videos that “maliciously insult” individuals based on their race, gender and/or sexual orientation.
The video sharing platform is, by most estimates, the most popular online destination for music in the world. So some have wondered what do these new policies mean for the art form, and more specifically dancehall music which has a storied history of “gun chunes” and rampant hostility towards homosexuals. A report in the Jamaica Star, even suggests that artists should “change their tune” in light of the policy update.
The sweeping changes to its harassment policy are effective immediately and the Google-owned platform declares that it will penalize videos that violate the new guidelines. In the statement made by Matt Halprin, a Youtube Vice President, the company says they will also take further action on repeat offenders. The new community guidelines will also cover “toxic” comments made on the videos.
The stricter policies, Halprin says, will apply to everyone, “from private individuals, to YouTube creators, to public officials.”
However, buried in Youtube’s Help page, they have made exceptions for some content that may violate the new policies but only if the primary purpose of that content is educational, documentary, scientific or artistic in nature.
In their examples, they state that “scripted satire, stand up comedy, or music (e.g. a diss track)” are all exempt from the new harassment policy but they warn that it is not a “free pass” to target individuals.
So dancehall music may be safe from these updated community policies.
Today, dancehall artistes have largely turned away from homophobic lyrics in their music but several deejays have older hit songs on the platform that advocate or glorify the killing of gay men — among them Beenie Man, Elephant Man, and Vybz Kartel.
Most notorious tracks like Buju Banton’s 1988 hit Boom Bye Bye and Sizzla‘s Nah Apologise may continue to find a home on the platform. Buju had earlier this year said he would no longer perform Boom Bye Bye. He last performed it in 2007. The song was also removed from his catalog and all streaming services he controls but a few user uploads still exist on the platform today.
The company says “All of these updates represent another step towards making sure we protect the YouTube community.” But YouTube content creators have reacted to Wednesday’s statement with much criticism and debate. Many are worried where YouTube will draw the line with it comes to satire and commentary videos. In a video on the subject, popular YouTuber PewDiePie said he was nervous about the changes: “I asked YouTube about this because I was kind of worried [about] where they [are] going to draw the distinction.”