The Year of "You're an Idiot"
a.k.a. The coarsening of online discourse and its impact on electronic music culture.
I can’t do it. I can’t write another “Spotify is bad” article.
Yes, just like everyone else, my social media feeds were full of those terrible Spotify Wrapped graphics last week, and I once again shook my head in disapproval, lamenting the fact that artists and fans would willingly provide free marketing for a multi-billion-dollar company whose exploitative business model has been so thoroughly documented over the years. Apparently, not even the news that Spotify CEO Daniel Ek had recently invested €100 million into an AI-based defense start-up was enough to dampen many people’s willingness to share their Wrapped stats.
The idea of Spotify’s profits literally being used to fund the war machine is something that sounds too ridiculous to be true, and yet that’s exactly what’s happening. And yes, the usual suspects have all tweeted their disapproval, and a #BoycottSpotify hashtag briefly did the rounds, but what’s been the concrete end result? A brief uptick in the streaming discourse and basically zero real change.
The latter isn’t really surprising, but as I looked through the most recent streaming debates that have unfurled online, I couldn’t help but notice the prevalence of a cynical (and rather depressing) streaming narrative. It takes many forms, but was perhaps most colorfully laid out in this tweet from UK outfit Sleaford Mods:
“Spotify is grim, but everything is grim, and I like using it, so shut up and stop bumming me out” isn’t the most progressive take, but it’s one that many people seem to share these days. In many ways, what’s being said here is essentially a variant of the idea that “there is no ethical consumption under capitalism,” and while that meme-ready concept was likely originally coined to encourage people to focus on systemic problems (as opposed to shaming individuals for their actions), it’s wild how many people have twisted the philosophy into a blanket rationalization for whatever they do.
That kind of consumer hypocrisy isn’t exactly new—and, if we’re being honest, it’s something that just about everyone is guilty of in one way or another—but what really struck me about that Sleaford Mods tweet was its obvious disdain for anyone who dared to disagree with its position. If someone is criticizing Spotify, they’re just an “edgy wanker” or a “diluted tosser with no tunes.” In the mind of the tweet’s author—who was almost surely vocalist Jason Williamson—he’s expressed “the truth,” and anyone who disagrees is basically an idiot.
This dynamic is something that’s present in seemingly every aspect of cultural discourse these days. Granted, people have been shitposting and attacking each other online ever since the internet was first invented, but where it was once limited to random chat rooms and comment sections, the rise of social media has made online evisceration into a kind of sport. Being an asshole on the internet is more than just a pastime nowadays; it’s practically a viable identity, and one that’s regularly rewarded with likes, retweets and clout, especially if said asshole’s quips are delivered with a catty flair or something resembling wit.