May 8, 2008

Music: Million DJ March to Unite Annoying, Headphone-Wearing Dorks

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mojo-photo-milliondj.gifThis can’t be serious. Eminem associate DJ Green Lantern and mixtape empresario A. Shaw have just announced The Million DJ March, a series of activities and rallies in support of the good old disk jockey, to be held August 28-30 in Washington D.C. Wait a minute, I’m a DJ. Why do I need to rally? Well, in a press release, Shaw alleges that “DJs do not get fully recognized for the work they do… Label and major businesses who reap the rewards of default publicity need to pay attention and give more recognition and financial compensation to DJs for the promotion they provide, without which music sales would surely suffer.” Well, okay, yes, we play music, people should be happy we do that. Hooray us. But why all this marching? The press release continues:

DJs… are often harassed and legally penalized for their promotional efforts even when those efforts have been solicited directly by the labels and artists themselves: an arrangement that is known about throughout the industry but kept “on the low.”

Hmm, harassment and legal penalties. Are you talking about what happens when you sell thousands and thousands of unauthorized mixtape CDs out of the back of your car?

After the jump: hey, I pressed “play,” that’ll be $25,000.

Either way, speaking as a DJ, I can say with great confidence that DJs are 99% douchebag losers, with our dippy hairdos and “Get Low” remixes and MySpace profiles and shouting out for the crowd to make some noise just because we pressed “play.” Ugh. Moreover, like a lot of the showbiz professions, DJs either make almost no money because they’re playing for 15 friends at the local beer hall, or way, way too much money because they dated Nicole Richie . (Actually he’s a talented DJ and a nice guy, but still, $10,000-$25,000 per set?)

Okay, sure, Grandmaster Flash, astounding genius, and yes, I’ve enjoyed amazing sets by everybody from Q-Bert to Erol Alkan. There’s as much art to a good DJ set as there is to any musical performance, or a photo collage, or whatever. But if cover bands marched on Washington to demand appreciation for helping promote their near-namesakes, people might find it a little ridiculous. Or, come to think of it, completely awesome. Can we get Superdiamond and No Way Sis to headline?

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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