I do skim many of the news threads, but I usually avoid commenting both to save time (do you want me to get involved in long arguments there, too?), and because the only news threads that are allowed here are for a very specific subset of indie artists that doesn't reflect the genre as a whole, and includes only a few artists I care a lot about. Every day we have 10 FJM news threads. I don't have any opinion or interest in him, so I don't participate. I don't actually enjoy being negative about things other people like, unless they come for my fav, or describe something inaccurately- I realized like a decade ago that I don't enjoy arguing on the Internet, so I only do it if I am defending something I care about, I don't just try to tear down all the shit others like, or you'd see me destroying FJM, Fleet Foxes, Grizzly Bear, Vampire Weekend, Beach House, Tame Impala, The National, and even Sufjan to an extent, since I don't even like most of those artists' music (let alone love or admire them as people- aside from Sufjan- or believe they deserve their rep). Hell, I got 40 downvotes when I merely suggested that the music of LCD (which I prefer to any of the above, but still don't love that much for the most part) was done a disservice by the director of the documentary Shut Up and Play the Hits, which I called a terrible film. If I can't even say that, what the fuck can I say? Certainly I'm not about to share my opinion that Chairlift, not LCD, are the true New York hipster flagship band of the past 10 years and the band who achieved more in three albums than LCD could hope to, and the band who will be missed more without even needing to market their breakup and reunion, and a band whose members exemplify all the thoughtfulness, conscience and playfulness that LCD have no trace of (maybe I'm biased because I've had a conversation with Caroline on twitter, but I already felt that way).

The other problem with this sub is that If you start a thread on an artist who isn't white or an artist who makes music not involving "real instruments" all the time, unless it's already an extremely popular artist, the thread will just be consumed with questions about whether that artist actually "belongs" in the sub, and mods will delete it eventually. Even female white artists get that to an extent, especially if electronic elements are present in their work. Grimes would be dismissed as not relevant to this sub if she was a black or Latino artist making the same music. She is occasionally questioned in her indie status as it is.

This sub is also a complete disaster because the mods delete any substantive discussion threads. There's no opportunity to have general discussions about music, without getting buried in the unreadable 500-post daily discussions (talk about monumental waste of time- having to read 500 comments to find if any interesting subjects were raised, instead of being able to pick and choose based on thread titles). All discussion threads on any subject are deleted, and all music news-related threads are usually deleted unless the artist is in a specific demographic category or recently was featured on Pitchfork.

The essentials list is just about the only area where the mods have allowed any community input into what they do, and it's important because it determines how we define indie in the present, which affects which of today's indie artists and their fans be at home in the sub. If we created an indie essentials list that features Prince, YMO, Grace Jones, Fela Kuti, etc., that would have more of a positive effect than anything else, it lets everyone know that music that resembles these artists are a key part of indie and you can trace back a history of this type of artist belonging here. It makes it harder for mods to routinely delete posts of certain races of indie artists, claiming they aren't indie, the way they were doing for a while.

Right now literally every single artist in the essentials is fronted by a white person, except Massive Attack, who had been a democratic collective up until Mezzanine, but were increasingly under 3D's control from that point on after Mushroom's departure, so even they fit. More important than the race of artists is obviously the types of music they do, and the music that falls under the indie umbrella today (including music by straight white boys) is now just as heavily influenced by Prince, YMO, Grace Jones and Fela (and actually, always has been, to a degree- see, Remain in Light) as it is by, say, Big Black. Actually indie today is waaaaay less influenced by Albini than by Prince. You can like that or hate that, but the fact is that Prince is a more enduring influence.

So if we create an essentials list that is entirely white (once again, this will probably happen- our '80s candidates include 79 white-fronted acts and a mere 2 acts fronted by POCs) it is not only a disaster for the obvious reason, it's also just seriously inaccurate as a representation of the 1980s music that eventually developed into today's indie. It creates a false impression that black, Latino and Asian indie artists did not exist in the '80s and only white artists were making indie music then, which makes any present non-white indie acts appear as aberrant tokens. Actually, there was much more racial integration and collaborations in the early '80s indie scene (albeit, mostly in certain cities like NYC and London) than at any time until the Obama administration. Yet this list has been manipulated by mods to wipe out the artists who aren't white people from English speaking countries.

I have an issue with it because it affects what happens when current artists who aren't white people or aren't from English speaking countries are trying to make it in "indie." They're dismissed and told they don't belong, or their only way of getting indieheads' attention is by imitating the most stereotypically "white" rock sound they possibly can (whereas a white indie artist is free to sound poppy or R&B-like, without having their indie cred dismissed) and writing songs directly about racism (or their songs being misinterpreted that way- see Mitski). They are only seen to have a value insofar as their work is a political statement that is "about race". Their personal statements and perspectives, their own musical tastes or traditions, are perceived to have no validity unless they can be think-pieced by white people into being a comment (even if a negative one) on white people (and the white critic will usually deal with the negativity by making other white people the target- e.g. female or queer male white critics demonizing straight white men as the subject of certain Mitski songs while acting like they themselves are not part of white privilege).

Anyway, that situation persists only because the contributions of POCs in indie are rendered invisible so that each one is seen as a novelty. Hell, how many Arcade Fire fans are even aware Regine is black? You could do that Beyonce sketch with her and you'd genuinely shock 90% of their fans. Does Nancy Whang even exist? The way these acts are talked about, understandably, centers on the very stereotypically-white background of the frontmen (who unfortunately- given that they are weaker vocalists- sing virtually all the group's songs). How many people know the lead guitarist of the most influential indie rock band of all time (a band Weezer copied, and- like many others- could not have existed without) was/is a Filipino American. How many white women who just graduated and who write these dumbass Mitski think pieces about the whiteness of indie are aware of that?

The usual whiteness of indie is something that is not invented- the scene is heavy on white people, especially in leading roles (Joey Santiago was not the frontman)- but it can be vastly overstated, and that overstatement is used to further enforce and entrench it. The mods of this sub have been making decisions that help entrench this. I understand their rationale in using a very strict, punk/post punk-based definition of what indie is in the '80s (which is why only Bad Brains and A.R. Kane made the cut) but they seem to give endless leeway to white artists to make music beyond that field, e.g. My Life in the Bush of Ghosts is essentially a hip hop record, and the samples are derived from Middle Eastern and African music, and this is counted as indie, but artists from those African countries, even who make rock records that get many upvotes, have been disqualified??

Another example, Disintegration. It's essentially a pop record, which uses guitars as a lead instrument (which was often true of pop at the time). It can be compared to Prince in that regard. So why is 1999 (whose highest charting singles were less successful than the ones from Disintegration), let alone Dirty Mind (which had no charting hits) disqualified for being "too pop" and Disintegration is not?

The list goes on...