Censorship and freedom of speech

Along with the freedom of speech in the media comes controversy. Creators of art have a motivation for their work, usually it pertains to a message they want to convey and that message is not always going to be agreeable with society’s popular viewpoints at the time. Our text points out that there are four major forms of censorship today: Music labeling, governmental criticism, Chain store restrictions and radio play restrictions (Rodman pp.240). These different levels of censorship create pockets of controversy for the industry in terms of freedom and creativity. Who has the argument beat when there is a 1st amendment? Who is in the right?
In the late 1980s labeling on albums to warn the buyers of any lyrics that might be offensive were added to the cover. This led to chain store restrictions in huge corporations such as Walmart, where the albums profits are very connected. Walmart has refused the sales of albums that contain these labels and therefore initiated the recording industry to adjust to changing the album covers if need be and even in some situations the songs, so they could gain sales from these stores support.
Governmental criticism and radio play restrictions are closely tied with the public’s view that censoring what goes out on the radio is a boundary to closely set up by the government authority and squashes the concept of the first amendment. Although America does not have a completely libertarian system when it comes to the media, the government does allow some private ownership. As this system grants, some private ownership is allowed, and this could be a cause for controversial issues surrounding censorship; the government and the effects of complete freedom of speech. So in reality when I think of who is just in their point of view, the record industry and the artists or the corporations that sell their product, there is no clear choice as to what side to defend. Each side has to make its case and compromise in the end. Although I would say the artist does have has the final decision in the end; change the atmosphere of the album, or risk profits by staying true to the original intent of their artistic vision.