As protests demanding racial justice have multiplied since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis police custody last week, the spirit of reckoning has also spread across America, including within the music industry. One initiative seeks to redress the historic inequities of the music business by declaring Tuesday to be a one-day moratorium on business as usual — alternately knowns as #TheShowMustBePaused, Blackout Tuesday and Black Out Tuesday — as a means of identifying with protesters and considering how the music business can become more accountable to the black communities from which it profits.
As the initiative gained traction over the weekend, especially on social media, companies and organizations including major record labels like Columbia, Interscope and Republic Records announced their participation. Just as quickly, some wondered what participation would mean, and many questioned whether the effort, embraced so quickly by huge corporations, would end up being an empty gesture rather than a sincere effort to counteract a history of exploitation.
Brianna Agyemang and Jamila Thomas, both of whom are black female executives in the recording industry, launched the campaign as a challenge to an industry that “has profited predominantly from Black art.” In a statement, they continued:
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