Spotify Reportedly Declines to Remove French Rapper’s Anti-Semitic Songs

Spotify has declined to take down French rapper Freeze Corleone’s songs containing anti-Semitic lyrics, Digital Music News (DMN) reported.

Corleone, born Issa Lorenzo Diakhaté, released an album on September 11 called LMF [The Phantom Menace] that featured lyrics such as “I arrive determined like Adolf [Hitler] in the 1930s” and “Like Swiss bankers, everything for the family so that my children live like Jewish pensioner.”

An unidentified individual told DMN that he or she contacted a Spotify representative about possibly taking down Corleone’s songs containing anti-Semitism. According to a screenshot in the DMN article, the representative replied “We make music available as the artist intends it to be heard, and that sometimes includes explicit content. Based on the information they provide, we tag explicit releases with EXPLICIT or E.”

Jewish groups denounced Spotify.

“Social media companies, especially during the continuing pandemic have an outsized and dominating role in delivering and shaping culture—especially to younger generations,” Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean and director of Global Social Action Agenda at the Simon Wiesenthal Center, said in a statement to the Journal. “Whether its Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, or Spotify, if anti-Semitism and hate have been delivered by one or more of the social media platform, those companies have an obligation to remove the hate. Yes it is that simple, no matter how much money Spotify makes from a particular artist. If they don’t, they can expect an influx of hate music from both sides of the Atlantic.”

Ari Ingel, director of Creative Community for Peace, said, “The Creative Community Digital Task Force has been engaged with a number of digital streaming platforms on this issue. For instance, through our efforts, Soundcloud removed the entire Freeze Corleone album from their platform, while Spotify only removed one song featuring Freeze Corleone, called ‘Sacrifice de Masse Part 2.’ Despite being dropped by Universal Music France due to the racist nature of Freeze Corleone’s album, Spotify found that the album did not violate their content policy and therefore didn’t merit removal from their platform.

“We continue to engage them to better understand their hate policy, how music is reviewed, and how they come to these decisions. One would imagine that any music proudly praising Hitler would trigger automatic disqualification for streaming.”

The DMN report pointed out that Spotify has removed some of comedian Joe Rogan’s podcasts “featuring far-right guests” as well as podcasts from other hosts that promulgating “QAnon conspiracy theories.” Some of Spotify’s employees have also called for the music streaming platform to remove Rogan’s podcast featuring author Abigail Shrier questioning “why teenage girls are undergoing irreversible transgender surgeries and hormonal treatments,” per DMN.

DMN quotes Rogan as saying that “some of the lyrics [on Spotify] and some of the f—king music that you guys play over and over and over again makes my shit pale in comparison.”

Spotify did not respond to the Journal’s request for comment.

Universal Music France announced on September 18 that they are dropping Corleone from their record label because of the “unacceptable racist statements” on his recent album. French prosecutors are also investigating Corleone for “inciting racial hatred” in the lyrics on LMF.