The question of the ethical or less-ethical person behind the music goes back at least to Richard Wagner. Unbelievable music, anti-semitic writing. The classical world has dealt with this for decades. The basic take is, if you like the music, listen to it for what it is: just music. It's not a worldview, it's not a philosophy, it's not a guide for behavior--any more than "All You Need Is Love" by the Beatles is. It's a song. I hate to say "just" a song, but that's exactly what's at stake. Another current example: Is "Chinatown" still a brilliant film, or not so much? Of course it is. To appreciate the artwork is far from endorsing everything the artist ever has done.

I suggested Leadbelly, below. Is "Midnight Special" any worse? How about "Shiver"? Okay maybe that one was a bad example.

What do we do when a bad person makes good art? In the days of McCarthyism, many such people were blacklisted. The entertainment industry today employs few people who _aren't_ (by the standards of the 1950s) bad people.

If there are some entertainers whose behavior we still criticize, we can chalk that up to the times simply not having changed enough yet.

fsilber:

What do we do when a bad person makes good art? In the days of McCarthyism, many such people were blacklisted. The entertainment industry today employs few people who _aren't_ (by the standards of the 1950s) bad people.

If there are some entertainers whose behavior we still criticize, we can chalk that up to the times simply not having changed enough yet.

Well... your blacklist point is well-made. The idea is that what McCarthyists of the era considered "bad people" back then are more widely considered today to be victimized, or principled, or even heroic. And their "badness" did not adversely affect their art. Witness the Academy Awards given (eventually, or even posthumously) to Dalton Trumbo, Nedrick Young, Carl Foreman, and Michael Wilson.

Then again, some "bad behavior" may not eventually be excused as "temporarily unfashionable behavior." An argument could be made that Communists, drug addicts, alcoholics, sex addicts, homosexuals, bad-tempered louts and eccentric recluses are possibly lesser-degree reprobates than batterers, rapists, and murderers. If "the times change" sufficiently for those latter offenses to grow in public acceptability, then we have larger problems on our hands than "should I listen to this song or watch this movie?"

But as many have pointed out, the personal character of the artist doesn't matter a whole lot relative to the works of art themselves. Victor Salva's molestation conviction doesn't make Powder any better or worse a film. Same thing with Polanski's work. Given the troubled lives of a vast number of artists throughout history, our own collective guilt for experiencing, enjoying, or otherwise benefitting from their works is pointless. When a dagger above the eye took Christopher Marlowe's life at 29, whether because of a fight over a bar tab or because somebody was out to get him for heresy, blasphemy, and atheism... whatever the reason, as a result the world has seven of his plays today, and no more. Maybe if he'd been a more upstanding subject of the Crown, we'd have more. He may have been a completely reprehensible degenerate, but he was beloved for his talent. Lord Byron had his issues as well. Closer to the current issue, James Brown was arrested at least five times for domestic violence (prompting the Dead Milkmen to record their Brownian ode "Rc's Mom" featuring the chorus "Gonna beat my wife.").

Then there's Charles S. Dutton. Did prison time for manslaughter. Now he's a Yale graduate and a widely respected actor and director.

There are those who believe that the artistic contributions one bequeaths the world outweigh the importance of one's sins. See for example the lengthy list of Polanski apologists in Hollywood. Also there exist some who applaud the premature deaths of Byron, Marlowe, and even more modern artists like Hendrix, Morrison, Joplin, Haring, etc. Maybe these guys would have caused less trouble had they expired even younger. I share neither of these viewpoints.

One can disappear up one's own posterior philosophizing about sin and redemption and the relationship between art and the artist's life. I figure the artists themselves are liable for the crimes of their personal lives, but their opuses are separate. John Wayne Gacy's clown portraits aren't liabilities because of Gacy's criminal activities. If anything, their liability stems from them being clown portraits.

Such horrors aside, I'm inclined to feel that the art created by an artist generally serves to improve the world overall, just as the crimes of humanity tend to worsen the world overall. I have no way of knowing, but I suspect few of Charles Dutton's cellmates have gone on to leave behind so admirable a body of work as Dutton has. I say that that work is completely separate from the crime he committed, although a book on playwriting he read while in solitary confinement is what turned his attention to performing arts in the first place. That said, Dutton's body of work in no way makes up for the life he took when he was seventeen, and he'd be the first to tell you so.

But it is art, and it can be appreciated, and thus the world is better for it.

There is one further consideration I rarely see addressed, which is that these artist malefactors are not to be excused, because of their artistic productions. Whatever these persons have done that is wrong, a moral sense says that they must own up to their actions, accept punishment if that applies, AND make restitution. Chris Brown, if guilty, needs to accept all the consequences, and make restitution to his victim. That's the only moral path I can see.

p40tomahawk:

There is one further consideration I rarely see addressed, which is that these artist malefactors are not to be excused, because of their artistic productions. Whatever these persons have done that is wrong, a moral sense says that they must own up to their actions, accept punishment if that applies, AND make restitution. Chris Brown, if guilty, needs to accept all the consequences, and make restitution to his victim. That's the only moral path I can see.

I won't argue with that. Just as it's a widespread, commonly-held belief that nobody is above the law whether they be rich or politically powerful, so it should follow that our "creative demigods" should be similarly tethered to earth by their own responsibility for their actions.

But just as the rich and politically powerful often do escape responsibility, so will there be others who think creative geniuses should get a pass, too. This mindset could be stretched very slightly to imply that, had Hitler shown a smidgen more talent in his painting career, his other activities might have been more excusable.