If you’re younger than me, you probably don’t even know about this shit. If you’re older, you might’ve let it fade from memory. But let me remind you about the self-righteous, pearl-clutching prudes of the Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC)—a bunch of rich, power-hungry assholes who thought they had the right to tell the rest of us what we could and couldn’t listen to.
This wasn’t just some random group of concerned parents. No, these were the wives of powerful politicians, using their connections to push their own moral agenda on the entire country. Tipper Gore, wife of then-Senator (and future Vice President) Al Gore, was their loudest mouthpiece, acting like she was some kind of cultural savior. She teamed up with Susan Baker (wife of James Baker, Reagan’s Secretary of Treasury and later Secretary of State), Sally Nevius (wife of Washington politician John Nevius), and Pam Howar (wife of a wealthy Washington realtor). These elite, out-of-touch women weren’t satisfied with just raising their own kids—they wanted to control what everyone’s kids could hear.
For about a decade, from the mid-’80s to the mid-’90s, they waged a censorship war against music. They dragged musicians into the Senate, parading them around like criminals, trying to shame them for writing lyrics that reflected real life—sex, drugs, violence, rebellion. They went after artists like Prince, Twisted Sister, Mötley Crüe, Madonna, and N.W.A., calling them corrupting influences. These hypocrites acted like hearing a few curse words or songs about the real world was going to destroy society—meanwhile, their husbands were making deals with oil tycoons and bombing foreign countries.
Their crowning achievement? Those black-and-white “Parental Advisory” stickers slapped onto tapes and CDs. At first, yeah, I was pissed—who the hell were these uptight housewives to decide what was “acceptable” for me to hear? But then I realized something: those stickers were a fucking shopping guide. You see that label? It meant the album had bad words, real shit, the kind of music they didn’t want us to hear. And guess what? I fucking love bad words.
So, congratulations, PMRC. Your little crusade did the exact opposite of what you wanted. You made it easier for people like me to find the music that actually mattered—the music that scared the shit out of you.