Art

That's some horseshit.

Yeah, yeah, he agreed to the terms, and that puts a major kink in fighting the ruling, but the fact that he was coerced into the original agreement and therefore the added restrictions of speech/expression make that moot.

Like out or not, there's an established segment of hip-hop/rap that features violence and crime whether or not the artist has any connection to them. And braggadoccio is another traditional element of the genre.

This would be like telling a bluegrass singer they can't write a murder ballad. Now, obviously,, if they write and perform one about the murder they committed, that's going to be a problem, but that's a separate issue where you can't profit from your crime.

It would be like telling a hair band singer that they can't write about sex and drugs.

It would be like telling a metal band singer that they can't write about smashing faces with hammers.

Doesn't matter what crime they committed, you start infringing on the first amendment, and that's a fucking problem.

This guy is on parole, so it's easy to think that limiting his professional material makes sense. And I can't blame anyone for thinking that. It's dumb, but it's such an easy thought to have that I had a flash of it on first pass through my head "oh, it's only while he's in parole, just save those lyrics for later".

Then I immediately realized how bloody dumb it was amd mentally kicked myself.

For the government to limit the freedom of speech and expression, the standard has to be extremely high. Nothing in the first says "unless you're a past felon", or "you know, unless you're writing hip-hop lyrics". This decision is an unreasonable infringement, and it's based in the systemic racism of the United states as a whole. The judge needs to be removed from the bench.