However, after two decades as a music executive, she realized it was an “aberration.”
“It was an indicator of a pervasive culture in the music industry that actively fostered sexual misconduct and exploited the lives and bodies of those hoping to make it in the business,” Ty explained.
She further discussed how this culture has been allowed to persist due to the power given to “kingmakers: wealthy, entitled, nearly always male gatekeepers who control nearly every door that leads to success and who can, without consequence, use their power to abuse young women and young men.”
Addressing the question of whether Diddy’s arrest will spark a ‘#MeToo’ reckoning, Ty argued that it is reductive to attribute sexual coercion, harassment, and violence to a “few notorious individuals” like Harvey Weinstein or R.
Kelly, as this “suggests they’re outliers and obscures the more damning, stubborn, systemic rot that had infected the music business.”
She revealed her encounters with “experiences with predators” and their facilitators, which nearly led her to abandon the music industry.
She recounted a specific incident where she was dining with a high-ranking music executive while she was a business graduate student.
He invited her to his hotel room by subtly passing his key card under the table, an invitation she declined.
Ty continued: “I only persisted in the industry because, in 2005, an old college friend who was starting to find success as an artist reached out to me. That artist was John Legend and, 20 years later, I am still his manager and partner in multiple business ventures. It turns out that many artists, including John, want to be a part of a different model of business and culture.”
She concluded her op-ed by reiterating her belief that there is hope, stating “we can turn the page on a culture of exploitation and abuse.”
She emphasized that the industry owes it “to the countless survivors of sexual assault and misconduct who suffered silently to unearth the truth, encourage people to share their stories and hold perpetrators accountable. We owe it to the next generation of creators to remake the business into something worthy of the art they create.”