It's not based on some technical argument or law of physics. People either get why, or they don't.
If you want some kind of technical justification, those effects you mentioned just add some sparkle (flanger) or fixes the balance (often just to make a recording, which begins deader in a sound-treated studio, sound closer to real life environment (reverb) and dynamics (compression).
Autotune, on the other hand, changes the pitch and vibrato, you know two of the main things a singer is supposed to produce. And if overdone as "effect", it also fucks the timbre.
And let's be real, nobody says this about some singer using autotune to fix a flat note or two. It's the autotune-as-effect (whether T-pain levels or more subtle) that people complain about.
It's gatekeeping bullshit.
Do you have anything in mind that sounds misinformed? Or just can't fathom that anybody who can tell what a granular delay or an LFO or an automation envelope is can't possibly dislike Autotune?
Put frankly: your take is a small one. It's one that weakens the idea of art, and, no less importantly, is cruel and sabotaging to people. You should change your mind, but you're kind of glorifying in that cruelty and that smallness throughout this thread (which is gross!) so I will not be holding my breath for it.
Except if you thought that when complaining about autotune being bad, we were talking about some rare band that uses it as a creative tool, and not about the millions that use it as a clutch or for the 1000000th recreation of the same BS sound...
If I think it's "bad" then it has _zero_ value to _me_. Why does this bother you or anyone else?
And people can still be able to differentiate between stuff they merely don't like (taste) and stuff they consider detrimental to music in a larger way. In fact they might even like the latter and still consider them detrimental (e.g. I find some commercial pop tunes catchy, but consider them a bad musical and societal influence).
> But the idea that they're not "real vocals" is an attempt at shitty gatekeeping that has no place in music.
I'm not sure whether you see the irony in this statement. You're saying my opinion has no place 'in music'?
> This wannabe arbiter does not get to decide what "real" is or what "art" is.
I never claimed to be the arbiter of what art is. Art is subjective. It's a matter of personal preference. Like not wanting to listen to autotune.
Lastly, you seem really angry. I'm really sorry if anything I've said has upset you.
Man, this is basic Popper stuff. If you'd said "I don't like autotune", I'd have probably agreed with you. If you're saying that what others are doing aren't "real" because you don't like it, that's a whole different kettle of fish.
> I never claimed to be the arbiter of what art is.
You picked the word "real". Words mean things, and "real" does not mean "to my preference". It is a an assertion of legitimacy, it is that assertion to which all of my comments in this thread are directed, and it's something that neither you nor I get to take away from somebody.
> Lastly, you seem really angry. I'm really sorry if anything I've said has upset you.
I wouldn't say that I'm angry, I've been on the internet a long time and random posts have to be really special to do that, but I do write sharply when I care about something. If one believes genuinely in the openness and democracy of art--and I do--I don't think there's a properly strident reaction to the implications you laid down that wouldn't be a little bit testy.
There is nothing wrong with that. It is still art, I never claimed it wasn't. Deepfaked actors can still constitute 'art' (see Sassy Justice with Fred Sassy for a notable example). Photoshopped photos are still 'art'.
However, we don't refer to those 'real actors' or 'real photos'. They are examples of creative expression through manual editing. Photoshopped photos can be real art without being real photos, but there's a reason why National Geographic photographers don't crazy with the spot healing brush.
Perhaps there is also a standard mic for Vocal Realness. I assume it must be a SM58; it is, after all, well-known that having a low-pass switch on the microphone lowers the industry-calibrated Realness Score by at least 250 mSpr(ingsteen). More if it's on.
edit: A friend also pointed out to me the inherent Springsteen ceiling of computer-reproduced audio. And you know, he's right, I'm going to go find a chamber and hire some monks for the true realness that only an authentic Gregorian chant can provide. Denon sells them in twelve-packs, you know.