Maren Morris, a progressive chart-topping country and pop singer known for hits like “The Middle” and “The Bones,” has announced that she’s distancing herself from the genre of country music. Morris, an artist who’s been outspoken about her support of trans rights and abortion rights, said that her decision was driven by the fact that country music has refused to reckon with the sexism and racism that’s rampant among some artists and songs in the genre.
“After the Trump years, people’s biases were on full display,” she told the Los Angeles Times in an interview. “It just revealed who people really were and that they were proud to be misogynistic and racist and homophobic and transphobic.”
Morris’s announcement comes as a number of country singers have recently released hits with clear far-right and racist messages. Jason Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town,” for example, was criticized for a music video and lyrics featuring racist dog whistling that slammed protests of police violence, and obliquely alluded to lynchings of Black people.
[Related: What’s going on with these viral, right-wing country music hits?]
The song briefly topped the Billboard Hot 100, a feat matched by Oliver Anthony’s “Rich Men North of Richmond,” which contained QAnon references, derision for the poor, and also seemed to perpetuate racial stereotypes. Ahead of each song’s debut, Morgan Wallen, one of country’s biggest stars, enjoyed 16 weeks in the top Billboard spot thanks to “Last Night,” a single from his third album and the first to chart since he was caught on video casually using the n-word.
Aldean’s and Anthony’s songs in particular were celebrated by the right, with the latter even becoming the first topic discussed at the first GOP presidential debate. Both songs contain conservative themes and make implicit endorsements of right-wing policy, from the anti-Black Lives Matter, MAGA-esque messaging of Aldean’s song, to the…
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