One of the key facets of extremism is the element of plausible deniability. As such, “dog whistles” — coded language used to mask a deeper extremist or discriminatory rhetoric — have become a pervasive part of the way we talk about politics and the culture wars. They’re also exhausting to unpack.
No matter how diplomatically or plainly you point out the underlying racism or bigotry of a specific image or turn of phrase, there’s always someone eager to take the code literally, to dismiss its context, its subtext, and clearly harmful impact. They’re happy to claim this is just what happens when you pucker your lips and blow, and any hateful dogs that come running are just a coincidence.
Then a song comes along like country singer Jason Aldean’s risible “Try That in a Small Town.” The lyrics and accompanying video are layered with references to Black Lives Matter protests, sundown towns (“see how far you make it down that road”), and white protectionism (“good ol’ boys … we take care of our own”). The video’s main location was no less than the site of historical lynchings, a particularly unsubtle jab. Inevitably, however, when you attempt to illuminate this racist imagery, a “Try That in a Small Town” defender will show up. They will assert that the whole thing is really just about, as Aldean himself tried to assert, “the feeling of community” and the desire for a return to “a sense of normalcy.”
Normal, to Aldean, seems to be a reality where Black protesters don’t disrupt the everyday lives of white citizens — even if those citizens are, as the song suggests, stockpiling guns and turning paranoid eyes on any and all outsiders. This attempt to reframe socially sanctioned racism as “just a community looking out for itself” has long been a part of the discriminatory tactics used against Black Americans, from lynch mobs to the racist, KKK-apologetic Birth of a Nation, to the legal defenses used by white men who…
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