A letter to Jason Aldeen

[Bob Juch]

Dear Jason Aldean,

I grew up in Nashville. I’m as Southerner as fried chicken and collard greens. On my Dad’s side, we are from Louisiana and Texas, and Mississippi on my Mother’s side. I was born in Louisiana, raised in Tennessee, and spent much of my adult life in a small town on the Gulf Coast.

What really upsets me about what you have done here is that I know you know better. Unlike Trust Fund Kid from Michigan, you aren’t just cosplaying as a Southerner to sell some yeehaw dream to midwesterners with a hard-on for the “good ol’ days” who buy knock-off Stetsons on Broadway and pronounce Demonbreun Street as Demon-Brewing.

As a near-native son of Nashville, I know exactly what kind of town you were exposed to. One where we learned about how hard the hillbillies from East Tennessee worked to destabilize the Confederacy to win back Tennessee for the Union. I learned about that at age eleven at the Carter House in Franklin, TN, from the tour guide Mr. Cartwright. As a Nashvillian, I’m sure you remember how hard our city fought to keep that ugly private Confederate memorial from being placed on I-65. You know damn well that Nashville is a liberal city in a gerrymandered state that would otherwise be blue.

Instead of telling the truth about our community, you’ve played pretend. Tennesseans fought that anti-drag law and won. We are a community that re-instated our representatives who were unjustly forced out of office. We are fighters, but not like who you described.

Tennessee was the only seceded Southern state not listed on the emancipation proclamation because it had already been under Union control.

Why don’t you write a song about that?

I’m aware it’s not a perfect state; it’s got issues. We’ve got blood on our hands, just like every state in the union, but we’ve tried real hard not to be like what you described in your song. We aren’t going around proudly boasting about our mistakes; we are trying to build a better world together.

You currently live in the big city where I grew up, but I now actually live in a small town just east of the city. I mean, real tiny! Just 1,500 people kinda place. The kind of small town you tried to make sound real, real dangerous, but I’ll tell ya what, it sure ain’t the way you’ve described it.

When I moved back to Tennessee a couple of years ago, I decided to stop by the corner store near my house to introduce myself to the neighbors. The lady working there was very friendly, and a guy was sitting in a rocking chair, going back and forth. It was country as hell, and I loved it.

She starts to whisper in the way that Southern folks do when they are about to spill the sweet tea. She looks back and forth and then says, “Now, there is someone who lives on your street I wanna talk to you about. Now, sometimes, they dress as a man, but other times they dress as a woman…”

I start to get nervous about what she will say next, but I bite my tongue and wait.

“…well, you just better be okay with that. Because they are a nice fella and a sweet lady.”

They were checking me to make sure I wasn’t going to cause any trouble. I told them I was real fine with that, and the lady at the store just nodded. Then, the guy in the rocking chair, who has said nothing the entire time, finally says, “All I’m gonna say about it is, if I had legs like that, I’d wear those shorts too.”

Just as I walk out the door, she says, “And the tavern up the street. It’s owned by two lesbians. It’s not a gay bar, though. I keep reminding people that just because someone owns something don’t make it a gay thing. It’s a for everybody thing. Welcome to the neighborhood!”

You know what I see in small towns in the South, Jason? Chimneys standing where the homes of confederates once stood that the Tennessee Union soldiers burned to the ground as a reminder of what happens when you betray your country and its people.

Anyway, as a queer liberal Southern man from Nashville, I just wanted to say I know you are lying. You knew exactly what you were doing she. You conflated carjackings with protests. But you aren’t fooling me. Maybe you might convince your fans that you are tough, and you might make a few folks up North think we are all a bunch of backwoods cousin-kissers looking to re-live the 1950s. But you know you’re lying, just like I know you are lying.

Because we are from the same town and it ain’t small, it’s big enough for all kinds of folks. You could have been a Dolly, Garth, Faith, Tim, or even Taylor, but you chose to be a Toby Keith. You sold out to the hate machine and dishonored all of those who have fought and died to make sure Tennessee isn’t like you described.

Anyway, maybe I’ll see you around at Pucketts or Santa’s Bar someday; I’ll be sure to say hello, and perhaps we can talk this out in person with our minds and not our fists. Because that’s how we actually handle things here in Tennessee, with a little bit of Southern hospitality. So I got a sweet tea and a porch with your name on it.

Sincerely, just some small-town boy from Tennessee,
Father Nathan Monk

[BackInTex]

Does Jason have another song out?

This guy doesn't understand the song, at all.

[tlynn78]

Does Jason have another song out?

This guy doesn't understand the song, at all.

Sure he does (assuming "he" exists), he's just walking lock-step..

[Bob Juch]

I read a comment: "One problem with living in a small town is finding a woman that all your friends haven't screwed."

[tlynn78]

I read a comment: "One problem with living in a small town is finding a woman that all your friends haven't screwed."

Well, of course. They gotta have something to do between lynchings.

[Beebs52]

I read a comment: "One problem with living in a small town is finding a woman that all your friends haven't screwed."

Well, of course. They gotta have something to do between lynchings.

And building meth labs

[Spock]

I read a comment: "One problem with living in a small town is finding a woman that all your friends haven't screwed."

Well, of course. They gotta have something to do between lynchings.

And building meth labs

Reminds me of the scene in "Good Will Hunting" (set in Boston) when the Ben Affleck character talking about a girl that he had apparently screwed several times basically said that he had to stop screwing her as she was likely to marry a friend of his and said "You can only F**K your friend's future wife so many times.

Oops sorry, I guess that only happens in small towns.

[flockofseagulls104]

The left should have just left this alone. They are losing their minds.

[silverscreenselect]

The left should have just left this alone. They are losing their minds.

Spoken by someone who has never had a friend or family member lynched.

[BackInTex]

The left should have just left this alone. They are losing their minds.

Spoken by someone who has never had a friend or family member lynched.

I have. Does that make a difference?

Have you? You seem to think you have some authority in this discussion?

[flockofseagulls104]

I wasn't aware there were this many lynchings going on.
I also must have missed where this song mentioned or even implied anything about lynchings.
Must be dog whistles.

Some enterprising psychologist needs to create a construct describing the mental gymnastics the left goes through to legitimize their collective insane thought processes. And then declare it to be 'normal'.

[BackInTex]

I wasn't aware there were this many lynchings going on.
I also must have missed where this song mentioned or even implied anything about lynchings.
Must be dog whistles.

Some enterprising psychologist needs to create a construct describing the mental gymnastics the left goes through to legitimize their collective insane thought processes. And then declare it to be 'normal'.

I hear the Republican proposal to plant a trillion trees is racist and really they are dog whistling you and i because most lynchings used trees to hold the rope. Oh, and we can no longer use rope, either. We have to use chains, oh wait, chains were used to keep the lynchees held prior to the lynching. I'm searching Amazon for the book that has the list of banned items, but it looks to be sold out.

[Spock]

The left should have just left this alone. They are losing their minds.

Spoken by someone who has never had a friend or family member lynched.

I have. Does that make a difference?

Have you? You seem to think you have some authority in this discussion?

i have a family member who got in some trouble back in the day in Alaska and while he wasn't lynched-he was sent out to sea in an open boat. Does that give me credibility on this issue? Actually, IIRC, there was some talk of lynching him, but the open boat out to sea crowd won out.

[silverscreenselect]

I wasn't aware there were this many lynchings going on.
I also must have missed where this song mentioned or even implied anything about lynchings.

The video is filmed in front of a Tennessee Courthouse where a black teenager was lynched and, later, there was a race riot where Thurgood Marshall was almost killed. I'm sure that was just a coincidence.

"Got a gun that my granddad gave me... Try that in a small town, see how far ya make it down the road."

I apologize to BiT for any comments that might have been uncaring toward his relations who were lynched. I don't have anyone I know of who was lynched. I do, however, have relatives (admittedly somewhat distant) who were victims of the Holocaust. So I'm very opposed to anything that attempts to normalize or trivialize events like U.S. slavery or the Holocaust. If my great-grandparents hadn't left Poland and Russia when they did, their children or grandchildren might have wound up in a concentration camp.

[Spock]

>>>" So I'm very opposed to anything that attempts to normalize or trivialize events like U.S. slavery or the Holocaust."<<<

I note that you forgot the Holodomor-which is always forgotten by you and your ilk. By some accounts, your communist buddies killed more Ukrainians in the Holodomor than the Nazis killed in the Holocaust.

But it is inconvenient for you and your ilk to remember the Holodomor so you pretend it didn't exist.

[BackInTex]

The video is filmed in front of a Tennessee Courthouse where a black teenager was lynched and, later, there was a race riot where Thurgood Marshall was almost killed. I'm sure that was just a coincidence.

"Got a gun that my granddad gave me... Try that in a small town, see how far ya make it down the road."

... I'm very opposed to anything that attempts to normalize or trivialize events like U.S. slavery or the Holocaust.

How does Jason's song normlize or trivilize U.S. slavery?

I've personally known 3 people murdered, each horrifically by thugs, that all happened to be black. That is 75% of the people that I've personally known that have been murdered. I don't hate blacks because some murdered my friends, I hate murderers of any race.

I'm very opposed to anything that attempts to normalize or trivialize murder, rape, fire bombs, etc. or the anger and pain of the victims of such.

[silverscreenselect]

>>>" So I'm very opposed to anything that attempts to normalize or trivialize events like U.S. slavery or the Holocaust."<<<

I note that you forgot the Holodomor-which is always forgotten by you and your ilk. By some accounts, your communist buddies killed more Ukrainians in the Holodomor than the Nazis killed in the Holocaust.

But it is inconvenient for you and your ilk to remember the Holodomor so you pretend it didn't exist.

I don't know how you can talk about my "communist buddies,'" whoever that might refer to. That statement is beneath contempt. It's especially ridiculous coming from someone who has been one of Vladimir Putin's biggest fanboys, a man who is inflicting another extraordinary amount of pain on the Ukrainian people.

[Estonut]

I wasn't aware there were this many lynchings going on.
I also must have missed where this song mentioned or even implied anything about lynchings.

The video is filmed in front of a Tennessee Courthouse where a black teenager was lynched and, later, there was a race riot where Thurgood Marshall was almost killed. I'm sure that was just a coincidence.

"Got a gun that my granddad gave me... Try that in a small town, see how far ya make it down the road."

I apologize to BiT for any comments that might have been uncaring toward his relations who were lynched. I don't have anyone I know of who was lynched. I do, however, have relatives (admittedly somewhat distant) who were victims of the Holocaust. So I'm very opposed to anything that attempts to normalize or trivialize events like U.S. slavery or the Holocaust. If my great-grandparents hadn't left Poland and Russia when they did, their children or grandchildren might have wound up in a concentration camp.

You're supposed to know about show business. Do you think Aldean actually had any input into the casting of the location? Where was this uproar when many, many other shows were filmed with this courthouse as a backdrop?