July 20th 2023.
Country music star Jason Aldean is in the spotlight for his new music video, which has stirred up a lot of controversy. After receiving criticism for its content, Country Music Television (CMT) decided to pull the video from its rotation.
The video for Aldean's single “Try That in a Small Town” was released on Jul. 14 and had already garnered over 1 million views on YouTube. It was filmed in front of the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, TN – where, in 1927, Henry Choate, an 18-year-old Black man, was lynched by a white mob. The video then switches to images of protests, flags burning, and the robbing of a convenience store. During the second verse of the song, Aldean, who is a mass shooting survivor, references being pro-gun with the lyrics, “Got a gun that my granddad gave me/ They say one day they’re gonna round up/ Well, that sh-t might fly in the city/ Good luck.”
The controversy surrounding the video prompted Aldean to take to social media to defend both the song and video. In a lengthy post, he stated that the accusations against him were not only meritless, but dangerous. He went on to explain that the song was meant to evoke the feeling of community he had growing up, where people took care of each other despite their differences.
However, fellow country stars such as Sheryl Crow have spoken out against Aldean's song, calling it "lame" on Twitter. She wrote, “@Jason_Aldean I’m from a small town. Even people in small towns are sick of violence. There’s nothing small-town or American about promoting violence, you should know that better than anyone having survived a mass shooting.”
With the video now removed from CMT, Jason Aldean is left to ponder what went wrong with his latest release. As he takes in the criticism, he, and others, can use this as an opportunity to learn about the effects of racism and gun violence in America.
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