Liberal Street Fighters aren’t ready to make nice, either.

I’ve been listening to the new Dixie Chicks disc lately on my MP3 player. Good, sometimes great, album … and I’m in no way sure that it’s really right to describe it, as many reviews have, as some kind of popified big change from their previous efforts. It feels like a natural progression to my ears, but I’ve always hated the fake genres that the music industry insists upon. Cross-pollination is one of the most powerful things about music, and it always has been. Hank Williams learned the guitar at the feet of Rufus “Tee-Tot” Payne, and combined what he’d learned with the “hillbilly” music of his youth to create what we call Country. All American music is a polyglot born of the various traditions of the myriad cultures that came to this country.

Music and food, I sincerely believe, are major ways that people find common ground. When you break bread or dance with someone, sharing your culture with them, or they with you, you build bridges. When you share a tear over a sad song, even if it’s in another language, you see that we all suffer the same heartbreaks and losses. When you listen to a lullaby, you can feel the love that any parent has for their child, no matter what language the sleepy tune is sung in. When I took multi-cultural education years back (when I thought about becoming a teacher), our professor sung us the most beautiful lullaby sung in Xhosa, when one of the class expressed doubt that a language with so many click consonants could comfort a child. It was achingly beautiful, and to hear this man share it with us was one of the highlights of the many classes I’ve taken in my life. To hear the songs of others is to be offered doorway into their world.

This is one reason why genres are insisted upon: to keep people apart. Can’t have white kids listening to race records, after all. They might question the lies they’ve been raised with. The same goes with the attacks on artists like the Chicks and others who defy the easy stereotyping that politicians and marketers play upon.
This sort of crap was on full display yesterday on Joe Scarborough Country on Thursday night:

SCARBOROUGH:  And, Rick, you know, that`s what always sort of bothered me about Americans–about actors and actresses.  I don`t mind them attacking the president, people like me, the war, but what always bothered me was you`d have actors that would go on a promo tour for the movie in America and say, “Oh, I support the troops, whatever.”  The second they get to Germany, or Great Britain, or France, all of a sudden they`d start attacking us.  

In fact, I mean, they`re–the actors that I really respect are–you know, you`ve got some actors that will actually dare to take on American policy here in America.  But I think the Dixie Chicks know exactly what they`re doing.  They go over to Great Britain.  They attack American patriotism, and they know it`s going to win them a lot of fans over there.  

He sat and ranted about this with two morning show deejays who’s schtick is the whole redneck regular guy thing, (and I feel perfectly comfortable heaping some scorn on this kind of act, but I’ll get back to that). They went on and on about how rich the Chicks were (I’m sure none of them were hurting, and I’m sure they’re fine with Godsmack helping their music be used to lure teenagers to recruiters and getting rich off of it). How they had “betrayed” their fans. What did Natalie Maines say this time that was so terrible?

The Chicks can’t hide their disgust at the lack of support they received from other country performers. “A lot of artists cashed in on being against what we said or what we stood for because that was promoting their career, which was a horrible thing to do,” says Robison.

“A lot of pandering started going on, and you’d see soldiers and the American flag in every video. It became a sickening display of ultra-patriotism.”

“The entire country may disagree with me, but I don’t understand the necessity for patriotism,” Maines resumes, through gritted teeth. “Why do you have to be a patriot? About what? This land is our land? Why? You can like where you live and like your life, but as for loving the whole country… I don’t see why people care about patriotism.”

Of course, you know that lying faux “populist” Scarborough lifted the third paragraph in the excerpt out on its own, hammering at it over and over. It’s the usual slimey trick pulled by rightwing assholes. We all know that giving the full context on anything, or having a real open and honest debate about things will never be allowed as long as they can prevent it on their sleazy and pandering little hatefests.

So lets look at the context of Maines’ thoughts on patriotism:

“A lot of pandering started going on, and you’d see soldiers and the American flag in every video. It became a sickening display of ultra-patriotism.”

She’s PLAINLY talking about the country music industry, not all of those poor red state Americans that are so reviled and mistreated by big money liberals. PANDERING, sort of the exact thing that Scarborough and those grinning idiots Rick and Bubba trade in. The use of people’s love for the country they live in to make a buck and to convince their children to die for oil and permanent bases in the Middle East.

This is nothing new, of course.

Music builds connections, but you can only connect if you listen honestly. If you actually act like you respect other people enough to not take words out of context, not play games with what people say to make yourself a buck, not take advantage of people’s prejudices or lack of access to what you’re really talking about. How many Americans who listen to Rick and Bubba are going to bother googling the actual profile that the quote was lifted from? It took me a little time to find it. Scarborough doesn’t even link to it in the transcript, let alone read the whole thing.

I hate that for decades now that working class, especially white, Americans have been spoon fed and pandered to with this sort of “aw shucks” regular guy crap. My grandfather worked hard at a company farm. My dad and uncles served their country, then went and got training and schooling on the GI bill. My dad worked hard and built on that schooling so that I could go to good schools, have the kind of education that would enable me to be the first male in my family to complete a four-year college degree. I remember lively arguments about politics and religion and books growing up, until most of my family followed the rest of the country right, seduced by Wallace, then Reagan and talk radio. I remember that these good, decent, hardworking people used to talk about judging a person by what they did, not what they looked like, not by what party they voted for, to not dismiss them for believing something different. Over the years, though, I’ve watched that light be snuffed out by the relentless agitprop from the right and the narrow and nasty strain of evangelicalism that is destroying this country. I hate that I can’t really talk like we did when I was a boy, and they think it’s MY fault because communist professors ruined me.

I hate this, and I hate crap like Larry the Cable Guy, Rick and Bubba and Joe Scarborough … and the many others who trade on people’s hopes and fears. Joe Bagaent writes about it better than I do, so I’ll leave it there.

So, in solidarity with some smart and talented women who STILL insist on speaking their minds despite several different elements of our media relentlessly hammering at them, there isn’t anything random today, just a really good recording full of love and hope and sadness and wishes for a better world. One of those hacks on Scarborough made a crack about how sad and angry the Chicks always look now. Maybe they’re sad because they fear for their country, for their children, friends and families. Maybe they fear for the other mothers and children and fathers being destroyed by our belligerance and arrogance and bombs and ruinous dog-eat-dog economic system. Maybe they fucking CARE, instead of just being pandering hacks.

So no random ten today, just a hearty recommendation for fourteen tracks, for some good art for your ears.