“I love our country, I want to see it restored to what it once was before all this bullshit started happening to us,” country singer tells crowd after “long-ass week” of controversy

  • PersnickityPenguin@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    Well Mr Aldean did choose a stunningly iconic shooting location for the video. As the Washington Post reported:

    Aldean’s performance backdrop is the Maury County Courthouse, which at times appears to be on fire as images of burning American flags are projected onto it. It’s the same building where a mob hanged 18-year-old Henry Choate from the balcony in 1927. The teen had been accused of attacking a White girl who never identified him as her assailant, and whose mother begged the mob to let him stand trial.

    Columbia is also the site of an infamous 1946 race riot that nearly resulted in the lynching of future Supreme Court justice Thurgood Marshall.

    The footage he used in the video seems to equate civil rights protesting as violent crime and rioting, in the judicial use of footage from these types of events that are juxtaposed in his music video.

    The video itself is a little silly in that small towns are not responsible for civil rights movements as they are inherently a very conservative environment, that does not foster independent thought. Surprise surprise. However, the video has a very pro conservative tone that implies that protesting will be met by violence as it is equated as a violent act itself.