Country star Morgan Wallen has been forgiven by the country for using a racial slur last year after going out to Nashville. However The New York Times won’t let it go. In last Sunday’s “The Morgan Wallen Conundrum,” music critic Jon Caramanica spent a staggering 2,400 words condemning Wallen all over again for the one offensive word.
The story was keyed to Wallen’s appearance at the Grand Old Opry a year after the N-word incident. Admitting Wallen’s album, “Dangerous,” was the most commercially successful release of last year, Caramanica sounded bitter the cancellation had failed, and that the incident had not filled the singer with overwhelming shame and remorse.
Wallen’s continuing dominance, so shortly following the nationwide reckoning with racism that marked 2020, has been a source of here-we-go-again frustration for those working to bring change to Nashville, including many Black performers and observers, who see his success as a reflection of the racism that has long framed country music as a preserve and amplifier of whiteness. “The hate runs deep,” tweeted Mickey Guyton, the Black country singer.
Wallen’s return to the music industry is especially notable given the achievements of Black country artists in recent years and increasing recognition, even within a small town like Nashville. Black artists have been marginalized for decades because of inequalities.
Apologizing isn’t enough, apparently. (Equally, large financial donations cannot be made to black charities.
Wallen has not publicly apologized for his actions, although he did make an apology. He has generally opted for To gain trust by proximity instead of action, gestures of reconciliation were preferred to those of tough accountability.
Caramanica sounded petulant that Wallen is allowed to have a career, then implied that his fans are racists too: “For people who abjure racism and bigotry, there is no listening to Wallen without the simultaneous awareness of his infractions. However, many people don’t seem to have such concerns..”
Wallen needed to also take on his defenders.
Black country music musicians— especially Black womenTweet your concerns about the ease of Wallen’s redemption arc, they’re bombarded with bigotry and suggestions that country music would be doing fine without them and their concerns. Wallen never dissuaded any such violence on his part.
The Times even had to work in the fact that they loves to use Covid facemasks as moralizing (click “expand”):
But what’s most revealing is how Wallen behaves when no one is watching, or more specifically, when no one who might rebuke him is watching.
On Dec. 3, Wallen played the first of three sold-out nights at the 20,000 capacity Rupp Arena in Lexington, Ky., part of a sprinkling of warm-up shows before the start of his proper tour next month….even though the country was in the thick of the Delta variant, and a prominent sign in the arena read “masks are encouraged at tonight’s event,” almost no one wore one. However, the arena staff made sure they did. The attendance was almost equal to that of those wearing face covers.
It sounds like the 2021 Met Gala.
He faulted Wallen for failing to “stop the political nastiness,” except what was his sin? He did not condemn his supporters for cheering “Let’s go, Brandon!” So Wallen has to police not only himself, but everyone who buys a ticket to his shows? But how do you protect yourself? The Times found most disturbing of all was “he declined to reveal himself a changed, or evolved, person. The lobby did not have any tables promoting racial Justice Organizations.”
This is absurd!
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