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the cultural shift of how we all perceive tumblr fascinates me so much. it went from ‘home where all my best friends hang out’ to ‘horrible awful hellsite i hate it so much’ to ‘mess that’s shoddily taped together yet somehow the most bearable social network left’

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BIG DISCLAIMER: i was 9 when 9/11 happened, so this might be more about my own crystalizing tastes than anything else. i think it’s a pretty darn good theory tho and other people have validated it.

BIGGER DISCLAIMER: i am not saying that country music prior to 9/11 was free from nationalist, racist, misogynist undertones - i just think that these themes became more the norm!

MY HOT TAKE:

with very few exceptions, including goodbye earl, before he cheats, and daddy Iessons (side note - all women!) 9/11 ruined country music. around 2014 onward we’ve got margo price, sturgill simpson, jason isbell etc., who are making country music great again (wink), but those folks are mostly considered “alternative” country. the mainstream country music for well over a decade now is a glut of trash performative patriotic / working-class-but-not-really lab-crafted budweiser-sponsored nonsense that has managed to sound rebellious (or has convinced its fans that it sounds rebellious) without ever actually questioning any power structure. so much so that artists who ACTUALLY criticized the government were literally blacklisted for nearly a decade (the dixie chicks)

pre-9/11 country music, though not perfect or ideologically pure by any stretch, did not have the raging american flag painted truck boner that comes to mind for a lot of people who say “i like everything except rap and country”

SPECIFICALLY, toby keith’s “courtesy of the red, white, and blue (the angry american)” (2002) literally destroyed country music. it was a direct answer to the 9/11 attacks and war song in support of the invasion of afghanistan. the lyrics read like a disjointed feverish email chain letter forwarded from your great uncle sprinkled with glittering american flag gifs and heavily saturated pictures of bald eagles. the entire song is lifted from an estimated 248 peeling bumper stickers collected from rusted trucks on cinder blocks in overgrown yards, cut up and arranged to fit a catchy, formulaic tune that is almost certainly the background music playing in george w. bush’s head at all times.

“we’ll put a boot in your ass, it’s the american way and uncle sam put your name at the top of his list and the statue of liberty started shakin’ her fist and the eagle will fly, and it’s gonna be hell, when you hear mother freedom start a'ringin’ her bell”

country music and the new country musicians that toby keith paved the way for became so pro establishment and so unquestioningly nationalistic that, again, the dixie chicks who went against this grain were blacklisted by the industry and received death threats from country music fans. hell, there are folks who STILL froth at the mouth at the mere mention of the dixie chicks.

9/11 killed outlaw country - how can you sing the praises of law breakers when your main circuit consists of singing to troops? there are some great classic country songs critiquing the police state - especially from johnny cash and merle haggard - now country music artists hold fundraisers for FOPs. new country music is basically in-law country music.

you don’t have to write a pro-bush patriotic anthem to be part of this post-9/11 ruination. playing meaningless songs about living in the heart of (read: white) america, eschewing the city (read: not white), and cracking open a cold one with the boys for “authentic” country music is also important to the war effort.

there’s a progression of themes here:

post 9/11 top tier: war anthem, vocally patriotic, directly used as pro war propaganda; which paved the way for: “things used to be so much better” thinly veiled racist laments, good for campaign ads; which paved the way for meaningless party anthems - attempts to make things “like they used to be” and craft a reality that neither the artist nor listener likely ever experience.

that brings us to what most people think of today when they say they hate country music: the country party anthem - “tiny hot gal in tight jean shorts who can drink beer like the guys, she doesn’t like beyoncé Like Other Girls, oh she’s so into me and my truck, i’m gonna take her fishing after i finish sowing my corn - sung by a guy who’s never touched a tractor” - has overtaken the tragic, done me wrong, despairing country ballads of tammy wynette, george jones, and even up into pre-9/11 contemporaries like reba mcentire and george strait. you didn’t necessarily have to be country to relate to their pain. now you have to perform suburban redneckness to enjoy luke bryan.

when was the last time you heard a sad country song?

after 9/11, cowboys (whether or not they had ever been near a cow) weren’t allowed to be sad anymore (no more done me wrong country), and they certainly weren’t allowed to question authority (no more outlaw country). partying hardy became the most important American Thing and if you don’t sing about that, our Enemies Will Win.

so - understanding that country music has always had bad stuff, and that like any genre it suffers from commercialization, 9/11 DESTROYED COUNTRY MUSIC. and toby keith gleefully helped destroy it.

for some further evidence of the decline of country music, please listen to the dixie chicks’ “long time gone” which is an indictment of the industry (i believe it was written before 9/11 but my point still stands - the genre was on the decline and 9/11 was the major cultural event that hastened the decline).

maybe i am a curmudgeon - almost every generation of country music has had its own “country music is not what it used to be” anthem, but i really think something distinct happened with 9/11.

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big fan of walking in the rain. hate the concept of wet clothes. i am tired of life and its obscure sufferings

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another one bites the dust :)))))

im so tired

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americans think ABSOLUTELY NOTHIN of driving 7 hours. they’ll drive 7 hours just for dinner. they’ll drive 7 hours just for chips and dip

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i think part of the reason why i love disney’s hercules so much is that the idea of a sassy hades resounds so deeply with me as a person who has siblings. like imagine if you were rich as fuck and had to live in what’s basically the flooded basement of the entire world while your brothers fart around banging everything in sight. if i had to live in a literal swamp and listen to stories about poseidon turning into a horse to get sexy with demeter i’d probably have no fucking patience too

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Joe Keery being an absolute father and talking about how much the kids have grown over the years

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How cute is this 😊😇

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Pretty convenient that a lot of American students never learn that Einstein was a Jew who came to America and started the nuclear research after fleeing from the Nazis and having most of his research lost in the book burnings. 

Or how much of his life and work was shaped by his autism, like how it was his biggest asset because it allowed him to think differently, but also his biggest hurtle because of all the abuse he received in school from teachers who labeled him as a dunce and told him he was stupid because of his disability. Which he proved wrong by discovering the theory of relativity because of his autism instead of in spite of it.

EVEN THOUGH THOSE ARE THE TWO MOST RELEVANT DETAILS OF HIS LIFE THAT EXPLAIN HOW AND WHY HE DID ALMOST EVERYTHING HE DID. But nah, Im sure diversity wasn’t relevant enough to be important in this situation.

Its almost like we have a biased school system that censors the accomplishments of marginalized groups to stop them from realizing that people like them have accomplished things.

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Bill Hader’s knife story is the funniest thing ever

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i sent the bee movie script over imessage to my friend who lives overseas but it didn’t send as an imessage and sent as 315 text messages instead and i’m gonna be charged for international texting for all of them

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today at work a toddler in a high chair patted me on the arm to get my attention, then when i crouched down and asked him what’s up, he pointed at the table full of chatty old ladies across the aisle and said “NOISE” and i have never in my life been more delighted by a guest complaint

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My Father While Watching GOT Tonight

During the Arya and Gendry Scene

My Father: I don’t want to see this! She’s like my daughter. *to me* Stop smiling, stop celebrating, this is disgusting. SHE’S TWELVE!

Watching Theon Hug Sansa

My Father: He doesn’t have a thingy tho, right?

Me: Right.

Him: *scoffs* Okay then.

Greyworm comes on screen

My Father: HE DOESN’T HAVE A THINGY EITHER!

Anytime Bran comes on screen

My Father: Expose them all you creepy little shit.

Dany, realizing who Jon is

My Father: In that moment, she knew she literally f*cked up. (I DIDNT EVEN KNOW HE KNEW MEMES WTF).

The White Walkers Arrive

My Father: We need them to send a ship to Norway, to get the Vikings. Imagine Ragnar Lothbrok on a dragon. We’d win.

If you guys want more just ask. He’s a 55 year old man with no filter. There’s plenty more.

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Sansa: I trust Brienne so fine Jamie can stay.

Daenerys: well this is disappointing, what about you warden of the North?

Jon: I’m kinda busy having an existential crisis right now so cooool.