Another Country: On the relationship between country music and white supremacy—and what we can do about it
“The history of country music’s construction as a genre and an industry is a part of the history of white supremacy in America. It has been used in many ways to support this violent, brutal, and oppressive ideology. But music is more than genre. Country is also part of a body of sound that hears and holds people’s sufferings and their struggles and transforms them into song. In this way, country music holds the seeds of a resistance to the very ideology it has been used to help legitimize.”
A Grassroots Theory of Funding
“In a grassroots theory of funding, this money, like the sun, like the rain, already belongs to the communities a funder serves, already belongs to all those who, through their organizing, service, time, love, and sacrifice, are making change happen. A grassroots funder’s job is only to gather as many resources as possible and then distribute them to as many groups as possible. To honor and amplify the work those groups are doing. And to tread very, very lightly so that the grass can grow.”
Classified: How to Stop Hiding Your Privilege and Use It for Social Change
Two decades later, people still want to talk to me about these pages from Classified—not just the rich kids this book was written to organize, but people from all class backgrounds who say it’s a relief to see someone spell out the truth about how class privilege works.
You’re My Country Music
“I know the odds are against us here, but I believe the power of country music is on our side. What makes country music country, above all, is its core commandment: tell the truth about your life. So even if our lives don’t count as country to some—or don’t count at all, really—there’s no denying that the music itself has been hungering for our three chords and the truth all along.”
Rory Gilmore and the Meritocracy
“The children of the wealthy are one of the greatest dangers to the meritocracy myth because the truth of their lives proves without a doubt that the meritocracy is an outright lie. The missing part of Rory and Lorelei’s stories, the class privilege they are in such denial about, reveals how enormously the odds are stacked in favor of the few and against everyone else.”
