Losing Our Minds About It

Written by Tom Being Tom

Goodness gracious we live in a time, don’t we?

In case you haven’t heard some fella named Jason Aldean wrote a song with lyrics championing small town virtue. The song contains veiled threats of violence, gun-totin’ cowboy jargon, and subtle right-wing dog whistles. That caters to some and that’s okay. Unfortunately, imagery in the companion video also harkens to the BLM uprisings of 2020 and depicts the band playing in front of a courthouse notorious for a 1927 white mob lynching of a young black man. That skyrockets the message, for sure, and narrows the song’s target from “city slickers” to “folks different than us,” which is most assuredly worse. But, again, that appeals to some.

Some folks honestly feel like the American culture they grew up with, or imagined they were growing up in, is threatened and on the verge of extinction because of the coming of the “other.” That other could be Democrats, immigrants, liberals, BLM, or just anyone who doesn’t worship their particular god or put this country first over all humanity. It varies. Just the same, that is the way they feel. And they have the right to do so. Like always, there is a strain of credibility in even the most extreme doctrine. The changes that come, whenever they come, often nullify the prior arrangements. And change is coming. Change is here. For some, that’s downright scary.

I was asked yesterday, more than once, what I think of this controversy, and I said, “it’s nothing to lose our minds about.”

Let me clear that up. CMT, a station that plays some country music videos, pulled the song from its rotation after receiving complaints about the video’s imagery. We shouldn’t lose our minds about that, that’s a company decision and well within their rights. We shouldn’t lose our minds about the song, either. It’s typical country music lyric with a shade of dog whistle. No big deal. We shouldn’t lose our minds if people want to stop tuning into CMT because they pulled the video, and we shouldn’t lose our minds if people stop tuning into CMT if they put it back on the air.

But that’s what we do now, whenever anything remotely controversial happens in America. We lose our minds.

We lost our minds over Bud Light’s support of transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney. We lost our minds over Colin Kaepernick. And there were moments in both of those vicissitudes when real discussion could have been had. But one side overreacts, then the other side overreacts to that overreaction, and so on and so forth. Has it always been thus? Didn’t we used to be able to talk?

Maybe not. Maybe nothing has changed except the speed at which we know what each other is saying. And the speed at which we know who agrees with us. And, thanks to social media, we now know the breadth of our chosen information bubbles, and how many share it with us. Surely, we think, anyone I happen upon outside that bubble must be an idiot, right? Because look at ALL the people who agree with me!

But the truth is, in most cases, there are just as many who disagree with us as agree with us. Even when, as we see it, all the facts are on our side. Remember when Kellyanne Conway used the phrase “alternative facts,” and the left lost their minds over it? I remember thinking, she’s absolutely right. We all use them, facts that we find to congeal our arguments. The media bends them to fit narratives. Politicians bend them to fit agendas. You and I bend them to fit viewpoints. Facts are malleable.

So, what’s to be done? How can we correct our paths during this era of overreaction?

We relax. We allow for the fact that some people want to listen to gun-totin’ cowboy lyrics about preserving a certain culture. We allow for the fact that some people would like to change their gender. We allow for the fact that not everyone wants to stand for the national anthem, and we allow for the fact that to some people this country is everything. We tolerate the differences we see around us. Because the differences are not going to change. Everyone will not suddenly be alike, or view things exactly the way we see things. We are going to continue to interpret the same sets of facts and come to varied conclusions.

And that’s okay. That’s true freedom.

We’ll be fine.

As long as we don’t lose our minds about it.

15 thoughts on “Losing Our Minds About It”

  1. I didn’t lose my mind over Bud Light nor did I over Colin, BLM protests, or any of the things that people do to impress upon us the importance of equality and diversity. I do, however, take exception to people who use their platform (and a shitty song) to sow even more discord and violence than there already is. For me it’s not so much “as long as we don’t lose our minds about it”; more like “as long as we don’t encourage people to harm each other because we don’t like their race, gender, and so on”. Aldean doesn’t even come from a small town–he grew up in Macon, lol.

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    1. Yeah, exactly what is a small town these days? Less than 300,000? Less than 150,000? We’re 93,000 here and some consider us a “small town.” Still, the lyrics of this song are meant to appeal to a certain mentality I do see a lot in this town (the pro-Trump, flag-waving-in-the-back-of-the-truck, MAGA mentality) and it is rife with the messages of intolerance, violent solutions, and one-track mindedness. No doubt. I disagree with that mentality entirely.

      I do know some who disagree entirely with things that I very much believe in, too. They talk to me about it (instead of shouting on social media about it) and we can agree to disagree. We don’t lose our minds about it at all.

      I don’t see you losing your mind about this, either (any more than the other events you mentioned), I just see you stating a reasoned concern (which I happen to agree with). That’s all I can ask for. All of us aren’t going to see eye to eye, and are going to take exception to each other’s opinions, but we can do that gracefully and with eloquence (as you have) without losing our minds. THAT I appreciate. 🙂

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      1. I think part of the reason I backed off blogging is because I didn’t want to be part of the “You MUST listen to my opinions and values group”…. We all have them, but they don’t all need to be shared

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  3. I agree that humanity has always behaved in such a way and that it’s the speed at which we get affirmation or negation of our beliefs that exacerbates the bifurcation of society.

    I wondered about this “losing our shit” over alternate views that conflict with our own and concluded that it’s the threat we assume exists that is coming for our ways of life, our minds and our children’s minds. Basically it’s insecurity. “My world view is so fragile that even the mention that slavery existed and that my ancestors, and now I benefit from it should be stricken from school books.” A sure sign of insecurity.

    However, when the ignorant, who feel threatened by the truth, impinge upon our own way of life, we cannot stand idly by, calm and passive. We may have to reciprocate with our own losing of our shit in order to fend off the disinformation and maligned manipulation of reality. No?

    Evil = humanity’s stupidity and intentional ignorance.

    (But always remember, 1/2 of the world’s population has an IQ < 100.)

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    1. I think it is that way of thinking that led us here (no offense 😉 ). The what-aboutism of a certain set of beliefs – we’ll say of the less-tolerant amongst us – feared their way of life was ending. Reasoned arguments about “faith,” “god,” or “hell” weren’t working so the bible-thumpers and those who prefer a white-bread, male-dominated, nuclear family vision of America lost their shit to (over)compensate. Is the answer truly losing our shit in return? Or do we continue our long slog towards human courtesy, equality, and enlightenment?

      Is it too simplistic to use the old comic-book aphorism that if we behave like them we become like them?

      Perhaps.

      But, as I said to Steve below, I still believe in the progress and better nature of humanity. Even in the face of its worst nature (Trump and his likeness) and these seemingly stalled times. I see the evil and still think we can do better.

      Call it enlightened naivete. 😉

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    1. Actually, “they” are just humans, like us. Like Israelis and Palestinians, “they” have as many varied viewpoints as they have people.

      I sit at Church on Sunday mornings (the “Showboat” bar) amidst a great deal of “them.” I live in a small-ish, redneck-ian town and the principal belief here is that small town, conservative simplicity > big city, liberal complexity. Homogeneity over diversity. To them, it keeps things simple. Single-mindedness. One vision. America vs.

      By and large they are incredibly nice people but with limited knowledge, outreach, education, or scope. Bless their hearts, right?

      I find myself lucky to be among them. I learn as much about mankind from the rube as I ever learn from the sage. 😉

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