In March 2003, the American country band the Dixie Chicks publicly criticized President George W. Bush, triggering a backlash. At a concert in London during their Top of the World Tour, the lead singer, Natalie Maines, said the Dixie Chicks were ashamed Bush was from the same state as them, and that they did not support the imminent invasion of Iraq.
The Dixie Chicks were one of the most popular American country acts at the time. After the statement was reported by the British newspaper The Guardian, it triggered a backlash from American country listeners, who were mostly right-wing and supported the war. The Dixie Chicks were blacklisted by many country radio stations, received death threats and were criticized by other country musicians. Sales of their music and concert tickets declined and they lost corporate sponsorship. A few days later, Maines issued an apology, saying her remark had been disrespectful. She rescinded the apology in 2006, saying she felt Bush deserved no respect.
Some of the comments by prominent fascists at the time(cw misogyny)
Strange how this case never gets brought up when conservatives complain about cancel culture
Gonna start saying "Like the Dixie Chicks?" when my family brings up cancel culture from here on out.
They basically got canceled for criticizing the president for murdering something like a million Iraqis.
Todd In The Shadows on youtube kinda points out that a ton of high profile female country artists just get nuked by the industry right around this time and that creates an imbalance they never recover from, like it's still a huge issue today.
For the dixie chicks it was this horseshit, but faith hill basically just got shut out of the industry behind the scenes, and all the other high profile lady country artists of the 90s just sort of fucking vanish from public relevance in the wake of 9/11, the face of country going to an extremely masculine and regressive place even relative to it's perrenial conservative disposition
edit: it's in the context of a video about faith hill, not the dixie chicks, but this happens around the same time iirc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJpK_SGIcj4
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
It’s hard to get across how big of a deal this was at the time because we don’t have the same concept of mass media nowadays that existed back then. Cell phones weren’t nearly as ubiquitous, things like aux ports and Bluetooth connections in car sound systems were considered luxuries and were much less common, and streaming was yet to dethrone cable as the primary way that people watched TV. So you could ride in the car (having the radio on would be a given) and then you’d walk inside at home (turning on cable would be a given). You’d hear Dixie Chicks in the car and then they’d be in a commercial on the TV. I believe they made guest appearances on a bunch of shows as well. But it wasn’t because you were being targeted by the algorithm as a Dixie Chicks fan. It was because the Dixie Chicks were in and everyone was being targeted with them.
And then, overnight, they were gone. No more radio play. No more commercials. No exaggeration, I remember the day I realized I hadn’t heard their songs on the way to school and it was weird. They were so ubiquitous that I noticed their absence. I don’t remember anything that happened the day after 9/11, but I remember the day after the Dixie Chicks got cancelled.
I found YouTube links in your post. Here are links to the same videos on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
Link 1:
Link 2:
