Maren Morris may skip CMA Awards after blowback from defending trans youth against Brittany Aldean
Maren Morris is nominated for Album of the Year at the 2022 Country Music Association Awards for “Humble Quest,” but she may not attend the event. “I’m very honored that my record is nominated. But I don’t know if I feel [at] home there right now,” she explained to the Los Angeles Times. That follows blowback from Morris speaking out on social media against transphobic comments by Brittany Aldean, the wife of right-wing country star Jason Aldean.
Brittany Aldean posted on Instagram, “I’d really like to thank my parents for not changing my gender when I went through my tomboy phase,” suggesting that being transgender is a phase (it’s not) and that trans youth receive irreversible treatments (they don’t). Singer Cassadee Pope criticized her on Twitter, and Morris followed by saying about Aldean, “It’s so easy to, like, not be a scumbag human? Sell your clip-ins and zip it, Insurrection Barbie.” After that Morris was called a “lunatic” by Tucker Carlson.
“There’s a very insidious culture of people feeling very comfortable being transphobic and homophobic and racist, and that they can wrap it in a joke and no one will ever call them out for it,” Morris added. “It just becomes normal for people to behave like that.” Sometimes in the country music community it’s easier to get away with a racial slur than it is to get away with criticizing a Republican.
Morris has won six CMA Awards in her career so far, including Album of the Year for “Girl” in 2019 and Single and Song of the Year for her crossover hit “The Bones” in 2020. Jason Aldean has two CMA wins to his name, including Album of the Year for “My Kinda Party” in 2011. Aldean is currently nominated for Musical Event of the Year for “If I Didn’t Love You,” his duet with Carrie Underwood.
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