Jason Aldean Accused Of Trying To ‘Appeal To Trump Country’ With ‘Coded Language’ In ‘Try That In A Small Town’

Liberals have been out to get the conservative country music star Jason Aldean over the past few weeks because of his new anti-woke anthem “Try That In A Small Town.” Now, academics are accusing Aldean of using “coded language” in the song to make it “appeal to Trump country.”

Aldean Attacked By Academics 

The Hollywood Reporter published a story on Wednesday that was titled “How Jason Aldean Cynically Built ‘Small Town’ to Appeal to Trump Country,” and it notes that some have claimed that “Try That In A Small Town” is “a pro-lynching anthem and anti-Black.”

Hunter College music theory professor Philip Ewell was quoted as saying that the song is part of the subtle “anti-Blackness” that he alleges is prevalent in the culturally divided America of today.

“Right now, in 2023, we’re having these massive disagreements about race and what role it’s played in the history of our country. And in music, it plays out in these extremely subtle ways sometimes,” Ewell said. “It’s hard to deny some of these embedded stereotypes.”

“I’ve listened to some of Jason Aldean’s music — I think he’s a pretty good artist,” he continued. “But it’s just something that kind of comes out in culture, anti-Blackness. Because it’s part of the founding of our country. We shouldn’t run away from that simple fact.”

Ewell went on to say that lyrics like “pull a gun on the owner of a liquor store” have an implicitly anti-Black message in, adding, “Anybody really should understand that there’s a strong racial undertone to these lyrics.”

“Someone’s robbing a liquor store — in the American psyche, the person who’s doing that without saying it is a Black person, right? It’s just in our minds. It’s supposed to be that way,” he argued. “And when you paint that picture in someone’s mind of someone pulling a gun on an owner of a liquor store, the person pulling the gun is Black. The owner of a liquor store is probably Asian or maybe white. And there are these racial stereotypes that play out in lyrics like this.”

Related: Trump Defends Jason Aldean After Left Tries To Cancel His Anti-Woke Anthem ‘Try That In A Small Town’

‘Coded Language And Coded Pictures’ 

Country music historian and Belmont University professor Don Cusic slammed the “Try This In A Small Town” music video, which dared to show the violence and chaos that was caused around the country by Black Lives Matter back in 2020. Cusic claimed that the video featured “coded” racial messages.

“What upsets people is the coded language and coded pictures. You got a guy with a hoodie in a violent act, but it could have been a white guy; white guys wear hoodies too. But the implications go far beyond. And if you’re Black, you’re looking at that video a whole lot differently than if you’re white,” Cusic alleged. “And that’s the dividing factor.”

“Even though I think Aldean was careful, or the production company was careful to have whites in pictures of riots as well as implying Blacks as part of the division in this country, people in the metropolitan areas are looking at it differently than the rural areas,” he continued. “People who are Trump supporters are looking at it a lot differently than intelligentsia.”

“They knew what they were doing,” Cusic added. “There’s a giant wall in this country now — division. And instead of taking some of the bricks off the top of the wall, I think Aldean added some bricks to that wall, or at least the video did.”

Related: Jason Aldean’s Anti-Woke Anthem ‘Try That In A Small Town’ Hits No. 1 On Billboard Hot 100

Aldean Gets Defended

Culture commentator Christian Toto, however, spoke up to defend “Try That In A Small Town,” saying that there are many Americans who can relate to its lyrics.

“‘Try That in a Small Town’ speaks to a budding frustration that law and order is no longer part of American culture, witness the Defund the Police movement and lenient prosecutors in many big cities,” he said. “Many Americans haven’t forgotten the violent aspects of recent social justice protests and how the media framed them as ‘mostly peaceful.’”

“Aldean may agree with the lyrics’ message, or they may be him channeling the frustrations of hard-working Americans who lead lawful lives and hate seeing their neighborhood burn,” he continued. “He deserves the creative space to pursue either goal, and art is often a way to spark debate.”

“It’s hardly the first song to celebrate or glorify violence,” Toto added. “Plus, the violent protests in question were multicultural in nature. Antifa’s membership appears primarily White, based on news reports, while many White Americans joined BLM protests in their communities, both peaceful and violent.”

Toto concluded by blasting The Hollywood Reporter for running this hit piece on Aldean in the first place.

“The entertainment media is as relentlessly biased to the left as the news media,” he said. “It’s no surprise Hollywood reporters would frame the story this way, ignoring the violent nature of many progressive protests and shaming Aldean, a straight White country superstar, for daring to bring up the subject.”

Aldean has long been targeted by the left because he is one of the few openly conservative celebrities out there, publicly supporting Donald Trump in both the 2016 and the 2020 presidential elections.

Despite attempts from the left to cancel “Try That In A Small Town,” the song has become a massive hit, making it to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 this week. The woke left can whine about the song all that they want to, but it’s not going to stop the silent majority from continuing to make “Try That In A Small Town” a huge success!