By Mark
Antonio Wright
Monday,
August 14, 2023
Last
week, Oliver Anthony’s song “Rich Men North of Richmond” went supernova.
In a
world full of Nashville pop-country sludge, Anthony sings with an authentic
passion, and many people were instantly taken with his raw and raspy voice. In
just the time that you may have been on summer vacation, he came out of
nowhere, going from a complete unknown to a musical celebrity as the song
spread virally on YouTube and Twitter.
That’s a
great American story, but I don’t understand the adulation on the right for this
song’s message.
Anthony
sings:
I’ve been sellin’ my soul, workin’ all day
Overtime hours for bullshit pay
So I can sit out here and waste my life away
Drag back home and drown my troubles away
My
brother in Christ, you live in the United States of America in 2023 — if you’re
a fit, able-bodied man, and you’re working “overtime hours for bullshit pay,”
you need to find a new job.
There’s
plenty of them out there — jobs that don’t require a college degree, that offer
good pay (especially in this tight labor market) and great benefits, especially
if you’re willing to get your hands dirty by doing things like joining the
Navy, turning wrenches, fixing pumps, laying pipe, or a hundred other jobs
through which American men can still make a great living. If you’re the type of
guy who’s willing to show up on time, every time, work hard while you’re on the
clock, and learn hard skills — there’s a good-paying job out there for you. Go
find it.
And if
you go home and spend all night drowning your troubles away — either on TikTok
or by drinking too much — my friend, that’s your fault, not Washington’s. Not
that Washington is helping any — it’s not. But when we waste our lives, it’s
still our own fault.
Young men are puttin’ themselves six feet in
the ground
’Cause all this damn country does is keep on
kickin’ them down
The
tragedy of young men killing themselves through drink or drugs — the
catastrophe of deaths of despair — is a crisis of our own making. The federal
government in Washington — Anthony’s “rich men north of Richmond” — has had a
destructive role in our society. But Washington is not the cause of our
national sickness; it’s a symptom.
We, as
citizens, as men, still hold it in our power to ignore the corrosive effects of
our politics and the popular culture and get on with living the good life: get
a job, get married, raise your kids up right, get involved with your church,
read good books, teach your boys to hunt, be present in the lives of your
family and friends, help your neighbors.
It’s a damn shame what the world’s gotten to
For people like me and people like you
Wish I could just wake up and it not be true
But it is, oh, it is
Yes — it
is a damn shame what the world’s gotten to. But we can fix it. We don’t have to
just dream about it. Indeed, if we want to, we can fix it on our own even if
Washington is standing in our way or looking down its nose at us. I don’t
expect Oliver Anthony — or any singer-songwriter — to put a fully formed
philosophy in a three-minute song, and I don’t need to agree with its message
to enjoy it: There’s always room for Etta James to sing the blues. Steve Miller
Band’s “The Joker” is a masterpiece, even if I’m done living that particular
kind of life. And Woody Guthrie is a genius, even if his politics were juvenile
and absurd.
I wish
Oliver Anthony the best, and I’ll give his next single a listen, but he should
consider singing about what makes America a great land — a land of opportunity,
not of guaranteed success.
It’s a
land that’s made for you and me.
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