In the post-9/11 world, vulnerable Americans often clung to anything that would unite them – a common interest or common medium that classified them under the umbrella term of what it meant to be or not be an American. In this struggle for identity, many Americans found that music united them in this fashion, especially country music, a uniquely patriotic genre that was often conservative and pro-America in nature. Songs such as Darryl Worley’s “Have You Forgotten?” or “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue” by Toby Keith (as I will further analyze) pose, often controversial, patriotic statements such as “We’ll put a boot in your ass, it’s the American way” or “Have you forgotten how it felt that day to see…your people blown away?” Although these questions may be unnecessarily brash and politically incorrect, the avenue that they are described in make them viable to the American public. Specifically, one should understand the relevance of “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue” and the country music genre in the framework of the us vs. them binary and the hegemonic nature of what it means to be “American”.
Keith’s song has an unbridled amount of patriotic symbols. The music video opens with Keith on a stage, donning a cowboy hat, which is a clear sign of patriotism and the American image. His guitar has an American flag style that is similar to the multitude of flags behind him on the stage. Clearly, his appearance is intentional. When he begins to sing the song, Keith uses heavily Americanized personifications such as in this line: “Uncle Sam puts your name at the top of his list, the Statue of Liberty started shaking her fist” and so on. By appealing to this, as well as the fact that his father was in the Army and that he gave his “right eye” for his country, Keith appeals to inherently “American” qualities.
The most concerning aspect of this song, however, is the nature of Keith’s creation of an us vs. them binary opposition. In the period after 9/11, the tendency was to distinguish between those who were for America and those who were against America. Keith sings as if he is singing to enemies of the United States, in short, threatening them that the backlash of being against America is violent. “You’ll be sorry that you messed with the U.S. of A. We’ll put a boot in your ass, it’s the American way”. Not only does Keith generalize that American responses are strictly violent and defensive ones, but he perpetuates an us vs. them binary that shows the United States, and those considered Americans, as retaliatory. Never in the song does Keith reference ethnicities or specifically Arab/Muslims that would most likely be racialized in the song. He does not even mention the word “terrorist”. However, the simple reiteration of the United States being locked in a struggle against an enemy, one that, in the situation of the violence of the Iraq War, Keith feels is “the American way”.
The hegemony of what it means to be an American and what the United States is, as a whole, is retold in several fashions throughout the song. Keith alludes that his father is the ideal American because he was injured fighting for his country and that he flew a flag outside of his house every day. Open signs of patriotism such as this, however, do not necessarily speak to an individual’s level of patriotism. The United States, as a country, is characterized in the song to be the defender of freedom, the ideal environment for liberty and other various Americanized catch phrases, but with these ideas come a dangerous amount of exceptionalism that often leaves many groups on the outside looking in. Most notably in this situation, those who may be subjected to the stereotype of any of the enemies Keith refers to in his song. Although the song is intended to unite patriotic Americans in a time of desperation and vulnerability, the song also, indirectly, discounts those who may not fit the average image of an American — Caucasian and Protestant—something that’s discussed by many concerned with Muslims perception in the media, including Edward Said. With these perpetuated lines of what is or is not an American defined in the sense of a binary opposition, songs like “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue” have continued to wedge a separation between the American population, fueling the fire of prejudice and Islamophobia, especially in a post-9/11 era.
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