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‘em, the price they pay to do it and the longin’ we have
for them to return home to the ones that they love.
It’s about kids and how there ain’t nothin’ like ‘em. I get
tired of bearin’ about how bad kids are today, because
there are a lot of great kids out there that just need
somebody to love ‘em and believe in ‘em. Country folks
love their kids and they will jack you up if you try to
mess with ‘em! People in country music don’t forget the
people that allow them to do what they do for a livin’.
They sign autographs and they take pictures with the
fans because they know without ‘em most of us
entertainers would be getting’ a lot dirtier in the course
of our workday. We are thankful that people want to
hear the songs and the jokes that we write. Country
music doesn’t have to be politically correct. We sing
about God because we believe in Him. We are not trying
to offend anybody, but the evidence that we have seen of
Him in our small little lives trumps your opinion about
whether or not He exists. [...] Country music is about
new love and it’s about old love. It’s about getting’
drunk and getting’ sober. It’s about leavin’ and it’s about
cornin’ home. It’s real music sung by real people for real
people, the people that make up the backbone of this
country. You can call us rednecks if you want. We’re not
offended, ‘cause we know what we’re all about. We get
up and go to work, we get up and go to church, and we
get up and go to war when necessary. All we ask for is a
few songs to carry us along the way, and that’s why I
love this show, because it ain’t some self-important
Hollywood hype with the winners determined by
somebody else. On this show, you decide who goes
home with a trophy and you get to dance and sing along
with the people that bring you the songs of your life.
(CMT)
In a moment that has been lauded as a highly authentic expression of the
comedian’s convictions, we see Foxworthy lapse into an unabashed and
unironic celebration of country music and an appreciation of its fans, its
“rednecks,” not as marginal figures but as the “backbone of this
country,” as a patriotic us contrasted with a liberal, modem, urban them
who lack the virtues he has just espoused.
On the surface the monologue is an appreciation of good
“country folks” and their ability to focus on “the things that matter.” A