Maines told the Los Angeles Daily News about the song, "Don't get me started. I hate it. It's ignorant, and it makes country music sound ignorant.” What the Dixie Chicks have yet to understand is that when they make comments like that about a huge hit song, they come pretty close to calling the millions that love the song ignorant, as well.
In the years before the political controversy, I bought the Dixie Chicks’ first three CDs and just about wore them out because I played the music so much. I have always enjoyed music, even when sung by people who did not agree with my conservative politics, and gladly spent money on CDs (and records before that) of liberal artists. I am determined, though, to never spend another cent on a Dixie Chicks product. My reason is the same reason so many country music fans have made the same decision and it might surprise many to learn that it has little to do with their specific comments about the president or the war.
When Maines made her now famous comment about being ashamed of the president I thought she was out of line. I thought so because she was on foreign soil and we were on the eve of war. That is her right, though, and if that was all she said, it would have most likely blown over eventually. Willie Nelson and some other country music stars are vocal Democrats who have spoken out against the war. What the Dixie Chicks did that was different from other country music singers is disrespect their fans.
Recently Dixie Chick Marti Maguire said "I'd rather have a small following of really cool people who get it, who will grow with us as we grow and are fans for life, than people that have us in their five-disc changer with Reba McEntire and Toby Keith," Maguire said. "We don't want those kinds of fans. They limit what you can do.”
The new Chicks CD sold well the first couple of weeks, topping the charts. It is hard to imagine with the cover of Time Magazine, a 60 Minutes feature and an avalanche of favorable media, that the CD would not be a top seller. I recently heard Democratic Congressman Harold Ford, Jr. say he went out and bought a copy the first week.
I suspect that many who never would have paid a dime to listen to the Dixie Chicks when they were a kitschy country band, went out and purchased a copy as a political statement.
Although sales the first week put the CD at the top of the charts, compared to the previous Dixie Chicks CD, sales were down considerably. Concert ticket sales in some venues have been so slow that some shows may even be cancelled.
The example of the Dixie Chicks’ rejection by many country music fans is one that carries a lesson those marketing any product would do well to heed. It easily translates from musicians and fans to politicians and voters, too. When politicians treat voters as ignorant and backward for not accepting their position on an issue, the voters are likely to go elsewhere.
When a politician accuses the president of being an idiot or a liar for believing or espousing a particular point of view, voters who hold that same view are likewise going to feel assaulted. Those wondering why so many voters in the red states have rejected the Democratic Party could learn a lesson from the Dixie Chicks’ example.