The Black Lives Matter movement has a supporter in Dolly Parton.
“I understand people having to make themselves known and felt and seen,” she said in an interview with Billboard. “And of course black lives matter. Do we think our little white asses are the only ones that matter? No!”
In 2018, the country music star changed the name of her Dixie Stampede to Dolly Parton’s Stampede after some critics pointed out the association of the word “Dixie” with the Confederacy.
“There’s such a thing as innocent ignorance, and so many of us are guilty of that,” she said, adding, “When they said ‘Dixie’ was an offensive word, I thought, ‘Well, I don’t want to offend anybody. This is a business. We’ll just call it the Stampede.’ As soon as you realize that [something] is a problem, you should fix it. Don’t be a dumbass. That’s where my heart is. I would never dream of hurting anybody on purpose.”
Melinda Newman, who interviewed Parton, wrote, “This is perhaps one secret to Parton’s widespread appeal: Just because she wants to be for everyone doesn’t mean she doesn’t stand for anything. Offending as few potential customers as possible is just good business. But when Parton explains the philosophies that drive her life and career, her answers are hardly corporate.”
The Black Lives Matter movement has seen a resurgence since late May, when George Floyd, a black man, died in Minneapolis police custody after a white office knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes.
