Kacey Musgraves is facing backlash from some fans after she showed support for immigrant families during a birthday performance.
The Grammy-winning country singer celebrated her 38th birthday on Friday by marking the opening night of her Middle of Nowhere tour in Chicago. At one point during the performance, she paused the show and urged the audience to donate to the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights as her “birthday wish.”
“It’s a wonderful organization, and they help give aid — legal aid — and money to children whose parents have been deported unfairly,” Musgraves said on stage. “It’s not a political thing. It’s just, these kids need help.”
She continued: “They have no guidance and no way to get through this thing without their home base or their parents. So anyway, 50 cents, whatever the hell, I don’t know, whatever you want to do, but that would mean a lot to me. If you don’t want to, that’s totally fine too.”
The plea was met with applause and cheers from her crowd at the United Center. However, once videos of the moment started circulating online, conservative political commentators were quick to unleash their wrath on the “Follow Your Arrow” singer.
One fan countered in the comments of her latest post: “We love you Kacey! People upset and surprised she would support the Young Centre clearly know nothing about her: she’s always been a progressive, and not quiet about it.”
This is not the first time that Musgraves has upset conservatives. She has spent her career backing progressive causes, from supporting immigrants to gun control and LGBTQ+ rights.
Her pick of charity also does not come out of nowhere: Musgraves has repeatedly championed the Young Center, a national nonprofit that advocates for children separated from their families. Earlier this year, she partnered with Depop to sell pieces from her music videos and her personal wardrobe to raise money for the organization.
Reminds me when fascists / fascist enablers were surprised rage against the machine were left leaning
Left “leaning” in the sense of seizing the means of production, arming the homeless and openly calling for the revolution to do away with capitalism.
Conservatives: we’re Christian and love everyone. Except those fucking immigrants.
She has been progressive for years, and I love to see it. A lot of the “outlaw country” genre are down-to-earth grassroots progressives, not at all like the bro country artists heard on mass-market FM radio.
What’s wild is that’s what country used to be. Telling corporations to fuck off. I mean the song “Take this job and shove it” was a massive hit once upon a time
Saw a funny one on FB the other day. An exchange by a rather progressive outlaw style dude and the comment was “you sing all the time about crime and stuff” and his response was “tf do you think the ‘outlaw’ part means???”
Kacey Musgraves is an amazing artist. She has been beloved by the LGBTQ+ community for a decade now.
If you’re not familiar with her music, I would recommend starting with the song “Follow Your Arrow”, which is about living your life as authentically as possible and very explicitly supports the queer community. Here’s the chorus:
So, make lots of noise (hey)\
Kiss lots of boys (yup)\
Or kiss lots of girls, if that’s something you’re into\
When the straight and narrow gets a little too
straight\
Roll up a joint, or don’t\
Just follow your arrow wherever it points, yeah\
Follow your arrow wherever it points
“Golden Hour”, which is her Grammy-nominated album, is an absolute masterpiece and played a significant role in my first queer relationship. The song “Rainbow” still makes me tear up and look back fondly on my coming out years. I have seen her a few times in concert and she always dedicates it to the LGBTQ+ community.
My spouse was obsessed with Space Cowboy for a while, which is an amazing song. But at some point, I was genuinely worried I was about to get divorced since she’s listening to this saddest song ever about a breakup. Nope, just a super-captivating song, which I realized when I was also listening to it for the 5th time in a day.
Speaking of which…
I lost my faith in humanity during covid. The sheer cruelty of people doesn’t surprises me anymore.
Not sure where those “conservatives” draw the line… Obviously, almost the entire current population of US are immigrants or descendants of immigrants. Is it just whoever isn’t already here? How many generations until it’s fine?
Free Americas! Europeans go home! The Americas belong to the natives!
It’s a tragedy that pop country music has become Republican radio.
Now it’s all jean-shorts, parting, and trucks. Bring back the alcoholism, divorce, and murder please.
Fox News commentators might want to check their family history…
Clicked on the link and got sent to a scam website
What! Country music fans are racist?
Sounds about right.
