Unpopular opinion but I don't hear "Coal Miner's Daughter" (1970) as a working class anthem. It's a bootstrap story abt social mobility, overcoming poverty, & "the memories of a coal miner's daughter." We need to remember it w/in context of growing anti welfare rhetoric of time
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This anti welfare rhetoric increasingly framed poor Southerners (and poc) as lazy welfare leeches. Many popular country songs at the time tapped into this dialogue, nowhere more clear than Guy Drake's 1970 "Welfare Cadillac"
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Anti welfare rhetoric can also be heard in Merle Haggard's 1969 "Workin' Man's Blues," where he says "Never been on welfare, and that's one place I will not be"
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@Amammartinez
Where is this in the song? I don't see any sniping at others. If it's the bits about working hard and finding the money somewhere, it's a leap to call such pride in surviving hardship "anti-welfare." Suffering is very much part of the lyric, and regret is part of the end.
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@Amammartinez
@jesshopp
I wish I hadn’t seen your tweet and then looked up how Lynn voted for George W. Bush.
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@ambivalentricky
Lynn was always very vocal about calling FDR her favorite president since he gave her father a job again during the depression. But rhetoric surrounding welfare and “handouts” was much different by late 60s and beyond.
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