Dolly Parton Addresses Criticism Over Kid Rock Collaboration
L: Dolly Parton, R: Kid Rock
Dolly Parton is speaking out against cancel culture in the wake of criticism over her upcoming duet with Kid Rock, set to be featured on her soon-to-be-released rock album, Rockstar.
When the collaboration was first announced earlier this year, it sparked a wave of backlash from fans, due to the “All Summer Long” singer’s history of transphobia and homophobic rants and staunch defense of the Confederate flag, just to start.
But Parton, who sat down with the Hollywood Reporter ahead of the album’s Nov. 17 release, is defending the decision to record with him, looking back on her history with the church and God to try and explain her reasoning.
The “Jolene” songstress grew up “in a church where they criticized and condemned and so many things were a sin.” She said she was criticized just for the way she looked. “...they thought I was trash, they thought I was a whore, that I was going to hell in a handbasket just for being young and dressing the way I did and being the way that I was.”
But Parton saw the purity within herself. Thanks to that experience, she said she tries to look for the same in everyone else.
She also noted that they recorded the track “before the controversy that he had,” assumedly referring to his most recent blowout, in which he violently boycotted Bud Light over the company’s partnership with trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney before being spotted drinking the beer months later.
“...somebody was talking to me the other day,” she continued. “‘How could you do this [song] with Kid?’ I said, ‘Hey, just because I love you don’t mean I don’t love Kid Rock. Just because I love Kid Rock don’t mean I don’t love you.’ I don’t condemn or criticize. I just accept and love.”
But even in light of that most recent controversy, she stands behind the decision. “I’d have probably still done it, because he is a gifted guy, and that song was about a bad boy; it was about a boy that was cheating and mistreating her,” she described their song together. Plus, as she said already, “I love everybody. I don’t criticize, I don’t condone nor condemn. I just accept them.”
As such, she finds cancel culture to be “terrible,” pointing out that everyone makes mistakes, even if they don’t all get “caught.”
“...everybody deserves a second chance,” she continued. “You deserve to be innocent until you’re proven guilty. Even when you’re proven guilty, if God can forgive you, so can I. If God can forgive you, we all should forgive one another.”
Next: Dolly Parton Explains Why She's Been 'Sleeping With Makeup on' for Over 4 Decades
