With 'Goodbye Mary,' Molly Tuttle extends country music's lineage of reproductive rights songs to the post-Roe era

Molly Tuttle is a rising star in American roots music. Amy Harris/Invision/AP

Jason Aldean’s song “Try That In A Small Town” extols small towns as bastions of conservative values standing up against a litany of violent big-city bogeymen. The song, and the backlash against it, threatens to strengthen popular conceptions about the inherent conservatism of country music.

As an American Studies professor who teaches courses on country music, I am interested in the genre’s competing “liberal” lineage. For example, I have written about country musicians’ compassionate responses to the opioid crisis.