![\"Jason](\"https:\/\/static.foxnews.com\/foxnews.com\/content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/jason-aldean-try-that-in-a-small-town.jpg\")
<\/p>\n\u2018People are just saying, \u2018Enough is enough. Don\u2019t force an agenda down my throat,\u2019 Ted Jenkin said<\/p>\n
Country Music Television (CMT) angered many fans by pulling the video for Jason Aldean\u2019s new song, \u201cTry That In A Small Town,\u201d but the network could have learned that Americans are sick of forced agendas if they simply paid attention to Bud Light, according to a financial guru.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we\u2019re seeing as a trend in America is that people are exercising their free speech on businesses one way or the other,\u201d entrepreneur Ted Jenkin told Fox News Digital.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen businesses decide to take these actions, they also need to be responsible for the consequences,\u201d Jenkin continued. \u201cWe saw it with Bud Light and other brands, and this could happen to CMT.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jenkin, the CEO of oXYGen Financial who consults business owners and hosts the \u201cShrimp Tank\u201d podcast, believes that CMT honchos could have learned from Bud Light that woke politics aren\u2019t always good for business.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Country music star Jason Aldean appears in the official music video for \u201cTry That In A Small Town.\u201d The video took place in front of the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tennessee, where other music videos and films have been shot. (BBR Music Group\/Jason Aldean YouTube)<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know whether businesses should be involved in politics, and that\u2019s the real decision they have to make,\u201d Jenkin said. \u201cDo we want to take a political stand or not? Or are we in the business of selling a product or delivering a service?\u201d<\/p>\n
Sales of Bud Light have plummeted since a promotion celebrating transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney\u2019s \u201c365 days of girlhood\u201d irked conservative consumers, who have since boycotted the beer.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think people are just saying, \u2018Enough is enough. Don\u2019t force an agenda down my throat, especially when it comes to the products I buy or the TV that I watch,\u2019\u201d Jenkin said.<\/p>\n
CMT is thought to have a similar blue-collar audience that helped Bud Light thrive prior to the controversy. While backlash to CMT is nothing compared to what Bud Light has gone through, at least to this point, fans came out in strong support of Aldean on Thursday night.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think [Aldean\u2019s] talking about being an American and loving our country and being free and protecting the community that you grew up in and the people that you love,\u201d one fan told Fox News outside a concert venue in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat I\u2019m actually sick of is the woke left\u2019s canceling of everything. The song is just the next step in that process that\u2019s going on and it\u2019s terrible. It\u2019s changing the country that we lived in,\u201d said another fan who was featured on \u201cHannity.\u201d<\/p>\n
During June, CMT was the No. 43 basic cable network and managed only 116,000 average total day viewers, according to Nielsen Media Research, so the network can\u2019t afford to lose many fans.<\/p>\n
Jason Aldean concert attendees speak out on \u2018Small Town\u2019 song backlash: ‘Everyone’s sensitive nowadays’
\nIn addition to CMT\u2019s potentially questionable business decision, Jenkin also feels there is a \u201cmajor double standard in America right now\u201d because artists who are popular among liberals are given a free pass to say whatever they want.<\/p>\n
Some have even suggested Aldean sings a \u201cpro-lynching song\u201d \u2014 a narrative he adamantly denies. In the video, Aldean\u2019s lyrics are heard while news coverage from the 2020 riots illustrates his message. Some of the lyrics include mentions of illegal acts that occurred during rioting and the government confiscating guns before he warns, \u201cWell, try that in a small town, see how far ya make it down the road.\u201d<\/p>\n
Many conservatives have tweeted lyrics to popular rap songs that appear far more violent and graphic than anything sung by Aldean in an attempt to highlight the hypocrisy.<\/p>\n
\u201cIce-T wrote this song many years ago for the movie \u2018Colors,\u2019 which was a great movie. And it said, \u2018Sucker die for your life when my shotgun scatters, we gangs of L.A. will never die. Just multiply.\u2019 Ice-T played a cop on \u2018Law and Order\u2019 here for many years,\u201d Jenkin said, noting that he was a fan of the 1988 film as a kid and never really thought about the song lyrics until recently.<\/p>\n
\u201cWas he really promoting gang violence? Is that really what he was promoting, or it was just lyrics in a song that made sense in the movie? This is why sometimes things like this get blown way out of proportion,\u201d he continued. \u201cHave the standard of holding people accountable, but just be equal with all of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Aldean was also criticized for choosing to film the video at the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tennessee. But several music videos and movies have filmed there, including the Lifetime Original movie \u201cSteppin\u2019 into the Holiday\u201d with Mario Lopez and Jana Kramer and Miley Cyrus\u2019 2009 film \u201cHannah Montana: The Movie.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jenkin labeled the hypocrisy as \u201cselective accountability,\u201d which he feels is taking place throughout the polarized nation.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re very selective about what we want to hold people accountable for, and who we want to hold people accountable for. And that is one of the main, fundamental problems today,\u201d Jenkin said. \u201cIf we have equal accountability, we\u2019ll have a lot less of these problems. But when we\u2019re selective about it, there are some people that use words that none of us should ever, ever use that are still in songs today and they\u2019re deemed to be acceptable when we\u2019re told these words are not acceptable. So, we need to get rid of this selective accountability.\u201d<\/p>\n