Country Music Television Loses Its Tune

Country Music Television, more casually known as CMT, has struck a sour chord with viewers for promoting a gun control campaign. 

“We’re (virtually) wearing orange today in support [for] National Gun Violence Awareness Day and to call attention to the more than 100 lives that are lost every day to gun violence,” CMT tweeted last week. “#WearOrange and visit wearorange.org for more.” 

The Wear Orange campaign encourages people to wear the color orange to “remember lives lost to gun violence and to raise awareness about this public health crisis.” To spread its message, the campaign partnered with left-wing groups like Bloomberg Philanthropies, Planned Parenthood Federation of America and the Democratic Attorneys General Association, the Daily Wire reports. 

Fans blasted CMT for pushing the campaign, threatening to boycott the CMT Music Awards, which aired on Wednesday. 

A survey of the first 100 direct responses on the channel’s page showed that a majority of viewers are unhappy with the message. Of the 100, only four were supportive. 

Human Events co-publisher, and founder of Varsity Brands, Jeff Webb has been a frequent critic of what is being called “corporate wokism.” He said of this latest move from CMT: "When any public company starts to promote a political agenda, they risk alienating half their employees and half of their customers. In this case, it seems CMT is alienating an even larger percentage. When my team and I were in the process of building Varsity Brands, while we encouraged employees to get involved in whatever cause mattered to them personally, we as a company focused on providing the best product and service at the best possible price to all customers and clients. We wanted a welcoming environment for all consumers and all employees. We tolerated differences in opinion. That was a key to our success and in building a very positive corporate culture."