I’m a Second Amendment guy … That’s in the Constitution, it’s people’s right, and I don’t believe it’s negotiable. But nobody should have that many guns and that much ammunition and we don’t know about it. Nobody should have 21 AKs and 10,000 rounds of ammunition and we don’t know who they are. Something’s gotta be done so that a person can’t have an armory and pin down a Las Vegas SWAT team for six minutes. That’s fucked up.

These words came from Eric Church in a recent interview with Rolling stone when he was asked if his feelings about guns had changed after the Las Vegas shooting. Church goes on to say, when asked why he thinks nothing has been done:

I blame the lobbyists. And the biggest in the gun world is the NRA. … I’m a Second Amendment guy, … but I feel like they’ve been a bit of a roadblock. I don’t care who you are – you shouldn’t have that kind of power over elected officials. To me it’s cut-and-dried: The gun-show [loophole] would not exist if it weren’t for the NRA, so at this point in time, if I was an NRA member, I would think I had more of a problem than the solution. I would question myself real hard about what I wanted to be in the next three, four, five years. … I don’t care [about the blowback from fans]. Right’s right and wrong’s wrong. I don’t understand why we have to fear a group [like the NRA]. It’s asinine. Why can’t we come together and solve one part of this? Start with the bump stocks and the gun shows. Shut a couple of these down. I do think that will matter a little bit. I think it will save some lives.

That blowback from Eric Church fans has come in spades, particularly on social media, where fans are boycotting the singer’s music for not standing with the NRA, and others are in the “artists should shut up and sing” mindset. The beautiful and ironic thing about this is that any true fan of Eric Church, or anyone who read the article, would know Church doesn’t give a damn whether these people agree with him or not. But the bigger problem is the overwhelming way we continue to let politics divide us, and seep into the world of music which is an art form that can bring us all together and cross all political and cultural lines.

First of all, isn’t it sad that we’ve become a society which seeks out the political commentary in whatever we’re reading while simultaneously ignoring everything else? Eric Church does an interview here about Garth Brooks’ decision to lip sync at the 2017 CMA Awards, a major surgery and near-death experience, and the organic nature of country music, yet all anyone can discuss is his political comments. Shania Twain did an interview recently where she opened up about her childhood and horrific instances of abuse, and all anyone could talk about was her comment at the end saying that she understood why people would vote for Trump. But focusing on Church, even among the political stuff, he discusses Trump, immigration, and most notably, his unwillingness to vote for either side in 2016 and distrust of any politician. Yet for all these so-called fans, nothing matters except his stances on gun control.

And by the way, Eric Church didn’t make some radical statement about banning guns; he emphasized support for the right to bear arms. There are people on the opposite side of this debate, especially in the media, who have charged country artists with stronger positions on gun control to come out and speak on the issue. Maybe this reaction from Church’s fans will explain why they don’t. No artist should have to speak on any issue he or she doesn’t want to, and by the same token, every artist has the right to free speech and free thought, and every artist is a human being with their own ideologies. NO one should be obligated to take a certain political stance, but no one should be told to “shut up and sing.”

To Eric Church fans specifically, if you’re giving up his music because of his politics or his willingness to stand up for his beliefs, you had no grasp on Eric Church as an artist or a person in the first place. He’s made a career out of speaking his mind and going against the grain. And as music fans in general, how sad it would be to limit our tastes in music based on the artists’ politics; Jason Isbell wrote my 2017 song of the Year, but should I boycott his music because I don’t agree with a lot of his politics? The inability to separate Eric Church or any artist from a political viewpoint says more about the fan than the artist, for it signals that these fans are not really free thinkers capable of opening their minds. And whether or not you agree with Church, he’s being a free thinker here, not swayed by society or what people might think of his opinions.

Finally, music and other forms of artistic expression have a power like nothing else to bring people together. Artists like the aforementioned Isbell or the notoriously outspoken Sturgill Simpson may choose to use their music to speak about their politics. Others may use it as an escape from the ugly, divisive world that surrounds us. Music is above such things as people’s political views, and it’s the one thing that can draw us all together. Eric Church even speaks of this in his interview, a point that many have either not read or chosen to filter out of their brains for the sake of their own agendas, stating that he loves that the people who come to his shows are from many different backgrounds and cultures and hold all kinds of political viewpoints, but in that space, they are all united. That is what we should have taken from his interview if nothing else–that music holds the power to heal our divisive culture, and it’s a shame that so many are using his words to pull us further and further apart.