A ‘fast car’ to the commonalities on our economy’s lowest rung
“You got a fast car, I want a ticket to anywhere / Maybe we make a deal, maybe together we can get somewhere / Any place is better / Starting from zero, got nothing to lose / Maybe we’ll make something / Me, myself, I got nothing to prove.”
— From “Fast Car” by Tracy Chapman
In 1989, at the 31st annual Grammy Awards, Tracy Chapman won the Grammy for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, for her song “Fast Car” from her self-titled debut album. She performed the song that evening on the Grammy stage, with nothing but her voice and an acoustic guitar. Her performance received a standing ovation from the celebrity-filled crowd.
Thirty-five years later, at the 66th annual Grammy Awards, Chapman was on the Grammy stage performing her classic song again. This time, though, she was performing with country music superstar Luke Combs, whose 2023 version of “Fast Car” reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and No. 1 on Billboard’s Country Airplay chart. Once again, the house was brought to its feet at the performance’s conclusion.
As I watched the performance, I was struck by how different Chapman and Combs are, both in physical appearance and background. Chapman is a Black woman from Cleveland, raised by a single mother. Combs is a white man from Charlotte, N.C., raised by both of his parents.
Combs said that “Fast Car” was his favorite song. He talked about riding around listening to it on cassette tape. He still has the original cassette.
Think about that for a second. A song written by a Black woman who grew up poor in Ohio resonated with a white guy from North Carolina who loved country music and wasn’t even born when the song was released. He sings a nearly identical version of the song, which then resonates with millions of other country music fans across the country. That is both powerful and amazing.
Country music, rightly or wrongly, has long been perceived as the music of choice for poor, working-class whites. There is no shortage of country songs that invoke images of men performing manual labor, dirt roads, pickup trucks, cheap beer, trailer parks and the like. For those of you like me who watch “Yellowstone,” you may have noticed that country music is played often in the bunk house where the cowboys live and never in the main house where the wealthy Dutton family lives.
But if we take another minute to think about it, we shouldn’t be that surprised that a song written by a Black woman raised in poverty resonated with fans of a genre largely associated with white poverty. To be clear, being poor while also being Black is different from being poor while also being white. However, there is a lot that they have in common. “Fast Car,” a song essentially about escapism, speaks to that commonality.
To be poor or working-class, whether Black or white, is to feel disregarded and unheard. We see it in East Palestine, Ohio, where residents complain of inaction in response to their continued complaints of sickness as a result of a chemical exposure created through a train derailment that was no fault of their own. East Palestine is 89% white. We saw it in Flint, Mich., where residents complained of inaction in response to their continued complaints of sickness as a result of a chemical exposure created through no fault of their own. Flint is 55.5% Black.
A life framed by marginalization is also awash in despair. Despair which reaches out for anything to assuage it. We see it in the opioid epidemic, which has swallowed large parts of poor, rural (white) America. We saw it during the crack epidemic, which swallowed large parts of poor, urban (Black) America.
Donald Trump became president, in large part, by specifically appealing to poor and/or working-class whites. He spoke to their anger and frustration about entire communities decimated by job loss and lack of economic investment. He promised jobs and investment. He was their champion.
Every four years, whoever is the Democratic presidential candidate will begin to specifically appeal to poor and/or working-class Black people. He (or she) will speak to their anger and frustration about entire communities decimated by job loss and lack of economic investment. He (or she) will promise jobs and investment. He (or she) will claim to be their champion.
Trump did not fulfill his promise. Thus far, no Democratic president has fulfilled his promise. The players change. The conditions persist.
In his 1935 book, “Black Reconstruction in America,” W.E.B. Du Bois wrote about whiteness as a “public and psychological wage.” Whiteness was a kind of “payment” granted to poor whites to help them overlook their exploitation by American capitalism. Said another way, poor whites could much more easily swallow the pill of their own exploitation if they were granted the social status that came with not being Black.
Some 30 years later, the president of the United States, a white man himself, affirmed Du Bois’ theory. President Lyndon B. Johnson once said to a young staffer, “If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. ... give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you.” You may remember that LBJ had a prominent role in the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
If only poor and/or working-class whites would see the connection between their plight and that of poor and/or working-class Black people in America. If only they would see that their liberation is inextricably linked to the liberation of those who experience the same circumstances, just in a different color. If only they would see that their inability to see this connection is because of a blindfold put on them nearly at birth. The “blindfold” is whiteness.
“You got a fast car, is it fast enough so we can fly away? / We gotta make a decision, leave tonight or live and die this way ...”