Tina Knowles is clearing up all speculation that she clapped back at legendary country artist Dolly Parton in defense of her daughter.
Just two days after Parton tried to defuse whispers that the Country Music Awards robbed Beyoncé of getting any nominations for her “Cowboy Carter” album, a comment on Instagram that appeared to be from Knowles’ verified account went viral in response to Parton.
But not so fast! Mama Tina now claims, “This is fake not from me !”
The “fake” comment addressed the “Here You Come Again” singer and was originally shared by The Neighborhood Talk, which has since deleted their post.
The comment read, “Oh Ms. Dolly, we love you, but Bey did spend her WHOLE life workin’ hard since she was 9! She got country roots too. She’s mastered her craft and broken records in EVERY genre. So sayin’ she didn’t ’spend her life’ in country music dismisses all the work she put in.”
It continued, “Bey don’t need to stay in one lane to get respect – her talent and work ethic speak for themselves! She’s been putin’ in the work, and nobody else gets asked to “spend their life” in one place to be recognized! #been country.”
How many episodes did I miss, why miss Tina Knowles checking Dolly Parton on Instagram 😭 pic.twitter.com/T0iyht5a7A
— NATE (@NATERERUN) September 19, 2024
Before being declared fake, the message ignited a bit of a debate on the topic. Some people supported what they thought was Knowles’ clapback, including one person that said, “This just goes to show that white women are always gonna white women. No matter who it is.”
Another person drew comparisons to how the CMAs treat the “Irreplaceable” singer versus how they treat white hip-hop artist Post Malone — who also featured on “Cowboy Carter” and also happened to receive four nominations after putting out his first country album this year.
“If Post Malone was allowed to hop from Hip Hop to Country then Beyoncé should be allowed to do the exact same! It’s not even about if you think her album is good or not, to be counted out because you’re Beyoncé is unfair.”
Others respectfully sided with Parton. One person said, “Mama… Ms Dolly is correct. It was a specialty album. And an album that doesn’t deserve an award just cuz it’s Beyonce.”
Another wrote, “Dolly Parton was kindly tryna say how it goes down honestly. I don’t think she meant any harm and she’s been nt but loving towards Beyonce from the public view. I think Ms. Tina could have handled this differently, but I get she’s a momma bear as well. It’s just a trophy at the end of the day.”
Beyoncé put out her first country album “Cowboy Carter” in March years after having an experience at the 2016 CMAs where she “did not feel welcomed.” The Houston native performed her first country track “Daddy Lessons” alongside The Chicks, formerly known as The Dixie Chicks. Despite receiving much praise for the performance, she was also met with boos from the crowd and racial tweets from viewers.
So when the award show left her out of all categories to be nominated this year, the Beyhive immediately called foul play. But Parton doesn’t believe the snubbing was done on “purpose.”
In response to the allegations, Parton told Variety on Sept. 17, “Well, you never know. There’s so many wonderful country artists that, I guess probably the country music field, they probably thought, well, we can’t really leave out some of the ones that spend their whole life doing that.”
She later added, “So I don’t think it was a matter of shutting out, like doing that on purpose. I think it was just more of what the country charts and the country artists were doing, that do that all the time, not just a specialty album.”
Overall, Parton has shown major love to Beyoncé and given her nod of approval to the project. She even appears twice on the album herself with one song being named after her.
“But it was a wonderful album,” she said. She can be very, very proud of, and I think everybody in country music welcomed her and thought that, that was good.”
