Chappell Roan was “treated the best and worst” by “country boys” at school: “That’s how I learned to stand up for myself”

After unveiling her new country-pop single, Chappell Roan has reflected on mixed experiences with “country boys” at school in a new interview.

• READ MORE: Chappell Roan: the pop supernova who feels like one of the ‘Drag Race’ girls

Earlier today (March 14), the pop artist shared ‘The Giver’, which fans were already calling a “lesbian anthem” after she debuted it during a performance on Saturday Night Live last November and told audience: “All you country boys saying you know how to treat a woman right. Well, only a woman knows how to treat a woman right.”

For a lot of fans, it felt revelatory to have an openly queer musician take on country, and Roan has since elaborated on experiences that shaped ‘The Giver’, including brushes with country boys and embracing her identity through music.

Speaking with Apple Music Country’s Kelleigh Bannen, the ‘Good Luck, Babe!’ singer was asked why country was the direction she chose, and she cited “campy” and “fun” tracks like ‘Chattahoochee’ and ‘Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)’ as major inspirations for how she wanted to feel while performing.

“I think I have a special relationship to where I’m from because of country music,” she continued. “So, to kind of honour that part of myself (…) it’s like, ‘You know what? Yes, I am gay and yes, I am ultra pop. Yes, I am a drag queen. You can also perform a country song.'”

Elsewhere in the conversation with Bannen, Roan reflected on her experiences with country boys. “I’m about to say something so controversial,” she warned, “but do you know who has treated me the best and the worst? Country boys.

“They treated me the nicest and they’ve also treated me the worst because – this is in high school – and that’s what I grew up around. Those are the boys I grew up around and that’s how I learned to stand up for myself, because you’re not going to look at me and be like, ‘Shh, shh, shh.’

She said time spent with them was how she learned “that I am never going to have this done to me ever again”, and was “never going to have someone put their hand up and say, ‘Stop talking.'”

She went on to say: “I learned from a lot of the boys that I grew up around who were influenced by their fathers and how these roles as, like, ‘I’m a man, so you speak after me.’ I began my confidence in feeling kind of inferior to a lot of the boys around me growing up.

“And so whenever I pointed out at that photographer on the red carpet at the VMAs, I heard boys at my freaking high school telling girls to shut the… up.” Famously, while attending the red carpet for the MTV Video Music Awards last year, the NME Cover star was seen telling off a photographer, saying: “Don’t! Not me, bitch!”

It was later revealed that a photographer had first shouted “shut the fuck up!” – seemingly at her specifically – prompting her to turn around and snap back: “You shut the fuck up!”

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