Singer Stella Parton said she’s “ashamed” of her older sister, Dolly Parton, for recent comments that seemingly dismissed concerns about sexual harassment in the country music industry.
“I’m ashamed of my sister for keeping her mouth shut,” Stella Parton, 69, said on the CountryLine “Our Stories” podcast last week, The Guardian reported.
“This is the first time I’ve really publicly called my sister out. But it’s high time that some of these older women speak up and speak out,” the award-winning singer said. “They’ve all gone through all kinds of abuse in this industry, so speak up.”
Stella, an advocate of the #MeToo movement, has spoken out against sexual harassment in the country music industry in the past, saying it’s nothing but “a bunch of Southern Baptist hypocrites” who “hide behind their religion,” Fox News reported.
Dolly, 73, faced some backlash in recent weeks after she told Sky News that she knew some “bad” men in her life and was “constantly” hit on as a young woman, but she never considered herself a victim of harassment.
“You know, I didn’t really think about it like that at the time because I had grown up with men,” Dolly said. “I have six brothers, my dad, my uncles — I was always close to all the men in my family. I’ve known a lot of great men. So I didn’t think about it that much. Of course, I’ve been hit on all my life as any young girl would be — but I always take it as a compliment. I never did anything to try and get ahead in the business. I never slept with anybody unless I wanted to.”
“I never found myself in any of those positions or I tried to stay out of those positions, and if I found myself in that, I was lucky I had a great personality and a great sense of humor that I could joke my way out of a lot of it — and then if I couldn’t, I have a temper and backbone so I could get out of it some other way,” she said.
Dolly has not publicly responded to her sister’s criticism.
• Jessica Chasmar can be reached at jchasmar@washingtontimes.com.
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