Is Dolly Parton a joke? A joker? A shrewd businesswoman? A brave woman of faith?

Dolly Parton, 1976. (Image credit: David Redfern/Redferns)

“Dollitics” from the podcast series Dolly Parton’s America by Jad Abumrad and Shima Oliaee.

All the episodes of the Dolly Parton’s America podcast series are interesting and thought-provoking. I highly recommend listening to them all. I want to write some of my thoughts about this episode, “Dollitics,” in particular. I experienced or related to much of what they talked about. And it made me rethink my conclusions about Dolly.

In the ‘70s, when I started hearing Dolly Parton on the radio and seeing her on TV, I thought she was a joke. Big hair, big boobs, super high voice, Southern accent, it all added up to me thinking she was a silly incarnation of the uneducated and unintelligent, playing up her sexy image to make money. Listening to this series has seriously changed my mind.

Do you remember the song and movie “Working Nine to Five”? I watched the movie when it first came out and got a big kick out of it. In the Dollitics episode, Dolly and Jane Fonda (both stars of the movie, along with Lily Tomlin) talk about how the “Nine to Five” song and movie came to be. Before either the song or the movie, there was a movement called 9to5, founded by Karen Nussbaum, a friend and fellow activist of Jane Fonda. Karen “paid the rent” by working in a clerical job she hated. This was the early ‘70s, when suddenly hundreds of women joined the workforce. They were "treated as the wife,” as Karen put it, expected to get the coffee and be a sex symbol in the office. More than that, they were paid much less than men in the same positions.

Jad: One day, Karen’s walking home from work and she passes by a restaurant.

Karen: And actually what happened was there was a group of waitresses. Holding picket signs. There’s just these eight working class waitresses who got hit on the butt one time too many or disrespected by the boss or whatever it was. And they decide that they are going to strike.

My ears perked up at “hit on the butt one time too many.” That happened to my co-workers and me when I was waitressing during high school. We wore a cutesy uniform with miniskirts, tucked-in white tops, and styrofoam hats. After taking orders from customers, we had to hang the tickets (the little slips from our order pads) on an order wheel for the kitchen.

An order wheel. Waitresses tucked the ticket into the clip on one side, and kitchen workers spun them around to the other side.

At this particular restaurant, the wall with the kitchen pass-through window had some kind of display on the floor in front of it. To reach the order wheel clips, we waitresses had to bend over the display. Throughout the shift, the floor manager would walk by and pinch our bottoms. It made me so angry! But, never once did I complain or tell anyone about it. Never thought of it. It was just part of being a woman at work.

Another thing I hated was men co-workers calling me little nicknames like “Dear” or “Sweetie.” When someone would say, “Would you type this for me, dear?” I so wanted to answer, “Sure, sweetheart,” through gritted teeth.

But I digress — kind of. After marching with the waitresses that day, Karen Nussbaum gathered more women workers and began a movement that they named 9to5.

Jad: They created an office worker’s bill of rights that they revealed at a press conference. They did studies of the publishing industry and the banking industry. The pay runs up to 40% less than men for jobs at the same skill and effort level.

There’s also Phil Donahue.

Another “ear perk moment” for me. I watched the Phil Donahue Show every day during the years I worked from home or part-time. “9to5 used to do an annual bad boss contest” on the show, and would present the awards to the bad bosses right there on TV. While Karen was working on these studies, shows, lawsuits, and fights for equal pay, she often met with her “movie star friend,” Jane Fonda. Jane had the idea to make a movie. She persuaded Dolly Parton to be one of the three women stars, and Dolly wrote the song that became so famous.

I also vaguely remember hearing about a moment at the 2017 Emmys. All three women from the 9 to 5 movie were nominated for lead actress for their roles in other shows. The organizers decided it would be a great idea to reunite these three women on the stage that night. The three of them presented the award for best supporting actor. Jane and Lily began making comments about Donald Trump.

Jane: Now back in 1980 in that movie, we refused to be controlled by a sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot. [a quote from a line in the movie]

Lily: And in 2017, we still refuse to be controlled by a sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot.

Dolly told Jad she did not like it. She had told Jane and Lily, “I said, now look, I’m not going to get into the politics of everything." She said many times, “I don’t do politics. I have too many fans on both sides of the fence.” They played a clip of the award presentation, which Dolly commented on.

At the Emmys:
Lily: They’re nominated for their extraordinary work in supporting roles.”

Dolly: Well, I know about support. Hadn’t been for good support, Shock and Awe here would be more like Flopsy and Droopy.

Dolly’s comment:
Try to turn it around and make it kind of funny. Like I say, I can always depend on a boob joke. If I have to.

At the Emmys:
Dolly: I’m just hoping by the way, I’m just hoping that I’m gonna get one of those Grace and Frankie vibrators in my swag bag tonight.

As Jad said, “Within just a few seconds, Dolly had disarmed the whole room.” Later in the interview, Shima, the co-host, asked a question.

Shima: When you saw, when you’re in a room and everyone’s attacking this man, like Trump, because of your story of forgiveness, does it almost make you feel like you want to protect him?

Dolly: Yes.

Shima: What was your feeling?

Dolly: I wanted to say, Let’s pray for the president. Why don’t we pray for the president? If we’re having all these problems, let’s just, you know, why don’t we just pray for Mr. President?

But she knew that wouldn’t work. “So, when all else fails, tit joke.”

Jad confessed that Dolly's answer “messed him up.”

Jad: I came in thinking that her refusal to talk about Trump was probably mostly a business calculation. She has a lot that she needs to protect, including a massive charitable foundation. So I think we can all get that. But it’s also easy to see that silence cynically, like a refusal to speak truth just because it might hurt the bottom line. But when she said, “Let’s pray for the president,” it just hit me like a ton of bricks. I thought, “Oh no, no, no, no, that’s not all that’s happening here."

He goes on to talk about many other Dolly Parton songs that are about political and social issues.

Jad: So this is not someone who’s in denial. But the Trump comment made me realize, oh, I get it. She’s saying her stake in the sand is that she will not cast anybody out.

Jad goes on to reference other times where Dolly refused to “flatten” people who had wronged her or whom people condemned.

Jad: And it seems suddenly clear to me that yes, while there is a business logic here, this is also a spiritual stance. This is an ethos she has chosen.

“A spiritual stance,” “an ethos.. That is the closest anyone (including Dolly) came to saying straight out what seems obvious to me: To the best of her ability, Dolly is living her faith.

But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. —Matthew 5:44

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. —Galatians 3:28

And [Christ] died for all… —2 Corinthians 5:15

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’This is the first and greatest commandment.And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” —Matthew 22:37-40

Dolly’s answer, “I wanted to say, ‘Let’s pray for the president,’” was another ear-perker moment for me. Have you ever wished you could pray with your fellow workers (assuming you work in a non-faith-based industry)? I have. On 9-11, we watched reports of United Flight 93, the only plane that was prevented from hitting its target in Washington DC. We had already watched the other three planes hit the towers and the Pentagon. When my boss, the company president, and I were walking together to the conference room where the TV was set up, I asked him if we could pray. I knew he was a man of faith and thought, maybe in this horrible moment, maybe it would be appropriate to have a moment of silence at least. We didn’t, but, like Dolly, I wished we could. That wish came to mind many other times, too, such as at the beginning of meetings or when a discussion got heated.

Back to the Dolly Parton interview and history. What are your thoughts? Dolly is, as she says, an entertainer. What else? Is Dolly Parton a joke? A joker? A shrewd businesswoman? A brave woman of faith?

I hope you will listen to this episode and/or the whole series. If you do, I would love to hear what you think.