Maren Morris Embraces 'Lunatic Country Music Person' Title as She Gets in on Halloween Costume Meme

The country star poked fun at herself with a seasonally appropriate callback to her tiff with Brittany Aldean

Maren Morris attends the 57th Academy of Country Music Awards at Allegiant Stadium on March 07, 2022 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Maren Morris. Photo: Mike Coppola/Getty

Maren Morris is embracing being a "lunatic country music person," and encouraging her fans to be one, too — just in time for Halloween.

The country star, 32, tweeted an image of a photoshopped Spirit Halloween costume package with the label "lunatic country music person," and a picture of her on the front. Of course, the costume isn't real and is just Morris' way of playing along with the internet's most-recent meme craze, but the details are quite impressive.

"I didn't commission this but I do acknowledge it," she wrote. "Happy Halloween, lunatics."

The faux costume, which is notably "child size" — Morris is 5'1" — boasts the inclusion of pieces like a tambourine, inclusive fans, a pickleball paddle, a wig, and "beef with transphobes," with a "tall guy not included." (Her husband and the subject of her song "Tall Guys," Ryan Hurd, is 6'3".) The meme nods to Morris' public feud with Brittany Kerr Aldean, the wife of fellow country star Jason Aldean, Her September interview with Fox News' Tucker Carlson inspired the conservative pundit to use the phrase against Morris.

Their back-and-forth began when Brittany, 34, made a transphobic comment in an Instagram video amid the ongoing debate and efforts to restrict access to gender-affirming care. At the time, Aldean thanked her "parents for not changing my gender when I went through my tomboy phase," which Morris seemingly responded to on Twitter, telling her to "sell your clip-ins and zip it" and calling her an "Insurrection Barbie."

After Aldean flocked to Carlson, Morris stuck the phrase on T-shirts and sold them to fans, when she raised over $150,000 for the Trans Lifeline and GLAAD's Transgender Media Program.

"I was like, 'Oh, here we go.' But I thought, 'You know what? This would be really funny on a T-shirt: 'Lunatic country music person,'" Morris later told the LA Times. "Thank you, Tucker. Was it funny? Sure. But if we can twist it into a charitable cause, let's do it. Then it just exploded."

The "lunatic" name is now a "badge of honor" to the country star, who told the Times that she doesn't have any "feelings of kindness when it comes to humans being made fun of for questioning their identity, especially kids."

"I hate feeling like I need to be the hall monitor of treating people like human beings in country music," Morris said. "It's exhausting. But there's a very insidious culture of people feeling very comfortable being transphobic and homophobic and racist, and that they can wrap it in a joke and no one will ever call them out for it. It just becomes normal for people to behave like that."

Maren Morris
Theo Wargo/Getty

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Since making her comments, Aldean has shared more images of herself modeling clothing that reads "Don't Tread on Our Kids," as she questioned what she claimed what the "genital mutilation of children under the disguise of love." "Some parents want to be accepted by society so badly, that they're willing to make life-altering decisions for their children who aren't old enough to fully comprehend the consequences of those actions," Aldean wrote.

Other stars like Cassadee Pope and Joy Oladokun were among those who called out Aldean's transphobic comments, with Pope asking why celebrities with beauty brands had trouble seeing "the positives in including LGBTQ+ people in their messaging."

At least 13 U.S. states have signed anti-LGBTQ legislation into law, and another 23 states have introduced such bills in 2022 alone, according to HRC, with many of those laws targeting transgender youth and gender-affirming care.

President Joe Biden recently pledged his support to trans citizens during Transgender Day of Visibility in March, and he's continued to urge Congress to pass the long-overdue Equality Act.

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