Beyonce made history last week with her iconic performance of her country hit “Daddy Lessons” with the Dixie Chicks at the Country Music Association (CMA) Awards, but unfortunately that still didn’t stop the social media trolls from coming out from under their bridges.

What was supposed to be an eventful night where the love of music is celebrated quickly turned into a race war between country music fans and Beyonce fans.

The reaction to Beyonce’s presence became so volatile and xenophobic on their social media pages that even the head honchos over at the CMA’s organization had to pull the plug on all things Beyonce from their accounts and website.

There wasn’t such an outcry when Justin Timberlake did a duet with Chris Stapleton at the CMA’s or when Katy Perry collaborated with Dolly Parton at the same awards show the following year. Their performances were received with open arms and called “the highlight of the night.” Someone please tell me why the same courtesy can’t be bestowed upon the queen of R&B and pop music?

I don’t usually like to play the race card in situations like these where a pop star legend dips their toes into uncharted categories of music. Because of the sheer bluntness of it all I’ll call a spade a spade and do it anyway.

Some of the tweets included, “That’s right folks. Beyonce performed at the CMAs last night & is on a mission to take the country away from us, hard-working white people!” The derogatory “n” word and the insulting swear word “b**ch” were used in others.

The comments went on: “@Beyonce the cop hater? No thanks,” and, “What place @Beyonce who vilifies police officers who keep us safe have to do with the #CMAawards50?”

Beyonce speaking out against police brutality doesn’t mean she’s anti-police. She’s anti-police violence, but that doesn’t make her against those in blue with a badge.

I don’t know how saying “Stop killing us” in her songs makes her a bad person. She’s tired of seeing people who look like her get unjustly slain by corrupt, rogue cops. I think most folks, whether they look like me or you, are exhausted by it as well.

Never did she say all cops were like this, or that all the minorities killed were innocent, but she did say “Stop…” and where in that is the lie? She’s right, is she not?

In a way, I understand the country fans point of view. Never in my wildest dreams did I think Beyonce, of all artists, would go country.

However, the CMA should know better than to treat a celebrity with a huge following and grand caliber, like Beyonce, in a dismissive way.

Perhaps one could argue Beyonce was dealt a bad deal because she was singing with the Dixie Chicks, previously exiled from country radio for speaking out against former President Bush over going to war with the Middle East post 9/11.

At the time, there was a substantial public outcry from fans accusing them of being anti-American for going against the Commander in Chief’s stance on the war on terror.

The country fans were wrong then in their handling of the Dixie Chicks, who have every right to have an opinion and speak their minds, just like they’re wrong now for spewing racial undertones towards Beyonce for simply doing what she loves to do: singing.

The CMA released a statement refuting reports that claimed the organization deleted from their social networks all mentions of Beyonce and the Dixie Chick’s CMA performance.

“CMA has not erased any mentions of Beyonce’s performance on the CMA Awards,” the organization said. “In advance of the broadcast, CMA removed a five second promotional clip from ABC.com and CMA’s Facebook page. The promo was unapproved and CMA removed it prior to the broadcast.”

This statement said that CMA are closeted-racists and liars too. The statement, found on several different news channels and websites, conveyed that they did, in fact, cave to the hatemongers of the world by wiping any trace or evidence of what is and was the highlight of the most boring awards show.

In an interview with The New York Times, the chief executive of the CMA Awards, Sarah Trahern, said Beyonce had provided her own photographer for the show and only approved one video of the performance to be posted.

I love how they deflected the blame to Beyonce, like she’s at fault for the CMA’s actions. Whether that was the case, you issue that statement beforehand, not after you’ve been called out by the country fans, The BeyHive (Beyonce’s fan base) and the Dixie Chicks themselves.

The fact that Beyonce hasn’t responded to any of this speaks volumes. Sometimes, silence is golden and speaks for itself.

Hopefully, in midst of this controversy that shouldn’t have occurred, racial tensions in this country can subside. Optimistically, we as a nation can soon follow in the footsteps of the Dixie Chicks, who took to Twitter and posted a clip of the song and wrote: “If we all turn this up really loud, together we can drown out the hate.”