Morgan Wallen's warm reception at the ACM Awards is proof country music is complicit in his use of the N-word ... so says the NAACP Nashville chapter president.
Sheryl Guinn -- president of the Nashville chapter -- tells TMZ ... by welcoming him back into their community, the genre's embrace of Wallen destroys artists' accountability.
The ways she sees it -- people in country music believe Morgan just needed to have enough time pass until people lose their outrage. However, Sheryl says time does not heal all wounds.
She thinks the Academy of Country Music banning Morgan from its 2021 ceremony had no impact ... they never addressed how the N-word is a symptom of the underlying inequality and bigotry. She points to the fact Wallen's album went on to do huge numbers.
As we reported, Wallen was caught on camera hurling the n-word during a rowdy night with friends back in February of 2021.
Sheryl tells us she hasn't seen the country artist make enough of an effort to show his fans why using the N-word is a bad thing. She acknowledges he donated $25K to her division of the NAACP, but says the money doesn't help his followers understand systemic racism.
The last time we spoke to Sheryl, she shared her thoughts on Wallen's 'GMA' interview with Michael Strahan back in July ... saying his words came from a place of embarrassment, and he was sorry for being caught, as opposed to being sorry for spewing a hateful word.
Now, she admits she doesn't know what action Wallen and the country music community should take, saying "I don't know what to tell people who have all the privileges and rights in the world ... but they can figure it out."