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When we all first heard of Taylor Swift, she was the nice, innocent, All-American girl who sang country music about heartbreak and relationships. She was there when we really needed her, through our breakups, when boys were mean to us (does this ever truly stop), and even when we were fighting with our best friends and needed some place to escape to for a couple minutes. Parents loved her because she was the face of what they thought teenagers should be like instead of artists like P!nk and Britney Spears who were topping the pop charts during Swift’s seminal 2008 “Fearless” album. But lately it seems like Swift is more problematic and annoying than anything else with what seems to be her never-ending feuds with Kanye and Katy Perry and headlines of “who she could be dating next.” Frankly, I’m sick of seeing her everywhere and here’s why:
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Let’s start with the never-ending drama between Taylor and Kanye West. Everyone and their mother knows the story of how this started but if you can’t remember, here it goes. Taylor wins the award for Video of the Year at the 2009 VMA’s, Kanye interrupts and says that BeyoncĂ© deserved the award because she had the “best video of all time,”, and drama ensues. Fast forward to February 2016, when Kanye releases his song “Famous” which includes a rather interesting line referring to Taylor, she comes out and says that she had no idea Kanye was going to refer to her in his song and said she found it vulgar and absolutely disgusting of him to say anything about her. A couple months later, Kim Kardashian decides to release the video of Swift approving of his lyrics over the phone while he raps them to her. Swift even goes on to say that she likes the song. So, what exactly is the problem here? Well without Kim releasing the video of Taylor approving of the song, everyone and the media starts labeling Taylor as the victim when she clearly is not. She loves playing the little girl who was thrust into the media and into this feud without her consent, when in reality she gladly plays along with this feud to her benefit. Taylor was never the victim, just another willing participant who knew exactly what she was doing throughout the entire thing.
And now she goes and releases the song “Look What You Made Me Do.” Oh Taylor, Taylor, Taylor. Sweetie, you were doing great. “1989” was a jam, and now you come out with this new version of yourself. The song, though catchy, is not what I expected from her and to be honest, I’m not quite sure I want this from her either. Yeah I understand the whole point of this song and her new “look” is to call out the media and her fans by saying, “Hey look this is what you’ve forced me to be like, because I wasn’t getting anything but hate from you when I was Miss Goody​​-Two-Shoes,” but man this is a complete 180. The references in the video to everything the media has said about her is spot on and a good move by Swift in showing that she really does not give two craps about what you say about her, but was the Kim Kardashian reference really necessary? And you know what really bothers me about her? The fact that even though she wanted to be “excluded from this narrative,” she keeps capitalizing on her feuds and what the media portrays her as. She has never tried to change what the media says about her, instead she just adds fuel to the fire by being as extra as ever. I will forever jam out to “1989” and scream at the top of lungs whenever “I Knew You Were Trouble” comes on, but for now I would like to be excluded from the narrative of this new Taylor Swift era.
So quite frankly, I think it’s time for all of us to stop feeling sorry for her. She’s a big girl, she can handle herself.