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*Note to readers: This article was not meant to offend Taylor Swift fans, but to just explain the controversy behind her new music, and her history in relation to the lyrics. Nothing said is meant to reflect badly on her as an artist, or her music.*
Just like any celebrity, Taylor Swift has had her share of negative responses and criticism from the media. Because she doesn’t make political statements, followers and subscribers call her out for her lack of participation and opinion on certain political topics. Along with that “hate,” she has ongoing high-profile feuds with other popular celebrities such as Kanye West and Katy Perry.
On August 24, Swift released her first single in a long time. On August 18 fans noted that she had cleared all of her content on her social media accounts, which provoked rumours that she was about to drop new music. On August 21 she shared on her Instagram account a 10-second video of a snake’s tail slithering. Two days later she released another part of the video, this time featuring the snake’s head. A day later “Look What You Made Me Do” was released.
The video focuses on Taylor’s condemnation of her “enemies.” People viewed the music video as a form of backlash with the intent of getting revenge on her adversaries. In both the song lyrics and music video scenes she was directly calling out her rivals: Katy Perry, Kanye West, Kim Kardashian, Calvin Harris, and Tom Hiddleston. The song received both positive and negative reactions, landing at the top of the charts but also earning heavy criticism.
Swift’s feud with Kanye West began when he interrupted her acceptance speech at the Video Music Awards in 2009 after she won the Best Female Video (“You Belong With Me”) award. Before West released his song “Famous” in 2016, he reportedly called Taylor Swift to ask permission to use her name in his song lyrics. Shortly after the song was released Swift publicly spoke out about not knowing he planned to use her name in the way that he did. Kanye’s wife, Kim Kardashian, then leaked a recording of the phone conversation, which falsified Swift’s claims.
Swift and Perry have been involved in one of the biggest celebrity dramas in recent years. In her video Swift appears in a sports car, which is the same car that appeared in Perry’s “Waking Up in Vegas” music video, with a similar imitation of Perry’s short haircut. Swift crashes her car, which is then followed by a scene of her accident being intensely photographed by the paparazzi. She then pulls out a Grammy Trophy. Taylor Swift has already won 8 Grammys from 29 nominations, whereas Perry hasn’t won any of her nominations. The media later called Swift out for showing off.
Another iconic scene in the music video includes Swift in a bath tub full of jewelry. She is reportedly said to be mocking Kim Kardashian’s Paris robbery when over 11 million dollars worth of jewelry was stolen. The iconic “I [heart] TS” shirt which her ex-boyfriend Tom Hiddleston wore also made an appearance in her music video. Lyrics such as “I would very much like to be excluded from this narrative” cite a line from her fallout with West and Kardashian over West’s hit “Famous.” The faux phone line “The old Taylor is dead” is an obvious reminder of her recorded conversation with West. Another famous line, “I don’t like your tilted stage,” is a direct reference to West on his Saint Pablo tour.
This “new” Taylor in the music video is seen as a darker, self-satirising persona. The video is seen as a way to “hit back” against past and new critics, and her detractors. In August Swift captioned an Instagram photo, “There will be no further explanation. There will just be reputation.”
Despite its possibly self-satirising intentions, since the video was released, a media outcry has accused Swift of using her platform as a superstar to redress trivial personal slights from other pop stars, rather than as a means of raising awareness of the injustice that many feel has run rampant in the United States since the new presidential administration began. Many seem to feel that Swift’s attempt to reinvent herself in a darker, more vindictive vein is poorly timed and insensitive to more important discourse in the U.S. right now, and furthermore, that this insensitivity makes her appear childish, shallow and politically clueless. But since when is it the official responsibility of pop singers to focus on social justice instead of their art and their careers? It seems like pressure from the media for them to make their voices political has increased in recent months. Will this have implications for celebrities that last beyond the Trump administration, or is this just a tense and divisive moment in American civil discourse?
For more information, see People, Billboard, Time Magazine and Rolling Stone
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