LOOK WHAT WE MADE TAY DO
It would be a surprise if no one shared a negative reaction to a new Taylor Swift song. Or, for that matter, to anything new that the pop star says, does, or posts. That's part of the game.
A few days after the release of “You Need to Calm Down”, Taylor put out the music video, which generated just as much—if not more—scrutiny from all sides. To recap, here is a list of general complaints and criticisms I’ve gathered in the few days since the release of the music video:
Swift is making an appalling comparison between negative comments people make about her stardom and hateful slurs people use to attack the LGBTQ community.
As a straight woman, she is exploiting the real struggle of LGBTQ people and using her newly-declared allyship as a marketing tool.
It took her way too long to finally say anything political and now suddenly she’s shouting it out with lines as explicit as “shade never made anybody less gay” in her song.
She’s using the word “shade” wrong because she doesn’t know the history of the phrase.
The amount of LGBTQ celebrity cameos in the music video only highlights her elitist perspective on the true history and culture.
Both set design and costume design for the music video demonstrate ignorant stereotyping and a lack of sensitivity to serious economic and cultural tensions.
The scene devoted to making up with Katy Perry is just a final testament to how Taylor Swift cannot possibly comprehend the magnitude of the LGBTQ struggle.
Even the title of the song is a misstep, further perpetuating the harmful stigma that still exists around female hysteria.
After the less-than-perfect scores that Reputation may or may not have landed, Swift cowardly reverted back to her more upbeat, bubbly, and commercially successful style of music.
It’s very possible that I’m missing pieces, or conflating ideas, or overlooking the nuances out of personal bias. With that in mind, here are my corresponding counterarguments, put as simply as possible:
I have more respect for someone who tries to offer up an experience in which they felt attacked or vulnerable in order to relate to me or empower me than someone who doesn’t try at all.
These days it’s more likely that the average American under the age of 30 has entertained bicurious thoughts or emotions than ever before. I’m not saying that Taylor Swift is coming out as anything, but I am saying that I know of several individuals who did not settle with one sex until their late 30s… if ever.
2a. As for the question of allyship and marketing tools, I’m fine with bashing Victoria’s Secret and YouTube for hypocritical support of LGBTQ… but it’s hard to deny that Taylor is practicing what she’s preaching (i.e. the donations, the Stonewall performance, the petition referenced at the end of the music video).
Yeah, Taylor was pretty silent about controversial issues for a long time—aside from relationship drama and her own personal feuds with other celebs. While I know I may be giving her too much genius cred with this counter, consider the possibility that, intentional or not, she’s managed to garner a wider and more diverse audience with this silence. And given her track record of expertly placed Easter eggs and precisely planned album rollouts, who is to say that this wasn’t part of some master plan? (Grains of salt here, because, yeah, admittedly, I also like to entertain the possibility that Taylor and Kanye’s feud was orchestrated from the very beginning by both of them as a sort of performance art piece.)
I may have to concede on this one. The lyrics here really make me curious about the alternate lines that must have been beaten out by “shade never made anybody less gay”... it doesn’t make sense. I admit it. Shade has totally made people less gay in certain ways.
Imagine that she didn’t have any LGBTQ cameos, though. Taylor is damned if she does, damned if she doesn’t. Also… Ellen.
I could maybe concede a little on this one… but I could also point out that choosing a trailer park as the setting is actually a logically sound metaphor and a somewhat historically accurate common ground between hicks and queens. I can acknowledge that Taylor may have been better off with a less provocative setting, but a trailer park inherently implies shared living space and community. Yes, it uncomfortably dramatizes the opposing sides, but was anyone this outraged when she dramatized women putting other women down with explosives and machine guns in the Bad Blood video? This is POP MUSIC!
See Counterargument 1.
But, like... also kind of neutralizes and/or reclaims the sentiment.
Reputation was obviously a divergence from Taylor’s signature style. She’d been through a lot of drama and bullshit in the media, and, I mean, come on—the first single was titled “Look What You Made Me Do”—she wasn’t oblivious to the divergence. And who the hell makes up the rule that once you enter into a dark phase of life and art, you have to stay there and let it get darker.
Reactions—like the ones that I’m sharing right now and the ones that others will then have to mine—are important. But intentions are important, too.
Taylor Swift is a pop star, but she’s also a storyteller, and she is an expert at telling her own ongoing story through music. But is she telling someone else’s story with this new song in order to make herself look better? That’s a tricky question to answer when one of the major criticisms of the song points at her inserting her own struggles into the message.
Taylor Swift’s intentions with her newest release are ultimately more important than any single reaction… but if any single reaction is worth mentioning, I’d say it’s less of an opinion and more of a question that her newest single raises:
What does it mean to be an ally of the LGBTQ community?
Does it mean subtle, reserved support—humbly attending the right events and donating money to the right causes?
Does it mean loud, radical support—publicly announcing a stand and angrily attacking the opposing side?
Does it mean arguing with loved ones or calling government officials or marching and protesting in the streets?
Does it mean declaring your preferred pronoun in your Twitter bio or referring to your significant other as your “partner”?
…Does it mean something different to everyone?