On Feb, 11, it seemed nothing was more important than the Super Bowl match set against The Kansas City Chiefs and The San Francisco 49ers. Well, except for Taylor Swift.
In Las Vegas, where this year’s Super Bowl was held, you could bet on anything involving the big game, including how many times camera shots of Taylor Swift were shown. There was so much speculation about the sightings of Taylor Swift during the game, what she would wear, and how she would act among other things.
To me, I think it’s obvious that betting companies are out to profit off Taylor Swift’s existence at these games like some sort of novelty. However, when the spectacle of having her in the audience loses its appeal, what is left but criticism?
It’s already circulated that Chiefs fans were not happy about Travis Kelce showing up at Taylor Swift’s Tokyo concert the night before the Super Bowl. While fans have expressed their concern, I don’t think it’s the job of fans to be hounding and policing a celebrity’s whereabouts.
There have been all kinds of backlash about Taylor Swift attending the Chiefs games and being shown during game time. This backlash has gotten very severe in the past few weeks, with some individuals going as far as to generate AI and deepfake explicit photos of Swift at these games.
These photos were posted to X, formerly known as Twitter, and have since been removed but this is far from the first time photos of Swift have been doctored in this explicit and non-consensual way. This is absolutely not an appropriate reaction to seeing Taylor Swift at a football game. I’ve heard fragments of arguments from football fans saying that she’s “ruining the game” for them, that they don’t want to hear about her constantly, but is this really what it’s come down to?
My big question is: what is the big deal with seeing Taylor Swift at these games and what drives individuals to create derogatory content about her as a response? Where is all this hatred truly stemming from?
Aside from wondering about where all the deeply pointed hate is coming from, one may ask: where can we go from here? The first round of generated photos have been taken down but I want to know where the preventative measures are to stop this from happening over and over again.
Celebrities are always a spectacle in society; and the bigger the celebrity, the more polarizing they are to the public. Taylor Swift is a huge star with a very public and accessible image so naturally she has always been a subject of this phenomenon. However, the line must be drawn somewhere, and we can no longer be treating her like something to profit from and ogle at.
There has to be a little bit of humanity in this situation. Recently, Swift has donated $100,000 to the family of Lisa Lopez-Galvan, a victim of the Kansas City Chiefs Parade shooting. While she makes an attempt to reach out and engage with this community, she seems to still be mistreated. Hopefully, there will not be a flood of backlash again for this action or her presence at games in the future.