In July 2016, Kim Kardashian released an edited Snapchat video of a phone call between Taylor Swift and her then-husband Kanye West in regards to a derogatory lyric he was planning to include in his song “Famous”. This was the beginning of Swift being “canceled”, with #TaylorSwiftIsOverParty and #TaylorSwiftIsASnake trending #1 on Twitter. She publicly disappeared and came back a year later with her sixth studio album, Reputation, which served as her clapback to the haters, to Kanye, and to Kim. While this was a tumultuous time for Swift’s career, leading to many women hating and resenting her, where did this hatred stem from before this event? The more obvious reasons for her being so hated include being a billionaire, performative feminism, and emitting ridiculous amounts of carbon emissions. However, there are people who loathe the sight of Taylor in popular media or the press beyond these faults. Why do women still continue to hate Taylor Swift?
I have been a self-proclaimed Swiftie since 2008. The first song I ever heard from her was “Love Story”, and this also happened to be the first ever music video of many that I watched over the years on my parent’s old Dell desktop that sat in my home’s office. My mom bought Fearless on CD for me to listen to in the car, and the rest was history. I saw Taylor during the 1989 World Tour at Staples Center in 2015, and I also saw her at Sofi Stadium this past summer during the Eras Tour, both of which were with my mom. Her music was my childhood, and after falling off the Swiftie train during the album rollouts of Reputation and Lover, Folklore brought me back in. This album was such a huge shift from my favorite album of hers, 1989, but felt so inherently her. Folklore and eventually Evermore brought many old and new Swifties into the fan base, culminating in the chaos that was the Ticketmaster sale for the Eras Tour. As this tour progressed last summer, Taylor’s very public breakup occurred, and her relationship with Travis Kelce began, more and more people, particularly women, began to express their hatred for Taylor – as if it was 2016 all over again. But why? As someone who prides herself on her perfect public persona, why was the public so against her?
Taylor Swift is hated because she is “too perfect” to be human, and yet doesn’t seem to care what anybody else thinks of her post-cancellation. She is seen as having too big of an ego. Yet, men often share the same prideful traits that result in Taylor being called “egotistical” and a “conniving liar”. Men are never called “calculating” for being successful and are especially not shamed for celebrating their own accomplishments. Taylor is called “calculating”, simply because she is a woman who celebrates what it means to be a woman. Her lyrics and songs reflect this, with her more popular songs describing idealized relationships and heart-wrenching breakups. She is held to such a high standard simply because she decided to write about her life experiences when she became an artist. She is a storyteller, and she is shamed for it.
Swift is also arguably one of the most overexposed celebrities of modern times. Her every move is well-documented and hyper-analyzed. An outfit she may wear on a night out may be seen by Swifties as proof that the re-recording of Reputation is coming “this day” or “this month”. But, the general public loses patience, arguing that she strings her fans along to profit off of them. This may be true, but why else would somebody choose to so vocally and actively hate on Taylor? Well, maybe they just don’t enjoy the music all that much (personal preference after all). Or, maybe they dislike her attempts to profit off of feminism. Her song “The Man ”, is a prime example of this. This song has a girlboss tone that comes off as cringe or shallow to many. However, the lyrics explain the unnecessary hate she receives, with lyrics like “If I was a man, then I’d be the man,” being accurate to the narrative that surrounds her. The lyrics of this song or “You Need to Calm Down”, a song that promotes LGBTQ+ rights and claps back at Donald Trump’s remarks on the community, bring awareness to these social issues, but not much else. I can see why people resent this, especially women. I also agree that Taylor could do so much more with her platform. She is performative, and as a fan of music and pop culture I do believe that fans should have the ability to call out their favorite artists on what they could do better, especially when they are billionaires. Swift is not a perfect person, and although she is one of my favorite artists, she has a lot of faults. I can recognize these instead of blindly following her every step of the way and defending her.
But, society still deems female enjoyment to be obsessive and crazy in the year 2024. Examples besides Swift include boy bands like ‘NSYNC in the 90s, One Direction in the early 10s, and BTS in the late 10s. Another example of this is the contrast in reactions to the film “Barbie”, which came out last summer. America Ferrara’s monologue, which highlighted what it truly means to be a woman and finally earned her an Oscar nomination, is overshadowed. Instead, they focused on the mojo-dojo casa house and Ryan Gosling memes of it all, which leads me to another question: why can’t girls be allowed to enjoy things? I do think it is a part of societal norms that have been established and maintained for decades. Beatlemania is one of the first historical examples of this. Women were seen as being ill and insane and told that they needed to “calm down”. Swifties are not exempt from this mania. I myself waited 4 hours in line on a hot August day for the coveted blue Eras Tour crewneck, which ended with me being interviewed on the news with my friend. While I do agree that this was very extra and out of the ordinary for the average person, I don’t think somebody should be shamed for something they enjoy and find happiness in. Not everybody had the chance to get tickets to see Taylor, and buying merch was their only opportunity to feel connected to her and the tour.
The final and very popular argument as to why women hate Taylor Swift is her alleged victim mentality. She is seen as dating too much or not dating enough, and when she has had a breakup, she is always seen as playing the victim when she writes a song about her experiences. People also shame her for only writing songs about those breakups to shame her exes. This also ties into her experiences with Kanye West, Scott Borchetta, her former record label owner, and Scooter Braun, the man who bought her masters from Borchetta without her knowledge of the sale. The sale of Swift’s masters is a prime example of what is cited as “playing the victim” besides her choices in her romantic relationships. Her masters of her first six studio albums were sold by her old record label, Big Machine Records, for millions of dollars, when she was interested in purchasing them. To make the old albums worthless to Braun, she began to re-record her albums, with four of the six “stolen” versions being now revamped as “Taylor’s Version”. These versions include vault tracks, which are songs that were not originally included on the albums, which gives motivation for fans to purchase and stream. This has been a genius marketing move for Swift, leading to hype and discourse over which album is next. However, many people dislike this, calling it another money-hungry opportunity that she is profiting off of. People spread the narrative that she played the victim in the original sale, and that she meant to do this all along so that she could benefit. I do find this unfair, as she has repeatedly insisted she was not aware of her masters being sold, even referencing the sale in an interview with CBS Sunday Morning in 2019: “No. I knew he [Scott Borchetta] would sell my music; I knew he would do that. I couldn’t believe who he sold it to, because we’ve had endless conversations about Scooter Braun. And he has 300 million reasons to conveniently forget those conversations.” Thus, is she playing the victim, or was she truly blatantly unaware? Maybe she really is a mastermind, like her song off the Grammy-nominated album Midnights.
I love Taylor Swift. She was and still is a huge part of my life, and her music brings me so much joy. However, I can separate her music from the actions she chooses to make as a person, and I do not think she should be put on a pedestal. She is a human being, and she has and will continue to make mistakes, and people should view her as such. She can be a great role model for young girls, as some of her songs are very empowering and inspirational. But, I can see why people, especially women, resent or hate Swift. However, I do think that some of the hatred is based on personal preference. It could also be based on jealousy or just not liking her music, but the hatred for Swift is rooted in reasons besides her public strife with other celebrities. At the end of the day, she is a beneficiary of capitalism, and she profits off of our streams and concert attendance. Thus, we should see her as this and treat her as such.
Gavilanes, Grace, and Sophie Dodd. “A Complete Timeline of Taylor Swift and Kanye West’s Feud.” Peoplemag, PEOPLE, 8 Dec. 2023, people.com/music/kanye-west-famous-inside-his-and-taylor-swifts-relationship-history/.
“Taylor Swift on ‘Lover’ and Haters.” CBS News, CBS Interactive, www.cbsnews.com/news/taylor-swift-on-lover-and-haters/. Accessed 31 Jan. 2024.