In case you missed it, it looks like there was another outpour of bad blood involving Taylor Swift—only this time it doesn’t include Katy Perry, Nicki Minaj or an ex-boyfriend. On Sunday, July 7, all eyes were glued to every social media platform as celebrity life and culture essentially imploded before all of our eyes and the theatrics were out in full force. We can thank National Snake Day for this one.
To rewind, Sunday evening, Kim Kardashian posted a cryptic tweet mentioning the fact that National Snake Day was that weekend. She went on to say “They have holidays for everybody, I mean everything these days.” Shortly after, Kardashian tweeted fairly cryptically again, writing “do u guys follow me on snap chat? u really should ;-) [sic]” And thus began a whirlwind of hashtags, charged Instagram posts and memes to last everyone throughout the summer.
That evening, a new “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” episode aired, in which Kardashian discussed the long-time issue in question: Kanye West’s song “Famous” and whether or not Taylor Swift gave him the go-ahead for the lyrics about her. Earlier this year, following West’s latest album release, “Famous” sparked a great deal of controversy regarding the line “I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex. Why? I made that b*tch famous.” Though West immediately clarified to the public that he had gotten Taylor’s blessing for the lyric, Swift later denied her approval completely, prompting both a vague Grammy acceptance speech directed at West and a mass of Swift’s fans running to her defense.
Late Sunday night, however, Kardashian was determined to set the record straight after her previous attempts to defend her husband were still rejected by Swift’s camp (i.e. Kardashian’s interview with GQ which resulted in a rebuttal from Swift’s publicist). Kardashian seemed to break the internet once again as she posted a 12-part video on her Snapchat account of West’s past conversation with Swift about the song lyrics in question. West can be heard on the phone clearly enunciating the line to Swift who did, in fact, give him a nod of approval for the line “I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex.” Here is a link to the full Snapchat video and audio
As the conversation continued in the Snapchat videos, Swift tells West that the lyric is “like a compliment, kind of.” She also thanked West for even running the line by her in the first place, stating, “Yeah, I really appreciate it. Like, the heads up is like, so nice. [inaudible] … even asking or seeing if I would be okay with it and me just really appreciate it. Like I would never expect you to like tell me about a line in one of your songs." Immediately following the Snapchat videos, the internet basically began to eat itself as it quickly diverged into three sides: Team Kim, Team Taylor, and Team “Why are we talking about this?”
When the hashtag #KimExposedTaylorParty began trending on Twitter, new memes were thrown in every direction. No one was safe. Almost too quickly after Kardashian’s string of Snapchat videos, Swift responded with an emotionally charged Instagram post, which appeared to be a screenshot of a note written on her cell phone (a celebrity’s favorite tool for making a statement). In the note, Swift references the Snapchat videos, asking, “Where is the video of Kanye telling me he was going to call me ‘that b*tch’ in his song? It doesn’t exist because it never happened. You don’t get to control someone’s emotional response to being called ‘that b*tch’ in front of the entire world.” She also claims that West was supposed to play the final song for her, but failed to do so.
While several of Swift’s string of friends came to her defense, most of them involved urging the public to talk about something else. Selena Gomez tweeted directly after the incident: “There are more important things to talk about... Why can't people use their voice for something that f*cking matters?” This tweet also prompted a myriad of responses from the general public, mostly involving a large amount of people replying to her tweet with links to the touching statement Kardashian made about the Black Lives Matter movement earlier in the week. Of course, there was an inordinate amount of meme responses as well that we all can’t help but chuckle at.
On the other side, millions of Twitter users relished in the exposure of the underhanded nature of celebrity culture and in the fact that Swift was exposed for the way she controls her squeaky-clean public image—an image that seemed to come crashing down after the videos were released. Many wondered how so many people could turn against Swift when it seems to be true that the second part of West’s lyric (“I made that b*tch famous") doesn’t appear to be approved in the phone call. It likely has to do with a chain of behavior from Swift and her team that has gone on throughout Swift’s career: her immediately assuming the role of the victim.
On Swift’s side, it’s nothing new to draw from personal experience—break-ups included—when writing song lyrics. On more than one occasion, however, Swift has used her lyrics and her public platform to subtly lash out at the ones who have "wronged" her in some way. Swift even pulled a Kanye before Kanye pulled a Kanye when she posted Joe Jonas’ break-up phone conversation on the internet for everyone to hear.
Though she doesn’t always name-drop in her songs, she tends to make it clear about whom her lyrics are talking, and it remains to be known whether Swift called her subjects, actress Camilla Belle included, and asked their permission to brand them as someone “better known for the things that she does on the mattress.” Woah-oh.
A majority of the people delegating themselves to Team Kim aren’t necessarily as disdainful of Taylor Swift as they are of lying. While it is utterly obvious that the entertainment industry is nothing but a huge lie itself, Swift’s publicists did deny any sort of approval from Swift at the 2016 Grammy Awards when the phone conversation tends to prove otherwise. The conversation also included Swift telling West:
“And you know, if people ask me about it I think it would be great for me to be like, 'Look, he called me and told me the line before it came out. Like, jokes on you guys, We’re fine.' You guys want to call this a feud; you want to call this throwing shade but, you know, right after the song comes out I'm going to be on a Grammy red carpet and they're going to ask me about it and I'll be like, 'He called me.' … It's awesome that you're so outspoken about this and be like, 'Yeah, she does. It made her famous.'”
Rather, Swift went on to subtly yet publicly bash West during her Grammy acceptance speech; and once again, garnered the sympathy of the whole audience. While West’s line does have a misogynistic undertone, many people have been left wondering why Swift didn’t simply go on record initially saying that she wasn’t aware of the second half of the line but did approve everything else. The short answer is that such a statement might not have fit as nicely into her current PR plan.
If anything, this entire debacle serves as a public learning experience about the ins and outs of celebrity culture. Celebrity feuds are never groundbreaking, and it seems like this one has died down for now without a further statement from either party. There have even been talks about whether or not the feud itself was a carefully-crafted, collaborative plan from both sides to gain more publicity, which wouldn't be surprising in the slightest. Regardless, the event offers three incredible pieces of advice for the general public: don’t believe everything you read, everybody lies—it’s nothing new and be careful what you say, especially if you have plans to say something else later, because people might have receipts.
Finally, for everyone's enjoyment, here is a link to some of the most viral memes of the night we must never forget. Until next feud, everyone, we dance.
