This week I am going to engage in three things I wouldn't normally do: write about something I hate, willingly listen to Taylor Swift, and criticize someone's performative feminism. The second one on the list is probably the most surprising, as I have been known to aggressively slap the radio buttons when I hear the first shrill whine of "Bad Blood" come on in the car.
Honestly, my first reaction to "Look What You Made Me Do" is that if it was anyone else's song, I probably wouldn't give it a second thought. Musically, it doesn't offer anything new or unique, even if this Taylor Swift's supposed new "darker" sound, and it's incredibly repetitive. Pop music has moved on since the last time she released new music, but she didn't seem to get the memo.
But because this is T. Swift, we have to decode the lyrics. Considering the sickest burn she lands is "I don't like you," I'd have to say any purported darkness falls completely flat, which also gives zero credibility as a diss track. This is the exact same Taylor Swift who has built her career on being the one who has been wronged. If this is her comeback after some bad publicity in recent years, she hasn't learned anything and is still deflecting blame to everyone else.
"Look What You Made Me Do" is rumored to be about Swift's feud with Kim and Kanye, two more overexposed celebrities, and it's easy to see why based on the lyrics. Personally, I am aggressively bored by Bad Blood 2.0, but you can't deny that Swift sticks to her MO of karma and revenge. Although I am not a Taylor Swift fan, I am not sure why anyone would care or be interested in this song.
Swift's forthcoming album will be called Reputation, but if the lead single is any indication, she will not be apologizing or doing anything to rebuild her tainted reputation. So far her strategy has been to disappear from the public eye and delete her social media accounts, perhaps in hopes that everyone would forget about her parading around her fake squad, staying silent during the 2016 election despite her supposed feminism, and her numerous drawn-out public feuds. But the internet has a long memory, and if she is going to continue offering up the same recycled narrative, a lot of people won't be having it. Many of her lost fans want to see her own up to her mistakes, which go far in her gaining back respect. But if it's the same old Taylor Swift with a barely perceptibly different sound, this record won't do her any favors.
I am loath to call someone out for being a fake feminist because I think it cheapens the end goals of the movement. How can we make progress toward gender equality if we are constantly cutting down other women? Taylor Swift's particular brand of feminism is designed only to prop her up, and considering she is one of the richest people in entertainment, does she really need it?
Like "Bad Blood," Swift's new single is not the empowerment anthem many want to see it as. She is still painting herself as the victim, which makes the revenge fantasies all the more unbelievable. It's just the same move to continue to prop herself up, especially with the merchandising scheme to promote the song. Ultimately, I think I will be reacting the same way whenever this song comes on the radio.
You can listen to the song here, but I can't in good conscience recommend it:
