If you're not caught up with the current drama, you have a lot to catch up on. For starters, Taylor Swift and Kanye West go way back. He definitely started it, but his wife, Kim Kardashian West, was the one to end it. Years ago when Kanye took the spotlight from T-Swift at the VMAs, it taught her a valuable lesson: how to control the media.
From that point onward, she played the victim and spun the attention in her favor. For several years now, her career has been booming. Kanye may have not helped her with the sympathy vote for her awards won from her first album, but he definitely shaped her career. This article is by no means a way to bash Taylor Swift. I enjoy her girl-anthems just as much as the next person, but I also see the flaw in the situation.
One headline circulating in the media right now is that this is a petty issue that is simply taking away from the bigger picture. With the growing racial tensions in our country, we do need to look at how we treat each other in our society and how to fix issues of police brutality, white privilege, LGBTQ discrimination, and countless others. However, looking closer at what Kim Kardashian West did to expose Taylor Swift for her wrongful actions and lies, I'd say that this issue isn’t distracting from the bigger picture at all.
Taylor Swift lying repeatedly in order to play the victim and, “win,” the public over in her favor was dishonest and an example of how the public has been conditioned to take the word of the innocent white girl over the, “threatening,” black man in most situations. Kanye West by no means has a clean slate. He has committed countless offenses to countless people and we have sat and watched through all of them.
However, with video proof that Swift verbally approved of those demeaning lyrics (in his song, “Famous,” where he states that he and Taylor may have sexual relations), understood the situation, and accepted Kanye’s proposal of using her name in the song, it’s impossible to take Taylor’s side in this.
What Taylor is proposing now is that she didn't give the permission to be called a, "bitch," and doesn't deserve to be attacked based on her character. I, personally, think she forgot how typically misogynistic rap music truly is. As a feminist, I fully enjoy a good rap tune any day of the week. But I do recognize that what I'm listening to is art. Art isn't required to reflect any certain moral standard to the public and is an expression that is either appreciated or not.
The artist whose painting was chosen as the model for Kanye's music video for the song in subject even admitted that the criticism was ridiculous and that morally Kanye was in the clear because art has no, "moral obligation." As someone who listened to her verbally accept her name being dropped in a song that would most likely, "break the internet," due to that name drop in a reference to a long-lived public feud, there is no way Taylor can play the victim. But that's just my opinion.
All Kim was doing was protecting her husband, who has been taken advantage of by Swift for too long. After having her drag his name through the mud for the past few years, despite having attempted making peace (which in the Snapchat video of their infamous phone conversation, they call each other friends who have a high amount of respect for one another), it was time for Kim to settle the score and prove her husband isn’t the angry, threatening, or crazy, man who always seems to land himself in the center of the media buzz. In defending her husband, Kim Kardashian West made the point that despite hard evidence, we still decide to place our loyalty to where we are conditioned. I think this, "petty," issue happened right when it need to happen: during a time when our society needs to understand how we have been conditioned to white culture being innocent and black culture being fun, convenient, and, "cool."
Thank you, Kim Kardashian West for saying what needed to be said.
