On Friday, November 10, 2017, Taylor Swift released her sixth studio album, Reputation. By November 14, one million copies had already been sold according to Nielsen Music. Though the album is not yet available for streaming, Reputation quickly went from the most-anticipated album of the year to the highest-selling.
Not one of those million or so purchases belonged to me, and once the album is available to stream, I will not be part of that statistics category either. I have not voluntarily listened to any song on the new album and do not plan to do so.
Now before anyone jumps to conclusions, I do not in any way hate Taylor Swift or her music. Like many others my age, I listened to her quite a bit growing up. She was (and still is) practically everywhere.
While I would never consider myself to be a vital member of her fan base, I own a physical copy of the Red album and shamelessly listened to it in high school. That being said, I have reached a point where I can no longer support her as an artist.
To be completely honest with you I am so tired of Taylor. I'm tired of watching her take home all the awards despite whichever talented artists are in the same category, I'm tired of hearing about who she's dating on E! News, I'm tired of her receiving the utmost praise for making music in the same style as other artists, and most of all I'm tired of the bubble of drama that seems to follow her everywhere she goes.
At the time of the 2009 MTV Video Music Award conflict between Taylor Swift and Kanye West, I was completely on Taylor's side. While I may agree that Beyoncé should've won the award, it was wrong for Kanye to embarrass Taylor in front of the millions of people watching and ruin her moment of glory.
However, it seems that Taylor has been playing the victim in every situation since that incident, that took place OVER 8 YEARS AGO! With all the drama centered around Taylor, has anyone else thought that maybe she's the problem?
I am no fan of anyone that does something just to garner attention. It doesn't matter how famous you are, it's pretty irritating. In my opinion, this is exactly what Taylor does.
She blows things out of proportion and inserts herself into situations that have no relevance to her. It creates unnecessary drama. It's an endless series of PR stunts.
For example, after years of apology and back-and-forth between Kanye and Taylor following the 2009 incident, we thought everything came to a peaceful resolution. The two were finally getting along in public and Taylor even presented Kanye with the Video Vanguard Award at the 2015 MTV Video Music Awards.
When Kanye released The Life of Pablo, featuring the controversial song 'Famous', just a few months later, things took a turn for the worst. In one of the early verses of the song Kanye says "I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex/ Why? I made that b**** famous," in reference to the 2009 incident. Clever, right? Taylor immediately released a statement saying how she disapproved disrespectful and misogynistic song.
The media exploded, of course.
Things quickly got messier when a video was released by Kim Kardashian West, revealing Kanye asking Taylor's permission to use the lyric in the song to avoid conflict and Taylor approving. Kanye tried to avoid drama from occurring.
So why did Taylor come out and say the opposite? This is just one of many examples of Taylor being at the center of unnecessary drama or getting caught in a lie. Within the past couple years there have been issues with Nicki Minaj, endless problems with exes, social media drama, even legal action taken towards gossip blogs on Taylor's behalf, and the list goes on. Each situation could have easily been avoided.
I understand that most celebrities attempt to generate publicity for themselves, but at what point do we say enough is enough.
Her newest album is said to be centered around addressing issues related to her past and current reputation, hence the name, and serve to be a turning point for her career. But I am way too tired to even listen and hear what she has to say.
Is Taylor Swift a talented singer-songwriter? Maybe. But it seems as if her main her concern is being talented from a PR standpoint. As for Taylor, I wish her the best and hope she can continue to find ex-boyfriends and life experiences to tweet and write songs about. Hopefully, she doesn't take things too far.
