Give me back my girlhood; it was mine first.
The plight of teenage girls and internalized misogyny
Dear Taylor,
I’m sorry.
I was, for longer than I would like to admit, in the anti-Swift camp. I would roll my eyes at mention of your songs and repeat some clapback about unoriginality. I was a parrot, repeating the comments I’d heard without ever taking the time to form my own opinions. It wasn’t really until Folklore that I changed my view on you and your music. Sure, there were a couple songs on 1989 that piqued my interest, but the overwhelming criticism that follows literally anything you do tainted my perspective. Folklore and its being immediately followed by Evermore forced me to reevaluate.
Through the kindest lens, I like to think it was, because we are the same age, the perspectives reflected in your songwriting and lyrics of your earlier albums seemed geared for younger ears. The thought of being perceived by a song was uncomfortable and the last thing I wanted. I was too cool, too mature, and had moved on to bigger and better things.
What I didn’t realize until much later is just how much we are affected by the culture we grow in. To be specific, even as one myself, I wanted to be as far from the vitriol aimed at teenage girls as possible.
My adulthood has been spent unpacking and unshelving the internalized biases that I don’t own. The beliefs that had been thrust upon me, but that I don’t agree with or aspire to. Internalized misogyny is like oil, coating everything it touches. Even the deepest clean can still leave a glimmer of its sheen behind. Now I find myself checking each knee-jerk reaction to find if its truly how I feel about something or rather a product of conditioning.
Music has been a particular sticking point. Growing up it was everywhere. There was always a song on the radio, grandmother singing a melody to make the latest grandchild giggle, a playlist used to escape, singing at church, etc. If art decorates space, music decorates time (I cannot take credit for this phrasing and I cannot find the tiktok that shared this thought initially, but holy fuck its so true). Music, which is so intricately intertwined into the human experience, gets weighed down and dulled by misogyny. How many times have you heard a man of peak mediocrity announce that women just can’t rock out the way men can? I can count some variation of this on two hands. Leaders at church, or uncles, or the guy who brought his guitar on the second date, their own misogyny is spewed like fact.
The popular kids in school listened to Jamn 94.5, the local hip-hop and rap radio station. But I was drawn to songs that told stories (insert a decades long hyperfixation on musical theater), so when I was running so hard from ‘pop’ and the things ‘everyone else liked’, I found solace in lyrics. The Fleetwood Macs, the Bob Dylans, the Gusters; alternative bands with banjos and guitars that painted with words and tones.
And even when trying to avoid the vitriol, sometimes it came on thick from those I was closest to. I had a friend once who incorporated music into their identity in such a way that it was as much a part of them as their laugh, their family history, or even their name. They knew artists from every genre and spoke with such authority on what was good or what wasn’t. When an English assignment tasked us with creating a soundtrack to score Hamlet, we both jumped at the creative homework. Sitting in the classroom, our projects were handed back to us. While we both received high marks, I also received a comment from this very friend, “kind of annoying when you chose such obvious and superficial songs.” Looking at my soundtrack of 90s music, Disney songs, and a few ‘teenage girl’ specials, I pushed the things I liked further down. Comments like that cut to my core. I didn’t feel it at first, but even now I struggle to fix the way those wounds healed.
How many other friends did I ask for recommendations because “I was only drawn to bad music" (see also: feminine music)? Bobbing and weaving and doing absolutely anything to avoid being a teenage girl and liking the things teenage girls like. How many concerts have I attended where the loud bass bangs over some dude screaming about how women suck?
Somewhere in my late 20s, the weight of this inauthenticity became nearly unbearable. It is exhausting to try and be like everyone else just for the sake of blending in. Why was I filling my time with things I didn’t really care for? Without realizing, I tried to make a change. Slowly the likes of Lana, Beyonce, Sara, Demi, and Adele began to creep in. Fiona and Alanis and Amy and Halsey and their lyrics, whether self-written or collaborations, began to cast a uniquely womanly hue over my world. And I was living for it.
Then in the chaos of 2020 and the early days of the pandemic, you put out Folklore. A new style for you, more in line with the types of music that littered my playlists. For the first time, I sat down to listen to the lyrics. And I felt seen in a way that only a good song can make you feel. When Evermore dropped, I was craving lyricism and your storytelling — I must’ve listened to it on repeat for a week. Each subsequent rerecord of your catalogue has been a resetting in our relationship (parasocial as it may be), and I began to appreciate the impact you and your music have had. Now, your music can transport me to different chapters in my life. Or, you know, eras.
Today, my playlists are uniquely feminine, and a lot of that comes from you, Taylor. Renee and Olivia and Sza and Chappel and Billie and Boygenius and their fucking genius fill my days with myriad variations of what it means to be a woman, and what it feels like in this modern day.
I was a mean girl to you Taylor, and I’m not a mean girl. So I am sorry for every roll, every upturned nose. I’m sorry for letting misogyny win for so long, but I’ve decided our 30s are when we connect with our inner child again.
In a way, I hope we both can find our girlhood again.
Sincerely,
A late in life Swiftie.
I wanted acknowledge the irony of posting about Taylor immediately following my post about Palestine, as she has yet to make a statement about the situation (you could easily make the argument that her silence is her statement).I began working on this prior to the Grammys, prior to the PR blunders that led up to the Super Bowl. I debated scrapping this entire piece. As I was writing, I would consider each road block, navigating whether criticism was valid or misogyny was warping the narrative.
I struggle with the pedestals we place public figures on and the weight that comes with fanaticism. In some ways, why does it matter? She’s not a political leader or UN ambassador nor do I trust her understanding of public policy. But in other, arguably more significant ways, she is an influential person with a massive following and a knack for swaying public opinion. A simple post could drive thousands to call their representatives, if not take more dramatic steps towards activism.
Her silence is especially deafening when a certain ex-boyfriend and potential subject of her next album is extremely vocal in his support for the Palestinian people(not to mention the name of her album when famed poets from Gaza have faced brutal ends). But as much as she stands up for women, Taylor is very much a White Feminist who does not have a history of standing up for specifically women of color.
During the Super Bowl, the Israeli army began bombing Rafah. While we were all distracted by football, commercials, and the Taylor Swift drinking game, the Israeli military with it’s US funding took to bombing the city of Rafah, which is the size of Heathrow Airport. The southernmost city on Palestine’s Egyptian border, it is now currently the most densely populated plot of land in the world with it’s refuge camp/tent city. Each leaflet that has fallen on Gaza has encouraged civilians to move south, and they complied. But now they are as far south as they can go and the bombs are still coming. We’re going to start hearing arguments for Egypt to open its borders to Palestinian refugees, but what are they refugees from? Calls for humanitarian acts from the same people dropping the bombs.
Maybe it’s not fair to expect public figures to share their thoughts on centuries old conflicts. And if she never spoke on issues, this addendum might not have been written. But she has. Taylor has written songs in support of the LGBTQ+ community and has been quoted with tears in her eyes about how much human rights matter to her. She’s encouraged her following to register to vote, so we know that when she cares about an issue, she will take a stand.
As Miss Swift herself said, “Their hands are stained with red. Oh, how quickly they forget. They aren't gonna help us, too busy helping themselves. They aren't gonna change this; we gotta do it ourselves.”
Misogyny is not welcome here, but not all criticism of a woman falls under that umbrella. There are valid critiques of Taylor, and I do wish she would say something. I wish she’d stop flying her private jet everywhere, and that she wouldn’t bully a college student for calling out her carbon emissions. She is a billionaire and there is no way to become one ethically. She has not only the influence but the means to change the world, but there’s no Taylor Swift Foundation or philanthropic arm to her company.
Honestly, she’d be a great “death of the author” subject, but that’s an essay for another time.
Many things can be true at once. Anyway, just a thought.