My Favourite Musician: Taylor Swift

Anyone who knows me will know that I have a particular penchant for Taylor Swift.

Whether I’m posting new Swifty (while I realise that Swiftie is the tumblr-accepted spelling, I prefer it with a y, okay?) videos on people’s walls on Facebook with overexcited captions, OMG!!!1! ITS SO GOOD I DIDNT THINK TAYTAY COULD OUTDO HERSELF BUT SHE DID OH MY GOD, or forcing the entire Felix office to listen to nothing but Taylor Swift for an entire day, I don’t exactly keep my love to myself.

I know Taylor Swift isn’t exactly the epitome of cool, and I would love to name one of the generic indie bands that I generally listen to, in order to maintain some pretence of sophistication, but actually, when it comes to TayTay, I’m not sure that I care if people know that I love her. Every girl loves Taylor Swift, and those who say that they don’t are liars.

You see, Taylor Swift appeals to the very essence of the female being. I’m going to be very cis-hetero-normative here, but I’m pretty sure this actually extends to all genders/sexes/sexualities/etc, but I can only speak for myself. And Taylor Swift, obviously.

Taylor Swift is the manifestation of girl-cray. She is the feelings that you would love to display, the obsessiveness that you’re a little bit ashamed of, she is all the emotion that society tells us that makes girls crazy and they should suppress.

This is obviously ridiculous, and an example of our patriarchal society’s female-shaming, or even alpha-male-emotion-shaming. Everyone feels this way – whenever someone is upfront about it, they are lauded for their honesty – but for some reason, people try and hide it as much as they can, and are ashamed if they let it show. Taylor Swift is honest about it. She’s frequently mocked for being a bit over-emosh, for falling in love too hard and then writing songs about it, and while people might laugh along, there’s no denying that Taylor Swift is SO relatable.

Don’t you think that it’s incredibly liberating to be completely honest about how you’re feeling, to admit that you completely illogically want to get back with your ex who didn’t treat you right, because you miss the excitement, or to confess that you spend most of your time fantasising about your best friend breaking up with his girlfriend, because obviously you are really the girl for him.

Swifty’s latest album has several songs where she addresses her cray reputation, mocking people who say she’s just an overly attached maneater. But Taylor Swift isn’t crazy, she’s just honest. And on top of this, she’s a little bit basic bitch embarrassing, which she’s not afraid to embrace, and her songs are hella catchy. And that makes her better than us all.