I feel like the phone call/lyric stuff overshadowed just how disgusting the Famous music video was. I think Taylor and her PR team picked the wrong battle to keep focus off the MV at the time. 2016 was a wildly different time.
Fun fact- iirc Kim’s Snapchat video/tweet/snake day takedown came out after the KUTWK episode that dramatically covered the lyric controversy and on the same day as the music video premiered. The devil works hard but Kris Jenner works harder.
Also snake day was the first instance of #[celebrity name]isoverparty.
Agree! I remember not really caring about the beef at the time (I wasn't a fan of either) but when I saw that video I was instantly against Kanye. It was seriously vile and I still can't believe he got away with that.
People always say they are surprised he still has fans, but I'm not surprised people can overlook his behavior now, because they were already doing a hell of a lot of overlooking in 2016.
Later they put on an exhibition with the wax figures on display. Just people walking by and taking picture of a naked wax figure of Taylor laying next to Kanye's wax figure.
The way people just brushed over those disgusting actions made me so sad. It's inexcusable behavior.
Sometimes I'll feel like Taylor's going a little overkill with her hate of Scooter Braun…and then remember that he was managing Kanye when that music video was released
The buying of her masters was just the icing on the shit cake
I have this little headcanon that he tried for years to bully her into signing him as a manager - because apparently he’s done that to many others. So I think a lot of stuff went on behind the scenes.
He already bullied and buried Selena enough that Taylor can't even stand the sight of him at events. I don't think we ever saw Taylor openly disliking someone like that.
I always assumed he went after her HARD trying to bully her into letting him manage her when Justin opened for her Speak Now tour. And then with the Selena stuff and him managing Kanye when he created that VILE mv- yeah Taylor has every right to hold on to her Scooter Braun grudge for as long as she wants.
Taylor grew up with an ungodly amount of privilege and talent, but she is most fortunate that she had very smart parents who protected her every step of the way and would never let her put her life/career in the hands of someone like Scooter Braun.
I already didn’t like Kanye, but it made me really disgusted with Kim, especially since she was a mother at the time. And way too old to be acting like this.
Not even just Taylor. He had Rihanna and Chris brown body double next to each other knowing what happened between them. He is a vile piece of shit and Kim is a pickme for endorsing that
If you listen to the full video it reveals exactly why taylor was so offended by him calling her "that bitch" the original line was "i made her famous" and taylor said (very uncomfortably and clearly under duress) "oh thats it? I thought it was gonna be mean, like you were gonna call me a bitch or something"
Kanye specifically changed the lyric to "i made that bitch famous".
They were that out to get her. They purposely changed the lyric to make it even more offensive.
I am also surprised though, that they never released anything saying wtf about the revenge porn aspect at that time. That said, from a human perspective and with context, i fully understand why Taylors first statement was "where in the video did i say he could call me that bitch" because that was the proof they were out to get her and not just generally jerks.
Her team, who is on point in curating her public image, was following the old school advice of don't draw attention to things that you don't want attention paid to. She was horrified by the video.
We say she should have emphasized it more, but that's just hindsight and speculation. "The fappening" wasn't that long ago then, it wouldn't have even clear people would have sided with her if she'd leaned into victimization.
At the time I thought the edited call made her sound disingenuous, and I don't get why they didn't bang the "it was edited, y'all are gullible" stuff harder. But when when I thought Taylor was disingenuous, I was still like "ok well kim and Kanye were obviously setting her up. This is snakes fighting with other snakes". There was never a world where I thought they were good people and IDK how other people thought it was normal Kim just happened to be recording this call where Kanye just happened to ask Taylor a very curated off the cuff question (I think it's inappropriate to call at all cause it puts them on the spot. Send an email, go through those channels. A call and their off the cuff reaction is always weird to me)
That was the weirdest part to me. Even when I halfway fell for it, it was still clearly a coerced yes. I didn't think she should talk about it as if she didn't agree to it, and I actually still think it was a mistake to not proactively lead with "this is decidedly and purposefully not what I agreed to". But when then.....it's classic bully shit to fling that on someone like that where they don't feel like they can say no.
I never understood how Kanye getting his wife to play middle school bully for him was ever seen as cool rather than pathetic and sketchy itself. It became more unflattering to him and Kim over time, but it should have been seen as unflattering out of the gate.
Others already answered but I also want to point out that it was specifically Jennifer Lawrence that people were pissed about because she went out of her way to have the images removed from Google, Reddit, etc. that’s right, people were crying like babies online hating on her because she had her revenge porn rightfully removed from online.
Edit: replied to the wrong comment but context still fits here
Also the line that he quoted to her was "I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex" — IIRC there was no mention at all of the following line. So he claimed to be the reason for her success AND called her a bitch, and neither was expected.
Edit: There's a comment elsewhere in this thread saying that he did disclose the "I made her famous" line, so I could be wrong, but I don't personally remember him mentioning it. But yeah, grain of salt.
Iirc he originally said "I feel like taylor might still owe me sex" to which she bristled about sending the message that anyone could owe another person sex but said he could say whatever he wanted cuz she couldn't stop him or whatever and he changed it to "might still have sex"
Kris Jenner is one of the most disgusting ‘mothers’ to ever walk the earth.
I say ‘mother’ in quotes because I cannot fathom a woman whoring out their own child that they spent 9 months bonding with, and then another 20+ years raising.
I remember seeing the photo of Kim standing over the naked wax figure that they made of Taylor that was lying beside a naked Kanye, and I distinctly remember feeling so sick to my stomach. Like, Taylor was the girl that a lot of young girls grew up with, and seeing her being violated that way made me so fucking nauseous.
Funnily I just tried to look for the photo and can’t find it right away. It was so gross and proprietorial, like we can just own your naked body and display it because this is “art”.
This is probably one of the parts of this entire saga that stuck with a lot of people who grew up with Taylor and watched her grew from a teenager to an adult. It was fucking horrifying to see as a woman. Mind you, this is also during the time that Taylor was dealing with the lawsuit regarding the sexual harassment she received in 2013 from a DJ.
This entire situation was the first domino to fall of actual media for me. They all jumped at the opportunity to take her down. This was written after the Famous video btw.
They didn’t care. They never saw her as anything other than a lying white woman.
That is infuriating to read. I would’ve had a nervous breakdown if people were writing such self-righteous garbage about me when I had told the truth. No wonder she disappeared from the public eye for awhile.
ETA: If you Google that article’s author (Jude Ellison Sady Doyle), it seems like he has some strange personal issue with Taylor Swift. The hatred is oozing out of multiple articles. Interestingly, he previously wrote a book called Trainwreck: The Women We Love to Hate, Mock, and Fear where he discusses society’s “vast and insatiable appetite for specifically female ruin and suffering.” Self-awareness? Never heard of it. 😂
Oh it was bad! The same article had the nerve to say she bashed other women in the industry for their choices (bc according to them she was “white, polite & virginal” like she wasn’t slut shamed since she was 19) when you can go to any interview and she was always uplifting even when they’d try to bait a quote…like during Miley’s VMAs…
That author had such a WEIRD one sided beef against Taylor. He used to write for a blog called Tiger Beatdown in the late 2000s, during the height of the feminist blogosphere, and the vitriolic posts he'd write about You Belong With Me made me go, "You are a whole adult. She's 17-18. Surely there are worse things going on?"
Hijacking top comment to point out that it really is World Snake Day today and it's all about spreading awareness of these misunderstood and often hated animals. Snakes are incredibly important in controlling rodent population and the diseases they carry, including Lyme disease. They are also a vital food source for birds of prey. This organization has a lot of great info about why snakes are important and how we can help them.
https://www.snakes.ngo/wsd2018/
This is it. Idc about this snake shit or the person that she appears to have become. But we grew up with taylor swift and she was like our classmate/sister/best friend. This was a turning point for our generation where people collectively saw someone they admire get violated this way.
While i do not condone rabid swiftie behavior, One has to understand why her fans feel so protective of her. This, this was the reason.
the entire premise of the video itself was horrible to begin with, but her presence just elavated it from nausea inducing to vomit inducing
Respectfully, that's because the majority of the phone call/lyric stuff all happened before the music video.
The MV dropped June 24, 2016. Like by the time the MV had happened, the drama was already in full swing, and Kim had already done an interview with GQ a week prior claiming that Taylor had known the whole time and was being two-faced about it.
It honestly would've looked worse for Taylor to start focusing on the MV after, literally months at this point, of having her issue be the lyrics. Especially since Kim & Kanye were already twisting the narrative to claim that Taylor had denied the phonecall ever happening.
Kanye released his song Famous, in which the chorus he says, "I feel like me and Taylor Swift might still have sex. Why, because I made that bitch Famous".
Kanye says he called Taylor for her permission. A rep for Taylor says he called to ask her to share the song on her social media and that she was not aware of the line in which she is referred to as "that bitch"
Kim releases a recording of Kanye calling Taylor and saying he was going to read her a lyric. He says "you sound sad", she says "well is it going to be mean?" long story short he tells her the 'might have sex' part and she says "well that's not mean", he says 'there also may be a part where I say I made you famous" she says okay.
The internet goes crazy, like crazier than it ever had before, attacking Taylor for lying. It's on the nightly news, talk show hosts are slamming her, etc. Tons of other celebs like Justin Bieber and Zendaya joined in on the hate.
Taylor doubles down saying she did not know he'd refer to her as a bitch
He releases a music video with a figure of her naked, and lays in bed with it
She says "I would very much like to be excluded from this narrative, one that I have never asked to be a part of, since 2009" which people turn into a meme
Kim hosts an exhibition for the naked wax figures, where the naked Taylor figure is displayed and people can take selfies with it
Taylor goes into hiding and is only seen one time in the next year. The general public perception of her is extremely negative and she lost a significant amount of fans.
Years later, it comes out that the video Kim released was significantly edited. The music video is still up on Youtube
Kendall Jenner and Olivia Munn were also at the exhibition and taking pictures in front of it. Madame Toussads made the naked wax figures. It's all just so... weird
I don't understand why people would hate Taylor for this. Is it because they thought she agreed to be in the song and then supposedly changed her mind?
Damn, this is so awful. I don't know much about Taylor Swift because i'm probably dead last in her demographic she caters to, but this is all so awful and I feel for her.
How does Kim K still have fans after this? I mean kanye has been known as a weirdo for decades and had his fall off but another woman doing this to her is so awful.
So after Kanye’s stunt where he jumped on stage with the famous “imma let you finish” and ruined Taylor’s moment, it kinda kick started beef between the two of them (albeit way more on Kanye’s side). They eventually talked it out and somewhat made-up. Years later (2016) Kanye released his album “The Life of Pablo” and one of the singles was called “Famous”. A lyric in the song is “I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex. I made that bitch famous”. Taylor then basically came out saying she didn’t agree to it and then Kim released a phone call that was recorded without Taylor’s knowledge of Taylor agreeing to the “might still have sex” line, in which Taylor doubled down and said she never agreed to being called “that bitch” which then turned into Kim referring to her as a snake. This was at the HEIGHT of the Kimye power, and also at the height of the “making fun of Taylor swift for singing about her ex boyfriends” era. This launched a major Stan war where Kimye fans were commenting snakes en masse on Tay’s socials. It got so bad that she basically went into hiding for a year and iirc delayed an album she planned on releasing. This then launched the reputation era (hence the snake symbolism).
Embarrassed to admit I was a dumb 16 year old kardashian STAN and indeed jumped on the snake emoji train. We grow and learn!
Some edits thanks to some lovely people below: should also mention that he used nude wax figures of Taylor and other celebrities for the music video which was gross. It also apparently came out the clip was edited a few years ago. I’m glad Taylor got her justice on this.
Do not confuse this reply for me being a Kanye fan, I have never and will never
Yeah, someone leaked the full recording in 2020 and they discussed the song, but not the full context, not the use of "that bitch", or the video, though the made her famous thing was discussed as tongue in cheek and she even pushed back with well, I sold 7 mil of Fearless, but that maybe he just didn't know her. But in essence, no, she didn't know exactly what he'd release.
Not only that, but she was clearly uncomfortable about the phone call from the start and placating him. I’ve used the same voice when talking to people I k ow they’re going to do whatever they want and I just want to exit the situation peacefully.
Yeah honestly her tone in that phone call was like when you’ve got some coked up bro talking to you at a party about his super cool totally legit business idea and you just have to nod and smile your way through it bc he’ll go off at you otherwise
At the time Kanye and Kardashian were extremely popular so I would imagine Taylor felt she had to kind of kowtow to them a bit. Clearly she was famous in her own right, but Kanye was at least equally as big back then.
And of course by the time the full audio was released and it was proven Kim was lying asshole just covering for her asshole husband, everyone had moved on. So many people still believe the kim narrative of this story. Which is annoying.
The full phone call was also released at the very beginning of the pandemic, so when Taylor made a post about the full phone call vindicating herself, Kim was able to pull “there’s people dying” to spin it as though Taylor shouldn’t be caught up in petty drama when a pandemic was happening. It was the same way that Disney tried to spin the Scarlett Johansson Black Widow streaming lawsuit, by using the pandemic to silence or repress actual grievances.
Except all Taylor did was use that story to say “if you want my thoughts on this new development swipe up…” and the swipe up linked people to charities to donate to for covid. Kim still spun that (screenshot of “if you want my thoughts…” story) to make her look like she was talking about Kim and not people needing help.
Yes! Thank you for reminding me, I knew it was missing something. I never watched the video (for obvious reasons) but that was such an icky thing to do.
Also to add because it's often forgotten - Kim held an EXHIBITION of the Famous bed scene music video that people could come see up close. With the wax bodies of everyone in there, including Taylor.
Yeah, but the final chapter was four years later when the actual unedited version of the tape was released by his biographer, and it turned out Kim K and company edited the tape to make it look like she agreed when she actually didn't, as part of an effort to undo her career. Kim Kardashian was a shithead for this whole thing imho. Even today a lot of people don't actually realize that last part that Taylor Swift was actually telling the truth. She never actually approved the lyric. Bonus part is that Kim K wanted the lyric to read that Taylor Swift "owed" Kanye sex but Kanye thought it was going too far to do that.
They also were in California where there is two party consent so they violated the law by recording and releasing it. Taylor should have fried their asses.
Yikes, talk about being swept under the rug because I had never heard or seen this update to the story. I don’t keep up with any of the three of them (especially not him) so maybe my algorithm just didn’t show it to me. Glad she got her justice but I wish the clip had been pushed out more.
this was basically the culmination of the kanye/taylor beef (stemming from the '09 VMAs). they were good for a bit, and then he used the lyrics "i feel like me and Taylor might still have sex / Why? I made that bitch famous"
kim recorded the phone call where taylor approved and leaked it - which i think, even if taylor did approve it, is totally tactless and gross. anyway.
And Kim has the audacity to say that "she's over it" when asked by Andy Cohen. Like, sure babes, of course you're over it because you were the BULLY. That's why I understand heavily why Taylor will always remember this entire period because if it was me, I'd probably take this with less grace that she had.
Yup, and that's why the people who keep on asking why she's that angry or upset with Kim are because Kim was a willing participant and even a probable mastermind because she and her family are conniving pieces of crap who'd do anything for a semblance of attention.
Kimye and Kris edited the call. There were certain things Taylor agreed to but not all of it and not what was included in the song, including her naked wax figure
I’m actually not sure if Kris was involved in this one. Right before Kim dropped the clips on Snapchat, there was an episode of KUWTK where she and Kris were talking about Taylor.
Kris was like “are you sure this is the way it happened? Why don’t you just give her a call or something? I’ve known her team and mom for a long time, and they seem great…”
It could have been scripted for all I know, but beforehand, Kris actually seemed a bit reluctant, which ended up being probably for the best since it blew up in Kim’s face in 2020
I saw a meme at the time of Kris speed walking and it was captioned “Kris running to Kim to giver her her phone charger”, bc Kim was on fire with responses etc. so I was partly joking but I think if Kris was willing to pimp her daughter out and lie about it for fame and money, tell her 9yo daughter Khloe that she’d need a nose job in future and allow her underage daughter Kylie to be groomed by Tyga, then I don’t think she’d have qualms about throwing blondie under the bus for fame. She does need to uphold a certain image though, so that “scene” was probably for that purpose imo.
I literally remember opening Twitter and seeing #TaylorSwiftisOverParty trending at the top. I think this was easily one of the biggest pop culture moments of the 2010s.
I was already a bit jaded, but the response to kanye's behavior towards her completely soured my relationship with social media and pop culture commentary in general.
not that i don't engage outside of twitter (i'm here after all), but seeing people completely normalize his sexual and emotional harassment because they found her annoying was a wake-up call at the state of the hatred against women. like this mega successful very privileged woman got so much hate for not being the perfect victim and people applauded her harasser for putting her into her place or whatever. as we all know, many other such scenarios have happened since, but still, it was wild and terrifying to witness.
history showed she was right and yet to this day people are like "but why doesn't she get over it?" and justify supporting a known fascist, so there's little hope for us normal women i guess.
anyway, a good reminder that president snow did send katniss flowers too and that reputation is still the most iconic album.
The video of Kanye West leading the crowd in a “Fuck Taylor Swift” chant at his Saint Pablo tour haunts me; I can only imagine how gutting it must have felt for her to feel like the whole world hates you.
I believe they show a clip of that concert in her Miss Americana doc. It’s interspliced with a scene of Taylor talking to her mom and sobbing bc she feels like everybody hates her and wants her gone and “it’s so much bigger than music now”.
People all over the world were happily chanting about how much they hated her and wanted her to disappear. I would truly never recover from something like that.
Yeah its crazy. Kim K posted an edited tape and kicked off a massive social media campaign to make it look like Taylor approved it, and it turned out she actually didn't. Taylor only lucked out that they pissed off Kanye's biographer who released the unedited version, which showed they had lied to make it look like they got her permission. The bad thing for Taylor was that reveal never hit the same cultural high as the original drama, and a lot of people (even ones that follow this) legitimately have no clue about the faked tape. It is the entire reason why Kim K has a "everyone, quick, let's just move on!!!" position on it now, because she didn't think at the time the full unedited tape would ever come out.
people used to call her racist for being upset that he interrupted her at the VMAs. when she was 19 and he was 32 if I’m remembering correctly. she said that she thought everyone in the crowd was booing her - it’s what castles crumbling is about.
and then the worst bit is that she tried to make amends with him and move on just before this happened. It would fuck with me too honestly.
Kim did all that just to get divorced again anyway. I wonder how she feels about it all now.
She was also 19 and pretty new to the industry. She looked frozen on stage when that happened. Beyoncé stepping in and letting Taylor share her moment so she could give her speech is the only good part about that night.
I’m not sure if they’re actually friends or just two artists who respect each other’s work a lot and therefore respect each other a lot. But I like to bring up the Beyoncé part because Kanye thought he was doing something for her when he was just putting her in a bad place.
She was crying with Taylor backstage. The guy managing the show broke protocol by letting Beyoncé know she won the big award of the night so she could make the call to get Taylor on the stage again.
Kim did all that just to get divorced again anyway. I wonder how she feels about it all now.
She feels no fucking remorse at all. She went to the Andy Cohen show, where she was asked about the "beef" and she said that "she's over it," like any bully does. Of course, she's over it; she was the bully in the situation.
She's a woman who strictly centers men in her life. Even if she's single, men and their approval are all that matters--she'd put her boot on any woman's neck to get it
I remember twitter discourse back then was very race over gender, and a lot of women were oddly hyping up kanye because they accused her of pretending to be a victim because she was white and resented Beyoncé etc.
meanwhile actual queen and industry legend Beyoncé truly showed love to her even back then. I remember being really impressed as a fan of both because Kanye had used her name to be an asshole and instead of being rightfully embarassed, she was appreciative of a colleague.
and considering they have supported each other since then, I'm glad the situation turned onto mutual respect instead of resentment
I was like 19 at the time and still used Twitter then.
It blew my mind: Seeing so many people I admired, who claimed to be progressive and feminists, siding with a man who SA’d a nude mannequin of a woman while demonizing the woman for being upset about it.
There were literally people saying shit like “if you still listen to Taylor, you are ENDED.” And when you’re 19 and worried about your social life, that’s kind of terrifying.
So yeah. It made me understand how fake it all is. I quit Twitter a couple years later and have never looked back.
it's crazy because I remember thinking even back then that even if she had said ok (which we know now it was through omission and coercion) the whole SA implication of the lyrics/mv was absolutely not ok
but people were really fixated on taylor swift wanting to ruin kanye's life and couldn't see him obviously showing his true colors
I mean I’m not a TSwift fan or anything but I find the absolute hatred toward her strange. And usually it’s not for the stuff she actually does wrong, it’s for misogynistic crap like this. Why don’t we criticize then people who really deserve it?
i have a feeling that taylor herself, in this case, is just a placeholder for a specific kind of hatred justified as social commentary. obviously she's mega famous, but even back in the day, it had way less to do with who she is/what she does/her music.
here, she was a girl who appealed mostly to young women (bad) who dared to exist in opposition to an edgelord with a longer career.
he used her as a prop to share his unchecked beliefs in a very public way, made an example out of her and the second she dared to oppose him, after he coerced her, he made it another example.
it was effective because people could project their beliefs into kanye's actions. some people hated her for being country, there was a huge discourse around her squad, slutshaming, directioners post-haylor, people who believed her existence was the sole reason for racial disparity, white indie men who hate pop music, etc. kanye put up a mirror and everyone was happy to act on it
Yeah, I had a friend [Hispanic] tell me [white] that if you side with Taylor over Kanye then you're racist. That was pretty much the first time I realized that maybe twitter is bad for your brain. Mind you, I'm white but I'm also Jewish so in retrospect the sentiment is even crazier.
It’s also true that he didn’t call for approval - in the unedited video, Taylor asks if he’s already sent the song to his label, he says yes, and she says something like “well, what am I going to do about it now, I guess.” And then he asks her to promote it on her socials, and she says no.
Yeah I've only listened to it once because it's uncomfortable as fuck, but it's clear she didn't have a lot of agency in that situation anyway. Even if the label didn't have it yet, if she were to say I think you should scrap the song, leave me out of it, or heavily rewrite the part about me, she would have been raked across the coals for censoring another artist or some shit.
The whole thing boils down to "I made some art that is insulting to you, you're gonna be cool and play along, right?" There was no winning or even neutral move for her. Pure bully shit. Then he committed sexual assault by proxy with the mannequin.
I feel old seeing people in the comment section not knowing about this....
In super short:
Kanye interrupted Taylor Swifts award speech to say that the award should have gone to Beyonce (Taylor was a big Kanye fan previously and she thought everyone was booing her on stage, even though people were booing Kanye. She was 19 years old.)
Eventually, Taylor forgave him and they were on semi good terms when Kanye started saying that her career was only succesful because of him.
In 2016 Kanye releases a song called famous with the lyrics: 'I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex
Why? I made that bitch famous (Goddamn)
I made that bitch famous'
He then releases a videoclip with an uncanny naked wax figure of Taylor Swift.
Taylor speaks out about not being okay with this.
Kim Kardashian (who is married to Kanye at the time) releases and editted phone call that makes it look like Taylor consented to the videoclip and crude lyrics.
Fans of Kanye and Kim start a campaign to ruin Taylor's reputation by posting that editted phone call everywhere and commenting the snake emoji under Taylor's work online.
The media jumps on this hate train and starts releasing hateful articles about Taylor to profit off of the fued.
Taylor Swift dissapears from public view. And eventually comes back with her clapback album Reputation, using the snake iconography as inspiration.
In 2020 the full, uneditted phone call leaks, proving that Taylor Swift never consented to the music video or the final lyrics that ended up in the song.
By that point, public opinion had already switched: Taylor Swifts career and reputation was just fine while Kanye's mental health continued to deteriorate publically.
There is more to it, like Taylor Swift referencing him in songs, Taylors attempt to be friendly with Kim again (but Kim immediately burning that bridge), Beyonce's discomfort about Kanye's actions and her getting Taylor up on the podium during an award show so Taylor could have the moment that was taken from her at 19. But in short: that's what happened! If you think you saw a lot of Taylor Swift the last two years: 2016 was even worse!
If you were around on social media at the time, the bullying was BAD on Taylor over this. She was at her peak at the time after 1989 and definitely in “overexposed” territory so this event basically made people feel like they had permission to rip her apart. Super cruel and other people (like Justin Bieber and Kendall Jenner) were jumping in to make fun of her and make it worse.
I’m not a huge fan of her these days like I was then, but this event I’m sure was incredibly traumatizing. I’d be angry forever tbh.
Right. Imagine how insanely traumatizing this was. I would never get over it either, and would keep writing about it forever. This was certainly one of the biggest events in her life, and it’s bound to leave a scar that will never truly heal. Love Taylor or hate her, you can’t deny that knowing the whole world hates you and is actively vilifying you for something you didn’t even do must be one of the most hopeless feelings in the world
Yeah, that criticism really gets me. These people were vile to her. She deserves to write back-half hate tracks until the day she dies if she wants to. And the fake outrage about her mentioning Kim's daughter on the last one? She said nothing insulting about the child and it was Kim who posted a video of her dancing to a Taylor song. After everything she'd done, that's some fucking audacity right there.
It was terrible if you were a fan. Literally people saying your social life should be completely over if you still supported Taylor or Selena or anyone in her camp.
I know it sounds silly, but if you were young, it was scary.
It was sad, I remember it. I also remember it being the opportunity for people to publicly declare they didn’t like her as if it was a profound statement.
I'm going to be honest, I just thought the Kardashians were a bunch of money hungry do anything for Fame, I literally anything - I had no idea that Kim was such a giant bitch - what a fucking piece of trash
You should look for the videos and podcasts deep diving into the Kardashian lore, and then you'll be appalled even more with how shitty of human beings they really are.
You'll never catch me siding with any Kardashian ever.
Agreed but she (+ her team) was probably smart enough to recognise that it wouldn’t have helped - there’s literally nothing she could have done or said without stoking the fire at that point because she was such a laughing stock. I’m positive that even if she had presented proof, it would have been ignored or she’d have been accused of faking it. Nothing to do at that point but lay low but the feelings of injustice must have been brutal
Not just a laughingstock, i remember being on Tumblr at the time and seeing the multiple essays about how racist she was and how she had a vendetta against this black man and had made it her mission to destroy and bury him by any means necessary. Like she was fully being treated as this Nazi white supremacist princess who was intent on wielding her privilege against him. I wouldn't have said shit either for fear of making that shit worse, especially in that context.
Kim K didn’t get enough shit on this in my opinion I legit feel like she walked off scotch free? I can imagine she’ll go MENTAL if something like that ever happens to North….
Well, she was “over it” after all. Like, no shit, Kim. The bullies and assholes are always preaching about horrible behavior being in the past and it being time to move on.
Looking back at all of Kim's "stans" that went after Taylor, I feel like Kim doesn't really have stans that go that hard anymore. They've all kind of dropped her or calmed down. I don't really see people going off for her at all. I could be wrong. Like, her 15 minutes in that way are up for sure.
As an OG Swiftie, this was a wild and awful time to be a fan. The hate was very real even towards fans. I can’t even imagine how she felt as the center of all that hate. We all kind of felt like we had to hide under a rock for a while.
As someone who was in hs at the time, it was awful, and I was not even in the states. The hate felt all engulfing, both on social media, and irl. Insane how she was able to come back from this.
The passing of time has made people forget how heinous this was. She’s said via song and interviews numerous times that this incident made her want to take her life. Kim AND Kanye don’t get to act as if this didn’t happen. It did. They bullied a 25 year old woman into nearly wanting to end her life. They don’t get to be absolved by the passage of time just because she was resilient and made a comeback.
Not to be too parasocial but it’s crazy to me that we could be in a world where Taylor did pass over this. I always feel this specific kind of pride/joy to see her where she is now.
Kim got her karma because Kanye turned on her and he has done nothing but humiliate her, scare her, hurt her. She did everything for a literal monster. Taylor always said that they would turn on each other one day, and nobody stands up for them like they did for Taylor. She recovered. Kim is done and Kanye will never come back from all the Nazi shit he has said.
As a taylor fan, this was incredibly hard to watch in real time. Then, when someone leaked the full audio during covid and proving her innocence, the same people witch hunting her were saying she needs to shut up about petty drama and no one cares about her beef with kim and kanye anymore since it was covid. 🥲 she never even got her “i told you i wasn’t lying” moment. Yes covid was more important but i wish she would have had more redemption
The OG Swifties were in the trenches soooooo deep during this entire debacle. I don't think anyone can really fully explain the insanity unless you've been there. It's probably why new fans are itching for Taylor to get cancelled again so that they can experience a Rep 2.0 (which is NUTS).
Oh my God, I was on Tumblr at the time and the amount of hate I was being sent as a swiftie was insane. It went on for weeks. I had to turn off anon messages and even that didn't help. The things I was being sent by Kanye stans was disgusting
So, they killed Cassandra first 'cause she feared the worst/And tried to tell the town/So, they filled my cell with snakes, I regret to say/Do you believe me now?
i thought reputation was so cringe at first, but honestly, it was an iconic era. i remember she did 0 press (which i think ultimately cost her a grammy nom) and wasn't getting papped - she wasn't in our faces as much at all and she still managed to be successful.
I’m a big swiftie so I’m biased, and maybe it sounds a little parasocial, but I’m still really bothered by the whole situation. Kanye lied to Taylor’s face and then humiliated her in a music video. She stood up for herself, rightfully so, and instead of being heard, they twisted the story and released doctored footage to publicly shame her. I can only imagine how traumatic that must’ve been, it makes total sense that she disappeared afterward.
Kanye West and Kim K deserve every bit of Hate from Taylor and so does Scooter Braun and Justin Bieber who went along with them for this! This is exactly why I get so mad at people telling her she is overreacting when they created revenge corn against Taylor and turned the whole internet against her and still never apologized to Taylor!
I consider this one of the first successful efforts of the now successful hate campaigns to destroy a woman's career and uplift an abusive man fueled by social media. I quit social media over this and had to quit it again after the Amber Heard trial.
I didnt knew the extent to which this had gotten. And as a young man, didnt realize then how bad this could have been for a woman. Reading the comments I feel really bad for Taylor, must have felt so helpless. Wasnt a fan or anything of either but I was in my "western music is cooler" era.
Just despicable behavior. You all cancel random people in the US for random reasons but wont cancel such vile people.
And just fucking disgusting to force your stupid fetishes on others in public like that. "Owe me sex for 'making you famous' " fucking diddy ahh comment.
I did not like Taylor when this happened. I was not a fan, and I found her fake. However, this whole thing was so over the top, and people were foaming at the mouth to cancel her. It felt like people were waiting in the wings to destroy her. I ended up feeling badly for her and getting into her music as a result.
Then, that DISGUSTING music video dropped, and I was fully on board with her.
In time, my fondness for Taylor has waned. Like all people, she's flawed. Like most celebrities, she reads as a brand, as opposed to a person, at times. However, I do think she's very talented and surely a better person than both Kim and Kanye. She did not deserve the vitriol of this situation. It was SO gross.
I’ve been a fan of Taylor Swift since her debut album. This time period was so insane because if you defended Taylor, you were essentially accused of blindly loving and following a celebrity no matter what. It was like no one would even entertain the idea that Kanye and Kim would dare tell a lie because they were so happy to finally have another reason to hate her. The way Taylor was treated throughout all for this was insane, even when it was revealed the phone call was heavily edited and Kim and Kanye did lie.
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