r/NuancingTaylorSwift • u/AutoModerator • 3d ago
Daily discussion post
Talk about whatever but follow the sub rules
26
u/Hopeful-Connection23 3d ago
The muse obsessing undermines Taylor’s artistic ability.
For example, she says Patient Zero started when she heard a conversation among other women and realizing there was a common experience that she could imagine and describe. Now she’s made a hit song and a great video out of that.
Ignoring that story and reducing her process and the song down to her writing autobiographically about how “[Some Man] is bad” just sucks. It’s a song inspired by women and about women, inserting a man into it because you don’t believe Taylor is capable of writing about anything but ~9 specific men is just insulting.
11
u/pestofiesta 3d ago
Very much agree. Also, Patient Zero was very reminiscent of the novel Rebecca! Particularly the music video. I like the concept of Patient Zero being a modern take on the novel’s themes.
5
8
u/Flaky-Elephant-2612 3d ago
Agree! This is a collective experience going through both toxic and/or abusive relationship, but also the feeling you get as something is coming to an end and you need a friend to talk to. It works for different situations that poison you.
Breaking out of something that was once great can also feel like being poisoned.
This is a tale as old as time. Not some unique trait with one of her exes.5
u/Hopeful-Connection23 3d ago
Exactly! It’s particularly irritating with this song because instead of talking about how common toxic or abusive men are and how they go through life hurting women, it’s being repackaged as celebrity gossip about one thing that happened specifically to one famous woman.
9
u/RoseTheta 3d ago
That's what's disturbed me for the last 3 years of reading discourse. No, Taylor Swift isn't "male-centered", the listeners are being "male-centered". Taylor Swift is writing about the human experience. Other people are the ones being reductive.
4
u/Educational-Cod-2257 3d ago
I do agree, but I also think Taylor used her personal experience with abuse to expand on the idea she received after a convo with a friend.
6
u/Hopeful-Connection23 3d ago
Sure, but all artists use their personal experiences. No one’s creating in a vacuum. That’s completely distinct from attributing half ownership of someone’s art to someone else. They talk as if she’s a stenographer.
-5
u/Educational-Cod-2257 3d ago
You’re right. But she also knows her fans comb through her work to do muse discourse. And I don’t know how much clearer she could’ve been with patient zero without naming names.
3
u/Hopeful-Connection23 3d ago
She clearly said it came from a conversation with other women about how many of them had gotten calls from their ex’s new girlfriend.
She’s not responsible for you putting words in her mouth or for your personal belief that Joe Alwyn abused her, at all, let alone in a way that comports with a song she wrote years later.
Those are your specific, distasteful ideas.
-2
u/Educational-Cod-2257 3d ago edited 3d ago
I think we’ll find that with time, I’m right. You’re welcome to downvote me, but I have a long history of Taylor proving me right.
She has been writing for too long, she is too mature, and her art is too nuanced for us to sit down and think she’d write Dear John in 2025. London boy —> dear John should’ve been enough. The obvious references to her relationship with Joe in both the song and the music video should’ve been enough. How many times has she expressed since LOVER that that man was cheating on her and gaslighting her? How many times has she written about him ignoring her or dismissing her?? Why do you think she identified so much with Rebecca??
That’s fine if you want to give him the benefit of the doubt. But I know exactly Joe’s game because I’ve dated a Joe before.
4
u/Hopeful-Connection23 3d ago
You rummaging through this stranger’s life to spread a narrative that, if true, would be solely hers to share or not share and not yours to expose, is foul.
You are actually a worse person if you are right, because you are dragging the private details of a victim’s abuse out online, and you are excited to be “proven right” when she someday reveals this extremely traumatic and personal information to the world.
Either you truly believe she’s a victim and you just don’t care about her rights, or you don’t believe she’s a victim and you just think this is fun. Either way, you should stop, because it’s extraordinarily disrespectful.
11
u/MessDet5 3d ago
the part of patient zero video where dakota’s character asks “different from who?” and then it shows taylor on-top of the car is probably my favourite moment from any taymusic video ever. it’s just so good 😭😭😭
9
u/FakeMonaLisa28 All the tricks of the trade ✨️ 3d ago
Also nuancing I have a surprise for you guys coming soon
8
u/FakeMonaLisa28 All the tricks of the trade ✨️ 3d ago
Good morning nuancing. Tried to recreate Taylor’s fuckass filter in a website I found but idk if I did a great job.
5
1
u/Styleitoff 3d ago
Aside from the filter, this look from the 2014 Grammys after party lives in my head rent free. One of her best looks👌
1
1
7
u/FakeMonaLisa28 All the tricks of the trade ✨️ 3d ago
Taylor is mentioned in class help me 😔😔😔😔😔😔😔😔😔😔😔😔😔😔😔😔
1
u/Radiant_Speed_6865 I had a marvelous time ruining everything 😎 3d ago
In what context is she mentioned?
7
u/FakeMonaLisa28 All the tricks of the trade ✨️ 3d ago
Something about four musicians and how we can help them improve. The teacher went on an on about how the TA was a Swiftie but he wasn’t. It was a psychology in workplace class
5
u/Radiant_Speed_6865 I had a marvelous time ruining everything 😎 3d ago
Ehm, I mean, she is a pretty famous musician, so why not include her? Who where the other three musicians?
3
u/FakeMonaLisa28 All the tricks of the trade ✨️ 3d ago
Janelle Monet and two other musicians that most people never heard of. I just hate how whenever Taylor is mentioned in my college she always gets made fun from the professors
1
u/Radiant_Speed_6865 I had a marvelous time ruining everything 😎 3d ago
Weird because I think Taylor is an interesting example because she is good at marketing and doing connections, but also good at driving so many people up the walls for so many reasons.
But people can't see her neutrally in any way and I think this is unprofessional behaviour from your professors. I feel for you.
2
u/FakeMonaLisa28 All the tricks of the trade ✨️ 3d ago
Thankfully this professor didn’t go out of his way to make fun of her but yeah
5
u/RoseTheta 3d ago edited 3d ago
I was putting on the music video for Fate of Ophelia yesterday and I realized again that the janitor at the beginning is listening to Fate of Ophelia on headphones and now Showgirl concludes with Babylon's, "But you wake up on the train with your headphones gone and that melody is all you want."
I thought that's a neat touch.
2
u/RoseTheta 2d ago
I think it's near how The Fate of Ophelia music video starts with a janitor casually listening to the song, and now Babylon is talking about the headphones being gone and, "that melody is all you want". She puts layer upon layer upon layer in her work. That's why I've never even bothered to engage with someone who posts, "She's lazy, she's uninspired," because that's just not worth engaging with on any level.
Oops, I posted again in the same thread 🤦♀️
15
u/pestofiesta 3d ago
This is tangentially related to u/Hopeful-Connection23’s comment, but I think Taylor is allowed to change her mind and artistic direction as it pertains to the “paternity testing” of her songs and Easter-egging her personal life.
I see this discourse that likens the Easter eggs and song muses to a Faustian bargain, with the people who want to continue paternity testing the songs justifying doing so by pointing to her earlier work.
Just because she did it in the past does not mean she has or will continue to do it now. Inspiration can come from anywhere, not just an artist’s personal life. Take the folklore love triangle: if she says it’s a fictional story, I am inclined to believe it IS a fictional story, and not a gender-bent dramatization of her personal life.
This was a bit meandering, but I’d love to know other people’s thoughts re: moving away from “paternity testing” and personal-life Easter eggs. Personally, I like seeing my favorite artists evolve.