Will The Taylor Swift Fans Please Stand Up?

What am I dancing to right now?

Good question reader! I don’t mind telling you at all.

Or do I?

Well, to be honest…

No, you don’t really want to know.

I know all the words though!

Oops. I wasn’t supposed to tell you that.

Okay okay fine. *Deep breath* I can do this. I’m…right now…I’m listening…well…right now I’m listening to Taylor Swift.

*Dramatic Pause*

DON’T PANIC. IT’S OKAY. I PROMISE. EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE OKAY. NOTHING IS WRONG WITH ME LISTENING TO TAYLOR SWIFT.

Really. There isn’t one thing that’s wrong with that. But why is it that I feel like it’s some big secret that I have to keep so I can retain the right to my cool kid card? Why do I feel like if I tell the guys that live 3 doors down that I like Taylor Swift that they’ll never speak to me again?

Why should they care?

These are the questions I asked when I read Vanity Fair’s article this week in preparation for Taylor Swift’s album release (which, just so you know, came out on Monday).

Now, I’ll be the first to admit that I haven’t been too excited about this album. I’ve seen it on my news feed on Facebook (because of course I liked Taylor on FB, duh), and I know all about the pre-releases of songs and such. But I haven’t really been “pumped.” I’ll probably have to blame this on her abandonment of her country roots. But honestly, after I got over the shock of “Shake It Off” being very non-country, I really, really loved it. So I don’t know what happened.

But now I have to back up. Truthfully, I’ve had a long history with TSwizzle. Cut to middle school, when her first few singles started trickling on the radio. My cousin was in high school at the time and probably knew all the words to the songs on her first album (though she’d never admit it to me), so I got the exposure there, and of course, wanting to be like her, decided that I liked me some TSwift too. And from there, things just escalated. I own I think 3 out of the 5 albums now she’s made? Yeah? And I’ve listened to every one of them. Multiple times. I got to see her when she came to Houston, and I danced to the songs and screamed until my ears rang. Taylor was where it was at.

But then, suddenly, she wasn’t. I never stopped liking her, but then my friends started talking about how shallow she was. How she only talked about her (ex)boyfriends.

So then I guess I bought into the lie. But thinking about it now, some of my best memories have come from Taylor Swift songs.

Listening to “State of Grace” on repeat. Screaming “Our Song” in the bathroom after a competition. That time I was in the car with two 22 year olds who just decided that they should turn down the windows and blast “22” on State Street. While we were stuck in traffic.

And seriously, why should anyone make me feel bad for liking Taylor Swift’s music? Does she torture kittens in her spare time? Is there some sort of mafia affiliation I don’t know about?

No. She doesn’t. And I will seriously punch anyone who tries to tell me that all of her songs are about her ex-boyfriends. Who cares? As TSwift herself pointed out, Ed Sheeran writes about his ex-girlfriends. Bruno Mars too. People have been writing about love and loss for years now. That’s practically all that’s ever on the radio. And yet TSwift gets the dump for that? How is that even fair?

And if I’m being perfectly honest, Red is one of my favorite albums. Period. Do I like all of the songs on it? No. But do I think some of the songs are so much better than anyone ever expected from Taylor? Yes.

So really, the hate on people who like Taylor Swift needs to stop. Do you like her music? If you answered no, that’s perfectly fine. If you answered yes, that’s perfectly fine.

Seriously. It’s just music.

And might I add…it’s pretty good music.

It’s music that I like.

Cuz I like Taylor Swift.

I said it. Deal with it.