Beloved teen pop/country sensation Taylor Swift is held up by many as a role model for our generation. Her songs are called “inspiring” and are loved because of how they voice the struggles of an average teenager. Is Taylor Swift, however, really that average and inspiring, or is she just another Top-Ten manufacturing basket case? Based on evidence that spits in the face of popular belief, I vote basket case.

Exhibit A: Taylor Swift’s many not-so-average boyfriends. She definatly has a type, because those she chooses to court are rich, or famous, or a glorious combination of both. With a record of ten men in the past four years, she has an average of a new man every five months. Any other person with this kind of track record would never be extolled as highly as Taylor Swift. She should take her own advice, and next time, just say no.

Exhibit B: Her song writing. While she does display a knack for mass producing catchy songs, they have the poor qualities of anything mass produced:
1). They’re all the same. This goes for musical structure as well as her lyrics. I understand that country music needs a particular arrangement and feel to have the desired effect, and this may not be very flexible. But I think that if she were as talented as everyone claims, she could come up with something a little more intricate and interesting.
2). The content of the songs seems based solely off of the boy-girl drama that has become expected and enjoyed in society. They aren’t products of passion for art or for a message she’s trying to convey, they’re just music for music’s sake. She takes each boy she has ever known and writes down their story in a three chord progression. Her latest hits We Are Never Getting Back Together and I Knew You Were Trouble are prime examples of the expected boy-girl drama. Six full minutes of how she let a boy take advantage of her repeatedly even though she knew what she was getting into. Insanity, dear reader, is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
3). The content of her songs isn’t healthy or stimulating, they’re the rantings of an irrational, broken, teenage girl. Take the song Better Than Revenge. It’s about how Taylor Swift was trying to play a boy into her hands, and then another girl came along who was a better player. The lyrics go back and forth between threatening this girl, and tearing apart her character for revenge. My question is: What about the dude in the middle of all this? Two crazy shallow chicks are in a cat fight over him and he just sits there? Not likely. I would high-tail it out of there to get away from the madness, and never look back. Taylor’s song, Speak Now, tells the tale of how she crashed her ex-boyfriends wedding, declares her love, and expects him to leave with her right then and there. Uh, sorry sweetie, that ship sailed a while ago, and if the man can’t make the right decision about who to spend the rest of his life with, why do you want him?


While we all enjoy a fun song about life’s mishaps and conundrums, I don’t see the need for 64 songs from one artist. As a strong proponent against accepting societal norms at face value, I say enough! So many things in this culture feed on teenage emotions, but I think the widespread support of someone so immature is just a little ridiculous.