Adding My 13 Cents to the Dumbest Imaginable Controversy Until the Next Dumbest Imaginable Controversy

Of all the things adult Americans need to concern themselves with right now, I am pleased to see that, for at least a small percentage of the voting population, there is no greater issue than Taylor Swift’s love life. Yes, the economy - despite growing strength - continues to be a bugaboo for vast numbers of people who do not feel as though they are getting ahead. Yes, the wars in Ukraine and Israel are important. Yes, we are suffering from divisiveness and cynicism and an ingrained hopelessness that appears to be growing steadily worse. But for all of that, it’s heartening to see people taking the time to uncover the dark conspiracy behind a popular girl dating a football player.

There are those who naively cling to the idea that Taylor and Travis are actually dating. These are the same people who probably believe that Joe Biden won the election, January 6^th was an insurrection, and Michelle Obama is a woman. Not you and I, friend. We will not be fooled. Because if there’s one thing we have learned over the past few years, it is this: our side is the side of family values. And there is nothing worse for family values than a loving heterosexual couple.

Setting the sarcasm (briefly) aside, the Taylor/Travis outrage is as manufactured as its critics believe their romance to be. It’s a combination of clickbait and an instinctive reaction to the encroachment of “liberalism” into one of the few remaining bastions of unapologetic manliness. But mostly it’s just stupid people making hash out of stupid shit. It’s one thing for them to endure the disorienting appearance of hot pink during breast cancer awareness week, quite another for the star tight end of the Kansas City Chiefs in to fall in love with a woman who once wrote this on her Twitter page

This is the same woman who declared her support for the LGBT community by speaking out against anti-trans legislation in her home state of Tennessee. She also committed the sin of encouraging her fans to vote. To the MAGA mind, the only difference between Taylor Swift and Che Guevara is the number of rhinestones sprinkled across their decolletage.

For all the hand-wringing over the obnoxious shoplifting gangs that have been popping up across the country, the truth is that the Republican party is the snatch-and-grab party. Whether it’s grabbing others by the wallet or the pussy, the MAGA movement has no problem taking what they want. Then they get upset when the (very conservative) NFL capitalizes on the popularity of the most popular woman in the country? Why are they spending all that time cutting to the skybox to see her cheering for her man? Are they just doing it to grow the interest in their brand? Are they just doing it for…. (positions myself near the closest fainting couch) money?!?

Here’s an actual headline from the conservative publication The Federalist that predates the dating scandal but nicely summarizes the conservative position towards America’s sweetheart:

Please note that the estimated time to read this article is 14 minutes. That’s a lot of words devoted to so stupid an argument. And, to be fair, having the read it (in less than 14 minutes because I am a liberal), the author Mark Hemingway waffles between castigating her and admiring her, at one point complaining that Taylor Swift “excels at writing popular songs, but that’s not the same thing as writing good songs” and then comparing her unfavorably the “obviously very masculine” Tom Petty. Did I miss something about Tom Petty?

The “obviously very masculine” Tom Petty

Personally, I don’t have a strong opinion about Taylor Swift one way or the other. Nor should I. I’m 52. The last pop music I paid any attention to probably came out around 1998. Nor do I care very much about professional football. What I do care about is hypocrisy, lies, cynicism, and corruption – all of which are on full display in the MAGA freak-out over an inconsequential celebrity romance. I care that people as inoffensive as Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce are being run through the meat grinder of American politics for committing an act no worse than falling in love.

My 20-year-old daughter is a Swiftie. She glommed onto Swift for the same reasons girls have gravitated to pop stars since at least the first bobby-soxxers swooned to Sinatra - because young people need somebody to look up to. I wish I was still young enough to believe in the power of a pop song, to be caught up in a band or a singer or an athlete or, hell, a politician. Alas, after meeting enough people, I’ve realized that most of them are just like me - ugh.

Republicans could do a lot worse than embracing the kind of people Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce appear to be. If their relationship turns out to be, as many a Twitterer has alleged, a “psy-op,” then Republicans should be grateful to (I presume) George Soros for spending his money on fabricating exactly the sort of traditional relationship MAGA heads claim to support. If nothing else, it seems to me that the entire Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce story is a testament to the kind of conservatism Republicans used to crow about. Now, though, they’re just eating crow.