Taylor Swift
The New York Times is under fire for publishing an invasive piece that speculates on Taylor Swift's sexuality. The piece, which was titled 'What We Made Taylor Swift Do', is a 5,000-word article in which editor Anna Marks openly suggested how Taylor Swift's references to the LGBTQ+ community are the singer sending subliminal messages about her sexuality, implying essentially that she is secretly a member of the community.
New York Times faces backlash after speculating about Taylor Swift's sexuality
Anna Marks wrote, "In isolation, a single dropped hairpin is perhaps meaningless or accidental, but considered together, they're the unfurling of a ballerina bun after a long performance."
She continued, "Those dropped hairpins began to appear in Ms. Swift's artistry long before queer identity was undeniably marketable to mainstream America. They suggest to queer people that she is one of us."
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CNN soon reported that Taylor Swift's representatives weren't happy with the article, stating, "Because of her massive success, in this moment there is a Taylor-shaped hole in people's ethics." As per a source close to the situation, "This article wouldn't have been allowed to be written about Shawn Mendes or any male artist whose sexuality has been questioned by fans."
"There seems to be no boundary some journalists won't cross when writing about Taylor, regardless of how invasive, untrue, and inappropriate it is - all under the protective veil of an âopinion piece,'" the person added.
Anna Marks also wrote, "I know that discussing the potential of a star's queerness before a formal declaration of identity feels, to some, too salacious and gossip-fueled to be worthy of discussion."
She continued, "I share many of these reservations, but the stories that dominate our collective imagination shape what our culture permits artists and their audiences to say and be. Every time an artist signals queerness and that transmission falls on deaf ears, that signal dies. Recognising the possibility of queerness - while being conscious of the difference between possibility and certainty - keeps that signal alive."
New York Times faced backlash after speculating about Taylor Swift's sexuality almost instantly. Chris Willman, the chief music critic at Variety, wrote on X, "I've defended the NYT before when they published questionable op-eds... but this was the least defensible op-ed I can remember ever seeing the NYT run, made all the worse by the fact that it was written by a staffer who specialises in these speculations."
