Right-wing pundit Mark Hemingway SLAMS Taylor Swift’s music, saying it tells women it’s okay to be 29, unmarried and childless
- Mark Hemingway wrote Swift’s music promotes a culture of self-obsession
- He claims her popularity stems from a need for shared interest with Swift, 33, and not actual talent
Conservative writer Mark Hemingway penned an essay criticizing superstar Taylor Swift’s music as a sign of societal decline.
Swift, 33, took over the NFL on Sunday when she attended her new beau Travis Kelce’s football game in Kansas city. 24.3 million viewers tuned in to watch with her.
In his essay for The Federalist, Hemingway, a book editor for the publication, wrote that Swift’s lyrics are ‘Me Music’ and promote a culture of self-obsession.
‘Given her popularity in the face of this lyrical obsession, it’s a chicken-or-egg-first proposition about whether the cultural avatar of millennial females is famous for being near constantly romantically aggrieved,’ he wrote.
‘Even as TikTok is full of videos of women insisting, ‘No really, it’s great being 29 and unmarried and childless, I don’t want that at all, I get to sleep in on weekends and learn to make shakshuka, this is the most fulfilling life I can conceive of, I’M HAPPY WHY WON’T ANYONE BELIEVE ME?!'”
Hemingway argued that Miss. Americana’s popularity represents a cultural shift in music from songs about community issues to ones based on individualism.
The singer-song writer projected to a gross of $2.2 billion in North American ticket sales alone for her Eras Tour
On Sunday, Swift was seen supporting her new beau Travis Kelce at his NFL game in Kansas City
‘Her music sucks: It’s utterly defined by self-obsession rather than introspection. Where other artists will occasionally do a Christmas album, it seems like every Taylor Swift album is a Festivus record devoted to the airing of grievances and feats of artistic strength.’
Swift did release a Christmas album in 2007 titled The Taylor Swift Holiday Collection featuring two original songs, Christmases When You Were Mine and Christmas Must Be Something More. In 2021 she released the original song Christmas Tree Farm.
Hemingway harps on that her songs are about breakups and old flames and said that some of her lyrics are too obvious.
‘There’s yet another song on her latest record bashing one of her famous exes, John Mayer, following up on her infamous breakup song Dear John in 2010. Look, everyone knows Mayer was a terrible womanizer — but this was known before he dated her — and that was 14 YEARS AGO,’ he wrote.
Mark Hemingway, a Book Editor at The Federalist, wrote an essay slamming Taylor Swift’s music
‘It’s, as the kids say, pretty cringe to still be exploiting these past relationships, which considering Swift’s had a charmed life since she was a teenager, seem like pretty hollow examples of genuine heartbreak.’
He is referring to a song off the record breaking Midnight’s album titled Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve. John Mayer reportedly dated Swift from December 2009 through February 2010 when he was 31 and she was 19.
Swift’s six year relationship with Joe Alwyn ended at the beginning of her Eras Tour this April.
Hemingway argues that audiences have lowered their expectations for what classifies as good music and that has allowed for the wide appeal of the Bad Blood hitmaker.
‘At some point, we have to recognize that even if you embrace the limits of pop music, the distance between middlebrow entertainment and the lowest common denominator is enormous,’ wrote Hemingway.
‘Our need for shared artistic connection cannot be allowed to overwhelm a duty to also collectively seek out music that takes us places and challenges us with insights into the human condition, revelations about ourselves we didn’t know (or maybe didn’t want to know), and otherwise produces insights into the problems of others.’
Swift’s The Eras Tour is shattering records and is projected to a gross of $2.2 billion in North American ticket sales alone. Her movie release of the tour is predicted to open at $100 million in ticket sales.
He acknowledged the relatability audiences can have with Swift’s songs.
‘It’s true that young men are frequently terrible to young women and there’s nothing inherently wrong with this being fodder for pop songs, but there are limits.’
Though he argued that in today’s polarized world with little shared culture, people will cling on the anything that breaks through but it does not need to be looked through a political lens.
Following record-breaking demand for screenings of the Eras Tour film, Swift announced the film will be screened worldwide
Swift (right) was seen in New York City with Sophie Turner (left) amid public attention around the Game of Thrones star divorce from Joe Jonas
‘Music has the power to connect people through shared experience, and people desperately want that connection in this polarizing age,’ he wrote. ‘In the case of Swift, however, that connection has to be interpreted, like everything else these days, through a political lens.’
He wrote about the New York Times coverage of Swift and mentioned noteworthy essay published in the New Yorker about listening to Swift in prison and criticized some of the coverage.
‘To be clear, I’m not so hostile or out of touch that I don’t get important aspects of her appeal. I think she’s worth paying attention to because something about Swift resonates at the frequency of America. But I’m genuinely not sure her popularity is a testament to her talent.’
Hemingway admits Swift is hard to resist and rather his issue is the quality of her music that he finds generic.
‘I concede she’s so good at the exact thing she does that she’s hard to resist in certain contexts. If the occasional three-minute bursts of Swift make you feel good, I won’t deny you that.’
Tuesday Swift shared the Eras Tour concert film will premiere across the UK and Europe next month following its success in America.
She has been remaking her earlier albums after a dispute with her old label, Big Machine Records, over ownership of the masters. Her 1989 album is slated to be the next re-release.
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