The saga between #TeamTayTay and #TeamScooter is yet to reach cruising altitude. It’s been all quiet on the Taylor Swift front for a few days, suggesting the Lover maker might be whittling away at another post, not unlike the one that started this A-lister tit for tat in the first place.
Her fans, however, remain as active as ever partaking in a mass pile on of Scooter Braun’s socials, bullying, if you will, the industry mogul.
First and foremost, I am unashamedly #TeamTayTay, however even the most loyal supporters of the musician are finding it difficult to navigate their support amid the mass spamming of Braun’s social media accounts. A cursory glance of Braun’s feed show the dude hasn’t been able to say peep without a horde of mean, rude, menacing and at times threatening clap backs from Swifites.
So, where’s the line?
As I sit here now in my TayTay hoodie, atop my TayTay t-shirt, listening to TayTay, it’s difficult to not feel a sense of hypocrisy in this clash of the titans. If TayTay’s accusations of bullying against Braun are true, which I believe they are, how much does Braun need to be bullied for things to be equal?
We’re all too aware that pile-ons and bullying can get through the armour of immense fame and wealth. Indeed, the solitude and insecurities that come with those two things can often compound the emotional reaction to mass vitriol.
It feels as though every other week a high-profile celebrity takes their own life having come off second best against the court of social media. Upon reading TayTay’s blog post, we were worried it could have happened to her.
This was an industry dispute, and a business matter with multiple moving parts and parties concerned – and probably something fans shouldn’t be privy to. TayTay was offered a bum deal to get her masters back, signing a new contract with Big Machine that would allow her to earn one album back for each she released in the future. That was ice cold. But business is cold.
The music industry is even colder, evident in the fact that Swift, despite her issue with being bullied herself, seems to take no issue with others being bullied. We’ve been here before. She knew what would happen when she hit publish on that post.
There are strong undertones of a gender war to boot
The suited, male business exec + cronies towering over the singular, female artist. As a staunch feminist, I believe all situations needs to be viewed through this lens as that’s an all too common dynamic.
But as per the pile-on, any form of structured discussion around this is out the window. Any ‘learning lesson’ has been smothered, any way to receive any form of ROI on the time we’ve spend consuming this story has dwindled.
Now it’s just another pile on, against another celebrity, encouraged by a different celebrity all at the detriment of civil discussion.
We’re better than that, Taylor Nation.
