Swifty, White Fragility and Ordinary American Stupid
In the Beginning
No, I certainly wasn’t planning on writing about this stuff. In fact, I had barely heard of Taylor Swift until a short time ago. But then I started to learn about, arguably, one of the most popular singers and entertainers in the world at the present time. So I became informed, well sort of I suppose.
I’m also from Kansas City and want the Chiefs to win another Super Bowl on February 11. But I also like the 49ers. If Taylor can help Travis and company win again, it’s entertainment at its very best as far as I’m concerned. (It as well brings big dollars to KC and the NFL in general and that’s capitalism and entertainment dear right wingers.) In all fairness, however, I give the MAGA louts some credit for my enlightenment.
Really? Taylor Swift is part of a diabolical Democratic psych-op plot to win it all in November. Yup, I learned this from FOX “News” and its assorted imitators. Now, will Swift publicly endorse Joe Biden for president and drive thousands of voters to vote for him on November 4, 2024? You may await with “bated breath.”
Just a Sampling
Ross Douthat, conservative columnist for the NYT writes: Taylor Swift, Donald Trump and the Right's Abnormality
Taylor Swift, Travis Kelce and the MAGA Meltdown
Jimmy Kimmel On Taylor Swift NFL Conspiracy Theories
Fox News Suddenly Wants Celebrities Out of Politics
No, It’s Not About Taylor and Travis
The presidential election in 2024 is a big deal. It actually is about democracy, authentic individual freedom and liberty. It certainly is about worsening global warming and environmental destruction. It definitely is about authoritarianism and possibly real fascism. Ukraine matters and Mideast instability is not just marginally important. We also have to figure out how to work with China like it or not.
In the U.S. we better come up with an authentic and comprehensive immigration bill. Because of climate change and political instability, global migration is only going to get worse as millions of people across the planet are moving whether we like it or not, whether or not there is barbed wire fencing and whether or not there are guns pointed at them. In other words change is already happening.
Republican congressional cult, your responsibility is to the country. It’s not to a barely literate degenerate and traitor to the United States, the orange, bloated and certainly repulsive man-child.
Most certainly economic equality and economic insecurity will have to be addressed in America and won’t vanish by pretending it’s not a problem. Yeah and enough of predatory capitalism, overindulged large corporations and too many jackass billionaires that have become more than an unpleasant nuisance. (Did you know that EXXON as far back as 1954 paid for studies that showed global warming was real and fossil fuels were a major contributing factor.) But drill baby drill … until it gets too expensive to pull it out of the ground or under the sea. That time is not that far away.
Get over this absurd “anti-woke” crap only fit for losers like Ron DeSantis, along with book censorship, anti-trans cruelty and the usual racist gibberish and misogyny. And most definitely get over this fragile, white entitlement bs. No magical entity gave you this country for your own special use. I know, you stole it fair and square. Just ask the Cherokee and the Osage Indians, for starters.
I certainly wonder if most of us really get it yet. Do we still believe that someone else will make it “all better.” Do we really think the MAGA lumpenproletariat can actually run a diverse and developed country in the 21st century and of course led by authoritarians, grifters, the morally bankrupt and the usual collection of rich reactionaries with their bought and paid for legislators? I don’t think so. Get mad, get really smart and get going. Make the damn story come to life. Leave it to Beaver and Little House on the Prairie ain’t coming back. Get over it.
At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reaches us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction is our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time or die by suicide. (Abraham Lincoln, in a speech as a young lawyer in the 1830s)