0:02 Hi everyone, Anthony Fantano here,
0:04 internet's busiest music nerd, and I've
0:07 got a bone to pick with Taylor Swift.
0:10 Something her and her fans are sure to
0:15 uh respond to reasonably with um no
0:17 hatred in their hearts whatsoever.
0:20 Because honestly uh what I am about to
0:22 say is not said with any hatred in my
0:25 heart and genuinely comes from a place
0:28 of concern for our country and honestly
0:30 her public image. I don't know if you
0:33 guys have noticed lately, but the worlds
0:35 of music and politics these days are
0:38 crossing over in ways that are kind of
0:41 tough to ignore. most recently with
0:43 multiple instances of the Trump
0:45 administration using pretty popular
0:48 songs from chart topping and legendary
0:51 artists to uh push their propaganda
0:53 through various promotional videos or
0:57 pieces of AI slop, even Tik Toks and
0:59 short form vertical type video. And
1:02 thankfully, most of these examples
1:05 recently have been met with uh very
1:07 active and aggressive responses from
1:10 these artists rejecting the use of their
1:12 hard work, their art, their copyrighted
1:15 material, and essentially hitting the
1:18 administration with lawyers, with
1:21 paperwork, with cease and desists to
1:24 basically stop the use of their work in
1:27 its tracks. And again, recent examples
1:31 include that of Olivia Rodrigo, MGMT,
1:33 Metallica as well. And they're certainly
1:35 not the only artists whose work the
1:38 Trump administration has been using to
1:40 normalize their bigotry, their hatred,
1:42 and their fascist agenda. However, there
1:45 has been a weirdly deafening silence
1:48 whenever it has come uh to the usage of
1:51 Taylor Swift's music, believe it or not.
1:52 For example, right now on the White
1:54 House Tik Tok account, there's a bunch
1:57 of text and propagandist images playing
1:59 against uh the fate of Ailia from
2:01 Taylor's latest record. And there have
2:03 been other disturbing and concerning
2:05 usages as well of the track's father
2:08 figure as well as Opelite. So, the
2:10 usages are there and the music is most
2:11 definitely being used to push a
2:13 narrative. And again, the fact that this
2:16 is happening, continuing to happen, and
2:20 basically uh just existing unabated is
2:23 just very curious and very odd given a
2:25 couple of things. One, not only the fact
2:28 that Trump has taken a very hostile
2:30 stance against Taylor Swift uh on
2:32 numerous occasions on social media. I
2:34 mean, that alone should be enough to
2:37 raise this woman's eye. I mean, she's
2:39 certainly gone after other people either
2:43 in interviews or uh in her own music for
2:45 less. But on top of that, Taylor Swift
2:47 is somebody who historically is known to
2:49 be uh uh pretty latigious when it comes
2:51 to protecting her music and her
2:53 copyright. I mean, this is a woman who
2:55 whipped the entire music industry up
2:58 into a frenzy, over her not owning her
3:01 own masters and had everyone, me
3:04 included, cheering her on as she went
3:06 through the process of re-recording all
3:08 of her older albums, only for her to end
3:10 up buying the whole catalog anyway,
3:12 which I mean, frankly, is something I'm
3:14 happy she was able to do. But again,
3:15 this is something I and many other
3:18 people supported her in because of the
3:21 sanctity of uh the creative process and
3:23 the necessity that she uh control her
3:25 music in the way that she saw fit, which
3:27 is a position and a perspective that
3:30 even her more skeptical fans supported
3:32 her in, despite the fact that Taylor's
3:35 insistence on enforcing her copyright
3:37 has been used against people as
3:40 powerless as Etsy creators, as well as
3:42 quietly behind the scenes making sure
3:45 that her and Jack Antonoff. Even Saint
3:47 Vincent got credit on Olivia Rodrigo's
3:50 song Deja Vu over I guess allegedly some
3:52 similarities that it had with Cruel
3:54 Summer. So again, Taylor is someone who
3:57 historically is very sensitive to and
4:00 aware of when she is being ripped off
4:02 and when someone else is using her music
4:05 and her ideas to their own personal
4:08 benefit. And yet, as the Trump
4:09 administration does it, she is standing
4:12 there silent, not doing anything. And
4:14 regardless of what her reasoning at this
4:16 point may be, I got to say the outcome
4:19 here is disappointing because it's
4:21 inconsistent and in terms of her public
4:24 image, it's unflattering. Now, with that
4:26 being said, I want to steal man argument
4:29 a little bit here because I know there
4:31 will be some Taylor Swift defenders in
4:34 the comments who will pretend that I'm
4:36 asking for something unreasonable here
4:39 and that Taylor, by virtue of ignoring
4:41 Donald Trump, using her music to push
4:44 his agenda, she's somehow playing 4D
4:47 chess because an engagement, a response,
4:50 a call out is is exactly what he wants.
4:52 You don't get it. Okay. First off, in
4:54 terms of what the Trump administration
4:56 wants, to operate uninterrupted and
4:59 unabated is most likely their biggest
5:01 preference here, which is exactly what
5:03 they're doing so long as Taylor Swift
5:06 says and does nothing. And number two,
5:09 what I'm asking for and expecting from
5:11 Taylor at this point, is not this giant
5:13 soapbox speech, though that would be
5:17 nice. It's not an endorsement of
5:19 everything I believe. Again, I feel like
5:22 the bare minimum of hitting this man and
5:25 the administration with as much lawyer
5:27 power as she possibly can would be more
5:30 than enough because if you've done any
5:32 analysis of how exactly we have gotten
5:35 to this point as a country over the past
5:37 10 years, one of the key channels
5:38 through which the Trump administration
5:41 has been able to normalize its hateful
5:44 and bigoted agenda against queer people,
5:46 against immigrants, against minorities
5:48 of all types and stripes, against women
5:51 too is funneling it through pop culture
5:53 and making what they do and think and
5:55 stand for seem cool by proximity of what
5:57 they're able to put it next to. Be it
5:59 memes, be it mainstream music or
6:02 whatever. And by allowing the usage of
6:04 her music in this way, Taylor is
6:07 allowing that process to continue. Even
6:09 if we're to tell ourselves the fairy
6:11 tale that Taylor's entire listening
6:14 audience is nothing but uh women who
6:16 hate Trump, when if we look at the
6:19 statistics, Taylor's fan base is mostly
6:21 white women. White women love voting for
6:23 Trump. which is exactly why the use of
6:26 her music in this way must be rejected.
6:28 Because if Taylor's response to this is
6:30 that h it's essentially not really that
6:33 big of a deal. There are going to be
6:35 people guaranteed that also see the
6:38 further empowerment of Trump as not that
6:41 big of a deal, which just to stress, it
6:44 kind of is considering that he like just
6:47 tweeted the other day in support of the
6:50 execution of his political opponents.
6:52 I'm sure you've heard phrases used very
6:55 recently in the past few years like uh
6:56 you know we're living in historical
6:59 times, we're crossing the Rubicon, we've
7:01 gone over a certain threshold, you know,
7:03 not to stale these takes out or
7:05 anything, but we really are actually
7:08 doing that. And one of the only things
7:10 we can do to prevent that continued
7:14 backsliding is openly reject and
7:16 denounce this stuff whenever it is
7:18 popping up. And again, I'm not even
7:20 looking for or expecting that from
7:22 Taylor at this point. Merely just doing
7:24 everything she possibly can to prevent
7:26 this guy from furthering his agenda
7:29 using her music would be nice. Again,
7:31 there are multiple options and
7:33 approaches Taylor could take to this
7:36 situation. Not all of them involve like
7:38 a head-to-head with Donald Trump in the
7:41 octagon. Nobody wants or is expecting
7:43 that. as entertaining as that would be
7:45 with Taylor's known experience in
7:48 Brazilian jiu-jitsu. She is a black belt
7:49 after all. But yeah, I'm going to leave
7:51 it there for now. Let me know what your
7:53 thoughts about all of this are in the
7:55 comments below. I'm sure you will. Over
7:57 here next to my head is another video
7:58 that you can check out. Hit that up or
8:00 the link to subscribe to the channel.
8:05 Anthony Fantano, Taylor Swift, Opalite forever.
