By now, most people have heard that pop czarina Taylor Swift has a new album out.
(And if you’re blissfully unaware of that fact, this writer is truly jealous.)
On Friday, the 35-year-old Swift dropped her newest album, “The Life of a Showgirl” and it was, as is often the case, a commercial success.
According to Billboard, “Showgirl” has already garnered over 3 million “traditional album” sales, though that large figure pales in comparison to the 300 million on-demand official streams of songs the album drew.
Yes, that one Taylor Swift fan in your friend group that you can’t get rid of is probably listening to and thoroughly enjoying Swift’s latest offering.
But if that friend suggests introducing their young daughter to “Showgirl”? You should probably intervene, as a slew of Christian moms on social media are doing after taking a cursory glance at Swift’s latest lyrics.
“These are some of the lyrics from Taylor Swift’s new album,” wrote Christian author and podcaster Haley Williams on her Substack. “An album which I have seen moms bring their 6 year old daughters to launch parties for. Eight out of the twelve songs on ‘The Life of a Showgirl’ are labeled explicit, marking the most Swift has sworn on one album in her career. But Christian women can’t wait to serve it up to their little sweeties! Because #beats and #vibes.”
“Let’s take a look at what’s lurking in those good vibes for your little cuties.”
Williams then broke down a number of lyrics to Swift’s newest songs, and … yeah. They’re bad in both the traditional lyrical sense and bad for people, let alone children.
From the song “Wood”:
Forgive me, it sounds cocky
He ah-matized me and opened my еyes
Redwood tree, it ain’t hard to see
His love was thе key that opened my thighs
From “Father Figure”:
I’ll be your father figure, I drink that brown liquor
I can make deals with the devil because my dick’s bigger
This love is pure profit, just step into my office
They’ll know your name in the streets
(Williams powerfully added on Instagram: “We cannot disciple our children in the ways of the world and wonder when they turn out lost.”)
Those are just two samples, but you surely get the gist. That country-inspired teenage singer from once upon a time has become a full-fledged woman … but is this the type of woman your daughters should be pining to be like?
Conservative author and pundit Allie Beth Stuckey certainly doesn’t think so:
“OK, moms, your daughters should not be listening to Taylor Swift,” Stuckey said. “She is not a role model, and it actually baffles me that there are Christian moms who will say she’s better than Chappell Roan. Y’all, the bar is in hell, if that is our standard.
“The bar could not be lower. If we are deciding on the righteousness of our kids’ entertainment choices based on the most degenerate stuff out there.
“See, it is different, teenagers listening to Taylor Swift today than us listening to Taylor Swift when we were teenagers. Because Taylor Swift was a teenager when were a teenager. She was talking about this silly, superficial stuff. She was talking about teenage romance.
“She was not talking about opening up her thighs to someone who’s not a husband. OK? And that is literally what she is singing about.
“We as parents are called to steward our children.”
Yes, we are.
Look, before “Showgirl,” the best thing I could possibly say about Swift is that her music was largely inoffensive (to be clear, inoffensive does not mean “good”) to me. It was, and still largely is, generic bubbly pop that anyone who grew up in the ’90s should be intimately familiar with.
But after “Showgirl”? The best I can now say about Swift’s music is that … uh … she wrote it herself?
And perhaps Williams summed it up best: “The album as a whole is not edifying or something Christian women should be letting their daughters listen to. It makes sense why the world would love this. It does not make sense why Christians would.”
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