The Taylor Swift Conspiracy is fun to write about.
It is a bit of crazy levity in a political environment that is deadly serious and consequential.
I found meaning in the controversy because I enjoy looking for hidden consequences from political events. Maybe a few hundred thousand young voters in key states will see this as disrespect for a symbol of their generation. I understand that feeling. Back in the 1960s, I didn't like establishment stiffs like Nixon criticizing Levis. Maybe voters of any age will see this manufactured controversy and decide that Trump and his allies have slipped another notch from manic-crazy to manic even-crazier and now outright dangerous. After all, if the GOP team picks a fight with Taylor Swift and imagines that Democrats are competent enough to orchestrate a plot to fix an NFL season, then they are crazy enough to start shooting missiles at flying unicorns. And maybe there is another group of people who are just sick to death of the Trump era of political polarity and see this as another and final straw in the politicization of everything, from cities to football teams, to celebrities, Disney, and beers. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
Mostly I consider it a huge, unforced error by team MAGA. If they want to reveal themselves as wacko, I can just sit back and watch the show.
Tony Farrell is a college classmate who had a long career in marketing. When he does guest posts I mention his management of the Trump Steak campaign back when Tony worked at The Sharper Image. It is a gentle way both to tease him and credential him. He worked at the highest levels of American product branding. This blog looks at candidate branding -- which is essentially the same thing as product branding, as has been recognized for decades.
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| Tony Farrell and family in California |
Guest Post by Tony Farrell
On Taylor Swift and Conspiracy
First question: Why am I doing this -- writing a guest post on the "Taylor Swift NFL Conspiracy" hoopla?
Well, Peter asked for my thoughts, speculating that my professional experience in marketing and (mainly) merchandising could lead to an interesting perspective. We’ll see.
In San Francisco not too long ago, I encountered a crazed homeless guy, filthy and addled and barking insane nonsense to someone I could not see. I later noted that what he said was not covered in the next day’s news.
Second question: If not him, why Taylor?
It is obvious the Swift Conspiracy is total, complete and absolute nonsense, but that does not mean it isn’t entertaining and fascinating. The latter two criteria are the only reasons I’m writing this and the news is covering it.
Anyone who’s been a merchant (as I was) or a music producer or other servant of mass consumerism knows that the emergence of a fad product or a hit tune or a viral meme or a blockbuster movie is an utter mystery. They are created by the organic fusion of billions of tiny interactions that cannot be predicted or controlled. If you get one, you ride it, like a wave.
I am sure that, at any one time, thousands of conspiracy fantasies are being conjured, nurtured, put out there to maybe grow and then certainly die, some day. Almost all die without notice; the rarest few emerge like this Taylor Swift whopper. One cannot point to anyone who created it; Trump had nothing to do with it, I’m sure. But there it is, here and on Fox.
Conspiracies have great allure. They can be endlessly fascinating, even across decades. (The JFK assassination conspiracies are thriving, still!) This is because conspiracies can be wonderfully creative; they can be the best-ever stories; one can join the world’s largest writers’ room and participate! Any fact or set of facts that point away from the conspiracy (or disprove it utterly) simply make it even more compelling, if not addicting. For many, this kind of creative social engagement is seen and felt as unusually entertaining and validating. The more one is disconnected from the real world, the more credible the most fantastic claims would be. Besides, all kinds of grounded, sane people love science fiction, fantasy and other inventions of the mind. Conspiracies are simply one manifestation of that very human sentiment. At heart, true belief is not required.
I recommend not adding any facts to the fight to derail this conspiracy; you are doomed to further it in your well-intentioned efforts.
You know, I never liked rap music until my younger daughter told me to not think of rap as music but as poetry, or some other kind of narrative art. And soon enough, I learned to appreciate rap, and judged it quite differently; I even came to really like some rap “songs.” In a similar vein, I suggest thinking of conspiracies as improvisational theater, where the latest drop in the pond creates new and ever-expanding circles of story. Trumpism as improv? Makes sense to me!
But to answer Peter’s most direct question to me, “Is there any upside to Trump going after someone as popular as Taylor Swift?” Nope. None at all.
6 comments:
On Flipboard that I look at daily there is an average of about 6 Taylor Swift/Kelce stories. I don’t know if that’s because Flipboard has figured out I like seeing them so I can laugh at the nuts. It’s the same power that MAGA nuts feel when others get mad about Trump. It’s the make liberals cry power, so I welcome the stupidity of their scrutiny. I also like drinking Bud Light in the Cayman Islands as a signal to some of the MAGA people here on the island when sitting in an outside bar.
Conspiracies already are a genre, the basis of countless thriller novels and movies. It’s when large numbers of people believe in them that they become as dangerous as the stolen election conspiracy, or as amusing as the Great Taylor Swift Super Bowl Conspiracy. On the PBS News Hour last Friday, Brooks and Capehart were asked about it and I enjoyed David Brooks’ response. He said he was a big fan of Taylor Swift and he’d vote for whoever she told him to.
By the way, the first rap song I remember was “Subterranean Homesick Blues” by Bob Dylan:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGxjIBEZvx0
It’s when the genre became associated with Black culture that it got a bad rap.
Here’s a perspective on rap from a relatively good amateur musician (me):
Think of the “clock rate“ (I.e. how many notes per second) of a particular instrument in a band. The bass is likely to be slowest. The lead guitar is somewhere in the middle. The drums, and in particular the cymbals, are likely to be very fast.
In rock, the lead singer tends to run at the same clock rate as the lead guitar. In rap, the singer is much faster, somewhere around the clock rate of the cymbals.
Consciousness tends to run at different clock rates too. It’s my conjecture that rap may be giving voice to a different and faster level of consciousness than rock, in addition to giving voice to a different instrument.
That doesn’t mean I like how most rap sounds, but I am way too old to like the music the kids are into, especially when they play it on my lawn.
Flipboard doesn't show me any of those, nor any TFG.
It's well trained
I think the lyrics about killing cops and domestic violence didn't do it any favors.
I think Rap is the worst music ever made. I think Jazz is the best ever made. Both invented by Blacks. Go figure.
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