Taylor Swift is a Cultural Weathervane

~9 min read

Whether she wants to be or not (and my guess is she would rather not), Taylor Swift is our own personal weathervane. In this analogy, we are all indeed the weather. Our current reaction to, our outrage of, our praise for, and our feelings about Taylor Swift are a direct reflection of us individually and collectively as a culture.

But the question is: what exactly is being reflected and why? Let’s dive in.

Taylor Swift and the NFL

If you’ve been living under a rock for the last 18 years, it’s possible you haven’t heard of Taylor Swift, the singer-songwriter superstar. If you’ve been perhaps living on a different planet for the last five months, it’s possible you also haven’t heard of Taylor Swift in connection with the NFL. The collision of these two worlds has ultimately turned the 34-year-old billionaire musician into a cultural weathervane. Here’s why we should all take a step back and ask why this most recent social frenzy exists in the first place.

Taylor Swift is dating NFL football player, Travis Kelce. This is an utterly irrelevant occurrence to anyone other than Swift and Kelce, except that it places Taylor Swift firmly within the NFL sphere. Her mere presence within this sphere is the inception point of this particular discussion – a very ethnographic discussion at its heart.

Very briefly, ethnography is the qualitative analysis of one culture, observing the customs, dialogues, and behaviours of a group of people to draw conclusions about how this society functions. We are going to take an ethnographic dive into our culture’s frenzied reaction to Taylor Swift from the moment she stepped into the arena (or rather, stadium).

What has the reaction been?

In broad terms, the reaction has been polarizing. But our reactions say infinitely more about ourselves than they ever could about Taylor Swift.

In any culture, there is a loosely defined “left and right of arc” in terms of acceptable behaviour, expectations, values, and roles of members within that culture. Most of these elements are not written down. Instead, they are taught to children at formative developmental stages and continuously socialized and reinforced into adulthood. Society functions with relative cohesion provided its members stay mostly within this arc. Of course, there’s usually a fringe element on either side who live somewhat outside of this arc, but it’s essentially a bell curve with the majority residing somewhere in the middle.

These arcs can manifest with vast differences across cultures. And these arcs can also experience sweeping changes over time. What was once culturally acceptable becomes taboo. One such pertinent example is women’s struggle for financial independence. A woman was not able to get a credit card in the United States without her husband’s signature until the 1970s. Fast-forward a mere 50 years, and a 34-year-old woman becomes the first billionaire for writing and singing her own songs. This represents a significant cultural change of values.

Taylor Swift is now pushing on another cultural arc. She has entered a social sphere that she ought not enter. Of course, no one explicitly said she wasn’t allowed there. No such rule exists that football players can’t date singer-songwriters. But this article is a discussion about the discussion. Therefore, we must dig deeper than the written rules of society. This discussion must consider various levels of culture down to the fundamental beliefs espoused by the group. These beliefs manifest in elements like power dynamics: who do we expect to be in charge at home and at work? They manifest in social roles: who do we expect to perform various functions in society?  

So, what’s the problem with Taylor Swift?

The problem is not that Taylor Swift is dating a football player. The fundamental problem is that she challenges, and in fact threatens the accepted power dynamic of men and women within male-dominated environments, specifically within the NFL in this case.

Taylor Swift is an undeniable powerhouse and an exceptionally savvy businesswoman. But she has existed without much outrage or controversy prior to her attendance at her boyfriend’s football game in 2023. She has quietly become the first artist to ever earn over $1B solely on her musical body of work. Nobody had a significant problem with any of this happening because she amassed power within a sphere largely comprised of young women. Culturally speaking, we were fine with her excelling within this sphere. She “stayed in her lane,” so to speak.

Enter Taylor into an NFL stadium to support her boyfriend. A frenzy erupts. Outrage ensues. Conspiracy theories abound. Loyal fans rally to her defence (and increase Travis Kelce’s jersey sales by 400%). Taylor Swift has dated several notably famous men without a spark of outrage, and certainly without a single conspiracy theory. So, what’s different here?

The NFL is a male-dominated sphere. The expectation is that men will dominate in this environment. It feels like there should be a more significant crux to this problem, but the unwritten cultural reality is that women are still not invited to hold power within these environments. Football is a male-dominated sport surrounded by a male-dominated NFL bureaucracy, with a largely male-dominated fanbase. This is not a problem in and of itself. However, the backlash and outrage that ensues when someone subverts this cultural expectation reveals the alarmingly brittle nature of these expectations.

Subverted expectations and outrage

Cultural power dynamics are not a zero-sum game. Attention and airtime given to Taylor Swift at NFL games does not diminish the power of the NFL. In fact, it has been the opposite. Her association with the NFL has already made hundreds of millions of dollars for the franchise. She wields no formal influence or power over decisions made by the NFL or the coaches on the field. Her presence does not take away from their power. This should be a win-win situation for everyone. But the brittle nature of gendered expectations instead creates social conflict, controversy, outrage, and anger.

Taylor Swift’s presence within the NFL has simply highlighted the perceived cultural threat of women holding power in opposition to cultural expectations. In many jobs and environments, it is still not socially safe for women to participate, let alone hold power. Many occupations within the military, the skilled trades, and executive-level leadership roles are still resistant and hostile towards women who enter the arena. Women are still met with antagonism, intimidation, unrealistic expectations, and even violence. Taylor Swift’s presence in the NFL merely highlights this broader cultural reality.

What’s the solution?

Overly prescriptive, defined, and rigid roles within a culture are brittle and fragile. They are easily broken, and violators will be persecuted. This is true of men and women, and particularly of those who don’t fit within either role. This persecution is social by nature, largely delivered through othering, exclusion, and ostracization. But cultural icons such as Taylor Swift serve as touchstones or perhaps mirrors of our own expectations within society.

Draw attention to these reactions. Discuss them on their own merit. This is the talk about the talk. The act of simply having this discussion may indeed help to create more resilient, expansive, and compassionate values and expectations within our society. What is your reaction to Taylor Swift’s association with the NFL? Dig deeper than any superficial outrage you’ve seen in the news or social media. Dig into your fundamental beliefs about roles and social expectations of yourself and others. 

At the end of the day, we’ll likely still have as much Taylor Swift. After all, she’ll keep wielding incredible power and influence. But perhaps we can all have a little less outrage and more compassionate expectations of each other.