Taylor Swift‘s latest album has generated plenty of buzz, but one essay about her lyrics has taken the controversy to another level.
Melissa Fabello, a self-described “politicized relationship coach” and academic writer, published an online piece accusing the singer of promoting white supremacy through a love song about wanting children with her fiancé, NFL star Travis Kelce.
Fabello‘s essay, titled “Yes, Taylor Swift is racist – just not the kind you think she is,” argues that the pop star’s songwriting reinforces racial privilege and traditional gender norms. “Is Taylor Swift racist?” Fabello asks at the beginning of the essay. “Yes.”
Fabello describes herself on her website as a “white, thin, middle class, queer, cisgender woman who lives with anxiety.”
Her essay claims that Swift‘s lyrics on The Life of a Showgirl, particularly the track “Wi$h Li$t”, represent more than romantic longing. Fabello interprets them as a coded celebration of white identity.
“What makes Taylor Swift dangerous isn’t that she writes lyrics that could serve as the background music to a pro-eugenics Sydney Sweeney ad,” she wrote. “It’s that she lacks the self-awareness to see how those two things could be connected.”
A love lyric becomes a flashpoint
At the center of Fabello‘s argument is a line from “Wi$h Li$t,” where Swift sings, “I just want you / Have a couple kids / Got the whole block looking like you.” To most listeners, the lyric comes across as an affectionate nod to the idea of building a family with someone you love. To Fabello, however, it is “pushing the idea of passing on one’s [white] genes.”
“People were quick to point out that, especially given the cultural climate, expressing a fantasy in which two Aryan-esque rich people populate a neighborhood with blonde-haired, blue-eyed babies is a little … insensitive, at best,” Fabello wrote.
She went on to describe the entire album as “a magnum opus of white supremacy,” arguing that Swift‘s success and image depend on what she calls “the fragility and purity of white femininity.” According to Fabello, Swift‘s brand of “liberal whiteness” is “actually scarier than if she was MAGA.”
Fabello also accused Swift of overlooking racial issues entirely, writing, “Taylor Swift is a white woman whose success relies on cultural narratives of the fragility and purity of white femininity, while practicing zero interrogation into her own whiteness.”
The author, who has previously written essays such as “The Nuclear Family is a Cult” and “The Way You’re Talking About Sex Might Be Homophobic,” tied her critique of Swift to broader themes about privilege, gender, and cultural influence.
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