Auntie Teekay’s Tea Shop And Wall Of Crazy

Wherein I semi-anonymously vent about my Kaylor obsession so my FB friends don’t have to put up with it

[tkrr]

I have not, as a general rule, been following the whole Baldoni-Lively dispute, but I did catch the news about the text messages between Blake and Taylor Swift, followed by Jenny Slate calling out Justin as a creep. My reaction: it kinda seems like Justin is a loose stair and that people familiar with him saw his claims of being sexually assaulted by his ex as non-credible, and Blake *may* have had some kind of harebrained scheme to undermine the efforts of a known predator to make a movie about domestic violence.

At the end of the day, I don’t actually care all that much about the whole thing, but if Justin Baldoni is pretty obviously the problem here, I really don’t give a shit if there was some conspiracy to take his movie away.

[tkrr]

I have deactivated my Threads account because I’m tired of opening it up to see constant algorithmically amplified ragebait. Also, people are morons.

[clementine-kesh]

popular canadian satire site the beaverton is expanding into micro-horror and it’s good

[tkrr]

Baseless speculation:

Taylor Swift is going through some shit right now. It’s bad. Between-1989-and-Reputation bad. Between being harassed by Trump and a portion of her fandom turning on her for mostly-imagined political reasons, her mental health is not good.

Wild-ass guess prediction:

She will go on a paparazzi blackout by the end of the year. She and Travis will split amicably and quietly after the football season. She will move, probably permanently, to the U.K. and may or may not come out as bi.

There will be no new album before late 2027, but the Rep vault tracks might drop.

[tkrr]

And the guy up and fuckin’ ragequits because it didn’t occur to him that I had a flush

[tkrr]

I've seen enough.

On *some* social media sites, there has been an onslaught of anti-Taylor Swift hate revolving around her supposed conservative leanings and alleged racist dog whistles in TLOAS. It is an incredibly stupid and obsessive firestorm of assumed conclusions and performative activism on behalf of black women, some of whom have accused Taylor of dogwhistling, and others who have said they disagree and don't want white people speaking for them. There's a lot of straight up denial that Taylor is the person she's shown herself to be over the years. It's a big mess. I saw someone suggest that this was troll farms at work, doing this on behalf of Donald Trump, but I don't buy that, because this is something a lot of people have believed for a while.

Then... I realized something.

Twitter was spamming it, but it's died down. Threads still is spamming it, and it flared up even more when someone decided that a lightning bolt necklace was Nazi imagery. But BlueSky wasn't, and I have no doubt the criticism that's blowing up other sites is in fact there.

This is an *algorithmic* smear campaign, and Zuck's crew is the one pushing it the hardest.

I did a bit of an experiment. I posted something on Threads on the subject, saying a very short version of what I said in the first paragraph above. I am nobody on Threads -- no reason to think anyone will see it.

Nine likes in seven hours. Over twenty in two days. It's not much, but it's a lot more than I should be getting given my profile there. Meta is using the algorithm to ragebait against Taylor Swift, and Twitter was doing the same thing but got bored. No more than a handful of people would pay attention to the discourse if this wasn't the case.

For the record, I haven't listened to the album yet. I plan to. My response to this is not based on the album. Honestly, a lot of this is pretty obviously driven by a subset of leftist fans that have never forgiven her for being a billionaire, and they'll use any and every scrap of "evidence" they can find to demonize her. But that'd be a pretty small discussion without the algorithm causing it to blow up.

[tkrr]

Bisexuality it is, I guess.

[tkrr]

So Billie Piper is the Sixteenth Doctor. Okay. So will we get Matt Smith as the Master?

[tkrr]

I think I was right about Rep TV

[tkrr]

Dear New Hampshire:

Don’t talk to me about “Live Free Or Die” when I’ve seen what the weed dispensary in Tyngsboro looks like on a weekend night.

[silly-little-gooses-deactivated]

Karma: The Long Lost Taylor Swift Album

The long-lost album ‘Karma’ is potentially one of the biggest Taylor Swift conspiracy theories out there. But what is it? Where did it come from? Could it possibly be true?

It is believed by some that Taylor created an album called ‘Karma’, set to release in 2016 (all images above are fan-made or photo shoots). This album was set to be after 1989, but was scrapped to create reputation after the Kanye West and Kim Kardashian drama.

If you’re unaware of the drama, here’s a quick summary. In 2009, Kanye interrupted Taylor’s acceptance speech at the VMA’s. But after that, she forgave him and they were friendly up until February of 2016. That’s when Kanye released a song called ‘Famous’, where he says the lines “I feel like me and Taylor might still have s€x/Why?/I made that b*tch famous.”

Taylor spoke out about this lyric and said she did not consent to it. In July of 2016, Kanye’s wife, Kim Kardashian, released videos on her Snapchat in which Taylor seemed to approve the lyric over the phone. Taylor then stopped making public appearances and deleted all social media for the rest of 2016. This sparked the creation of reputation.

EVIDENCE OF KARMA

In the ‘The Man’ music video, a wall of graffiti is shown. Spray painted on it are the words reputation, Speak Now, 1989, Red, Fearless, and Karma. The first five are albums that are her Taylor’s Version re-recordings, but Karma seems out of place. There is also a picture of a scooter with a cross over it, referencing her leaving Scooter Braun and her old record label. There is also a sign that says “MISSING: IF FOUND, RETURN TO TAYLOR SWIFT”, referencing her stolen albums that she didn’t have the full rights to due to Scooter Braun. This all makes sense, except Karma, which is in the very middle.

Taylor started wearing a lot of orange during 2016-2017, which is believed to be the color that represents the Karma album, similarly to how pink represents Lover, gold represents Fearless, purple represents Speak Now, etc. 

In the Look What You Made Me Do music video, she wore an orange outfit while swinging in a bird cage, which may have hinted at the “in the vault” status of Karma. Also, LWYMMD features the lyric “All I think about is karma.”

In Taylor’s 73 Questions interview with Vogue, she said “Karma is real.” Many think that this is an Easter egg. For example, in Taylor’s “30 Things I Learned Before Turning 30” essay for Elle, she hid a lyric of her song Daylight, which would be released in the future as part of the Lover album. 

Taylor had been consistently releasing albums every other year up until 2016. 

2006 - Debut

2008 - Fearless

2010 - Speak Now

2012 - Red

2014 - 1989

In 2016, she didn’t release any music to continue the pattern. This leads people to believe that Karma was meant to be released, but was scrapped to create reputation, which would release in 2017.

Some people believe that Taylor may release Karma (Taylor’s Version) as a part of her Taylor’s Version series. 

Some people think she will simply release it as an album by itself, perhaps TS12.

Do you believe in Karma?

[tkrr]

“Karma” being an early name for Reputation seems most likely to me. It would fit the timing of the rift between her and Scott Borchetta becoming irreparable, but then 2016 knocked the wind out of her sails and “Karma” would have been too aggressive a title.

[tkrr]

There is a nonzero possibility that Reputation (Taylor's Version) will never be released.

I could easily be wrong about this, so that's why I'm not saying "mark my words" or some shit, but here's the thing: Reputation was the Kaylor album. Most of the songs are love letters to Karlie, most obviously "Dress" and "Dancing With Our Hands Tied". It was written coming off a quite painful era in her life, at a point where Karlie was a critical part of her support system. It also represented a major shift in her artistic career -- burning bridges with Big Machine, moving past embracing pop into being more overtly experimental with it, getting ready for a coming out that never happened.

Kaylor is long dead. We really have no idea if they've truly reconciled and are even friends again, much less a couple -- I've maintained for a while that it's entirely possible Taylor and Travis are for real, but even if not Kaylor is still dead. But I'm calling it now -- Reputation has probably been a very painful album for Taylor to revisit, and it is very possible that RepTV will never see daylight in finished form. A few tracks may be released -- I'm pretty sure LWYMMD has been publicly previewed in an ad or something, I can't remember for sure -- but if RepTV never drops in full, we won't ever hear new versions of "Delicate", DWOHT, IDSB, "Dress", CIWYW, "Don't Blame Me", or "Gorgeous", the most Karlie-coded songs on the album. (The same might apply to Lover, except that was entirely done under Taylor's control and was never planned for rerecording anyway, so she doesn't have to relive that part.)

I could be wrong. I could hit post on this and wake up tomorrow and Taylor announces RepTV. But I think it'll be a long wait before we see it, if we ever do.

[tkrr]

She has short hair

I sell sneakers

She’s VIP tent

I’m in the bleachers

[tkrr]

lol at the salty men on Twitter complaining about Kristen Stewart’s Rolling Stone cover… my dudes. MY DUDES. You may think it’s ugly or whatever, but I promise you there’s about a 1 in 3 chance your female significant other (assuming one settled for you) needed a maxipad after seeing that shoot.

[tkrr]

I don’t think “dumpster baby” sees enough use as an insult. Henceforth I will be using the term to anyone whose politics are clearly just weaponized abandonment issues. First person I used it on was a tankie. I wonder if I’ll wind up using it more to describe unhinged leftists or the right in general.

[tkrr]

So tired of the moralizing, simplistic bullshit that people have been passing off as leftism since the 1960s. Leftism should be about community. It should be thoughtful and empathetic, not preachy and reactionary. And it definitely shouldn’t be as abjectly fatalistic as it is; even back in the 60s, I don’t think the fatalism was this pervasive.

I saw someone a while back point out that a lot of “leftism” is just anticapitalist libertarianism. It certainly seems to me like a lot of young leftists think justice can be achieved by ripping up the social contract and robbing those they deem to be the bad guys blind.

[tkrr]

So… Travis might be real, might be pr. If it’s a real relationship, then she’s bi. She ain’t straight. Can we be okay with this if it turns out to be real?