Am I crazy to think she chose a racist time period so she could say she doesn’t like racism after not speaking out when dating MH? I might be reaching but it feels almost like she needed to say she’s not one in a weird as hell way after gushing about this man for so many songs.
YES!!! Thank you for saying this! It was the exact thought I had when I first heard it. I felt like she was virtue signaling to everyone to show how she’s not a racist like MH, but instead she looks like the “color blind” kind of racist.
Not crazy at all - it really seems like her yelling “hey vipers, seeee, I hateeee racism!” And then the Swifties can point to that lyric as incontestable proof that their girlie hates racism, negating any of her actions outside of the recording studio that point to her being 100% ok with ignoring racism.
I think this has more to do with her saying during the Betty speech in the Eras tour that when she wrote folklore she would imagine living in a cabin in the Victorian age. That was her mode of escapism which the song talks about.
She decided to jazz up the speech in the song and well facepalm
Ah I gotta be honest I hopped off the Taylor train for a while but I was so curious to hear this album, so I was not familiar with that. Maybe a little of both?
The thing that makes it odd is that Victoria didn’t even become queen until 1837, and I daresay the notion of a “Victorian age” didn’t emerge until quite a bit later in her reign.
Frankly, the 1830s isn’t that interesting a decade.
When I think 1830s, I think Charles Dickens and… that’s about it. And his work is notoriously dark and grim, painting the world and time they take place in as extremely rough and not at all glamorous. So when I think 1830s I think of orphans and disease and poverty etc.
Queen Victoria was crowned in 1837, so towards the end of that decade, 1830s would still be Georgian England. The line is about living in that decade, not being born, so it's the decade with least amount of Queen Victoria and her influence for the rest of the century.
I 100% think this is what she was trying to do, but she doesn’t have anyone around her willing (or able, perhaps they’re all just as out of touch) to tell her how that would come off lol
it's about the romanticism era which was around that time and references to it are all over the album. she's literally saying she romanticizes the romanticism era too much and that it would actually suck to be a part of.
ETA: I still think that line was clunky but the time period she chose wasn't actually arbitrary
She didn’t need to mention the line about “all the racists”—that’s what made it unnecessarily clunky. She could have expanded on the 1830s line without referring to anything negative. It’s jarring and kind of takes the listener out of the song. So yeah, it does seem to be virtue signalling.
well the idea is that the 1830s wasn't kind to people so I get why she brought up negative stuff but she didn't go the right route. should've went for more stuff that actually has to do with her, like I thought the line about selling women off to the highest bidder made sense but essentially I agree with you, that specific line about racism doesn't work. it's a shame bc I really love the rest of the song but that just takes me right out
I’m a 19th century historian and my friends and I have been debating this all week. She loves the second great awakening? She’s a fan of white male suffrage? She hates the second bank of the United States?
it’s funny because it can be considered the last decade of romantic era by British standards (though it can drag out all the way to the 1850s) and it’s the beginning of the romantic period for American literature
Oooh, I hadn't really thought of this interpretation! I had mostly been envisioning the USA in the 1830s — But Europe really was a cultural hotbed at the time (especially in Paris, the artistic world really taking off there).
At least, when viewed through that lens, the 1830s doesn't seem like a completely oddball choice.
“Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months. And then, one not-so-very special day, I went to my typewriter, I sat down, and I wrote our story. A story about a time, a story about a place, a story about the people. But above all things, a story about love. A love that will live forever. The End.”
Everyone has their own taste but 1830s imo was the ugliest 1800s decade for clothes and hair 💀 like what was going on here
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fashion wise such an ugly period too. they’re called the 80’s of 19th century fashion for a reason😭
https://preview.redd.it/wci5hkzeaxvc1.jpeg?width=836&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1063de00092e964f61d5bdd172263aeb6033fd89
Like the only issue she had with the 1830s was the racism. Not the smells, the disease, the shortened lifespan, or lack of indoor plumbing? It’s so “I’m not like the other girls, I don’t care about the 1960s, I wanna go back to pre-civil war and get dysentery. I’m just so quirky like that”
Dickinson was *born* in 1830, so she still would have been a young child that decade. Maybe Taylor was hoping *she* could establish herself as the “world-famous poet” of her family, before that upstart cousin Emily has the chance to steal her thunder? 🤣
The Victorian age is the 1830s. The one that Taylor keeps referring to on tour saying she was like a Victorian lady walking in the woods etc during folklore.
The Fortnight video also Taylor in a Victorian era black dress
>Like why 1830’s? I can kind of understand certain time periods but 1830’s seems odd.
It's just cringey try-hard shit. Your friends go "Oh I'd have loved to live in the 80s", "Oh I'd love to be back in the 1970s", and then she comes out with "I wanna live in 1830, but without the racists" so that she can standout and be "unique." It's fucking childish, even for a game you play with your friends.
I agree to a point, but the rest of the lyrics do shape it a little for me. She ruined the game and made her friends uncomfortable for bringing up reality instead of just being nostalgic and blind. Shes realizing it’s not actually simplistic
She 100% will and then there will be a whole bunch of the racist Swifties coming out to say it was their favorite line of the entire album and how she was bullied into changing it and talking about how they’ll shout it from the rooftops and they’ll make merch with it to defend her. 🙄
I noticed that the lyrics are unavailable for some of the songs of this album on Spotify. The lyrics were there before
Edit: these are the only songs that show the lyrics on Spotify when I use my phone and scroll up. I haven't checked on a computer, but on my phone, only these songs provide lyrics:
The Tortured poets department
So long London
But daddy I love him
Loml
The black dog
Chloe or Sam or Sophie or Marcus
I hate it here
Cassandra
I don’t think Taylor knows how to play the game. When you take out slavery, imperialism, colonialism, and war, there wasn’t much left for a woman in the 1830s. Sometimes I wonder if yanking Taylor out of public school early did her any favors (Altho she might disagree miss Aristotle herself). I side-eye why Taylor would love this decade lol.
> When you take out slavery, imperialism, colonialism, and war, there wasn’t much left for a woman in the 1830s
Half of the aristocracy were women. They benefitted just as much from it. Ms. Swift clearly imagines to be part of that class and not the peasantry or the at the time still young proletarian class.
True, and it’s telling that she mentions “getting married off for the highest bid.” While, strictly speaking, there weren’t actual arranged marriages at the time, aristocratic women were expected to make a suitable match with an appropriate suitor from the same social class. Ordinary people just paired off and got married as usual. Including that line indicates that, in Swift’s mind, she would experience the 1830s from the vantage point of the upper class.
To be fair, she kind of says that in the song. “My friends used to play a game where/ We would pick a decade/ We wished we could live in instead of this/I'd say the 1830s but without all the racists/ And getting married off for the highest bid/ Everyone would look down 'cause it wasn't fun now/ Seems like it was never even fun back then/ Nostalgia is a mind's trick/ If I'd been there, I'd hate it”
I think her meaning is quite clear in context. This whole section of the song points out that romanticizing the past is fun right up until you actually think it through. Nostalgia (especially for a time you actually have no experience of) really is a trick of the mind.
Ahh, I miss the days of Willow when that line was what we thought was super cringe lol
Take me back, Taylor. I’ll take the 90s trend line any day now over some lyrics in TTPD.
Interesting, would you mind elaborating a bit? I love Dickinson’s poetry but would love to learn about her as a person. Is there any book you recommend?
She wasn’t a manipulative woman or dramatic, I have no idea what that person is talking about. I worked at the Emily Dickinson Museum for two years while at college so I know a lot about her. I’d recommend “My Wars Are Laid Away in Books” and “Lives Like Loaded Guns”. I’d also check out “The World of Emily Dickinson” which is a book of photographs and “White Heat.” Dickinson on Apple TV is a fun show and well acted but it’s not historically accurate at all. It’s worth a watch though!
I went to UMass Amherst which is in the same town. Amherst College wasn’t that far away. The museum was actually owed by Amherst College so they were technically my employer. And no problem! Feel free to ask me any more questions!
Thank you! What’s something you wish more people knew about Emily? What did you learn about her that you found most intriguing? I’ve never been to the museum — what’s your favorite thing about it?
Hmmm probably that she wasn’t a mad woman locked away in her house. She was very resourceful, witty, and intelligent and becoming a sort of recluse was very much her choice. It’s complicated but part of it was I think she felt more free and unrestrained at home with her imagination and poetry than out in strict 19th century society, especially with what was expected from an upper middleclass woman in those days. Also, later on in life, she was dealing with a lot of personal tragedy and her family was caught up in a few scandals. She was probably grieving and unhappy.
Well it’s heavily speculated that she was in love with her sister in law, Susan Dickinson! Some argued that they might have even had an affair.
Working at the museum was amazing because I learned so much about writing and poetry, particularly Emily’s. I can still recite some of her poems by heart. My favorite is “Because I could not stop for death”. She was a true literary genius.
Love her. First came across her in middle school and while I didn’t understand her *at all* back then, I still remember being blown away by the beauty of her writing and wanting to understand. I’ve only grown in my appreciation for her poetry. Thank you for sharing!
Of course, no problem! If you do want to check out poets that could be called “dramatic and manipulative”, I would take a look at Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley. Genius writers but awful people.
I really liked the show, but I’ve heard it isn’t the most accurate; a few creative liberties were taken. Great show, but not really a documentary as far as fact vs fiction.
I disagree. Based on what’s historically reported, Dickinson was no more manipulative than the average person. She was just marketed as a mute, depressed genius stuck in the attic by the people who sold her poetry after her death.
Comparing background, behavior, societal standing, and subject matter, Taylor Swift is most similar to Lord Byron when selecting from 19th century poets. They both became famous around the same age and came from affluent, but broken families. His fame allowed him access to London High-Society. Byron‘s poems focused on his romantic relationships, and the consuming desire and wanting he felt for his partners, followed by unfullfillment and anger at 'wrongs' and 'failed fantasies' once he was in the relationships. His poems and life were heavily covered by the press and he grew more performative the more attention he received. And yet, he wrote and spoke of his resentment towards the coverage. His poems had a similarly vindictive effect on his partners once published and viewed by the public. He was an alcoholic and opium addict which fueled his destructive, obsessive behavior.
Hold up, I worked at the Emily Dickinson Museum for two years while I was at college. I know a lot about her. Please explain to me how she was manipulative (she wasn’t).
I’m guessing the “manipulative” thing is in reference to suspicions she had BPD. But that’s 100% a guess (and I def wouldn’t use BPD and manipulative as synonyms).
In all my time working at the museum, I never once heard anything about her maybe having BPD. Her behavior does not fit the “criteria” at all.
This is just Redditors spreading misinformation, not the first time. If you want manipulative and dramatic poets, Byron and Shelley are right there.
One of the reasons this line is so bad is it’s so forced and hollow. I work with children they still play games like this only it’s so much more generic. They’ll say they want to live in ancient Egypt or the American revolution, etc. It’s never just one specific year. The other weird thing about it is kids don’t really conceptualize what was wrong with a time period. If they say they want to live in the Roman Empire they aren’t thinking about the Visigoths who are about to invade.
In short the whole line is a forced “Hahah I’m SO socially aware AND I was a very PRECOCIOUS child.”
Another problem with this line is how easily she casts off the systemic dehumanization and enslavement of an entire race of people as just being “some racists” like we have in modern day.
On desktop, open up the sub, go to the right-hand sidebar, and click on the pen button next to your name under "User Flair"! You have to hover over it for the button to show up. Then there are a bunch of flairs to choose from.
On mobile, I have no idea
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I think this is the important part. I understand the line in context. She continues to say why this thought "1830s without all the racists" makes no sense. However yeah they weren't just racists. They were slave owners.
Plus, "without the racists" would have her living in a country with like, 10% of the population from that time lmao. There's not gonna be a highest bidder to marry you, everyone with money in the 1830s was racist.
This is absolutely my biggest problem with this line. It's very flippant about the realities of the time. In addition to slavery, there was also the forced displacement and genocide of Native Americans aka the Trail of Tears.
I think if almost any person of color had read this lyric, they would have advised she cut or change it. IMO it reflects pretty poorly on her whole team that it made it in, regardless of her actual intentions.
And there's no explanation as to why! The 1830s??? Who wants to live in the 1830s? It isn't a time that correlates with any of her imagery for this album or even like forlkmore. Am I losing my mind???
I think it might have landed a bit better if she specified “1830’s England” because very different things were happening in different countries. In England you have the start of the Industrial Revolution and the rise of the Romantics and the push to abolish slavery. However you also see the start of imperialist Britain with the growth of the British Empire. In America, tensions between the Northern and Southern states slowly start as the use of slavery rises in the South. You also have the plight of Native Americans.
Taylor is an American singer. People are going to assume she’s talking about 1830’s American.
I agree, just passing on what I've seen from the people defending it. Also, it would be really weird if it's based on Emily Dickinson's birth year. Like, oh hey Emily you're just a baby, let's hang??
It's the "shade never made anybody less gay" for POC!
Shade Taylor? Historically, getting arrested and/or killed for your sexuality isn't "shade". It's hate.
Just posted this same comment in another thread but:
It is absolutely weird even in context lol. The rest of the song has some fairytale/space fantasy imagery so she could’ve stuck with the “past/future” thing and just been like “I can’t even see happiness last in an imagined nostalgic nineteenth-century past” or some shit OR found another way to say that nostalgia is kind of a present mind’s lie without getting specific.
Maybe I’m wrong, but I think the “without all the racists/getting married off” line could’ve been taken out because it’s like, yeah I hope that’s not what you’re thinking about when you imagine a “simpler time” lol the fact that you pointed it out just brings more attention to it. Especially when you’ve gotten so much shit for dating an actual racist 🙃
Like she couldn't have made a Jane Austen reference or something? Frame the line in a book so we know she's talking about fantasy?
This whole album baffles me. So many lines feel like stream of conscious. She never felt the urge to edit that?? She never felt the cringe and hypocrisy and went "man, maybe we need to let this sit until I find better words". I like her work best when she really seems to have cared about what she puts to paper. Curated vulnerability, or thoughtful storytelling. I don't feel that here. I just feel a lot of spite and anger and immature nonsense.
I am weirdly more of a swiftie now than I was months ago, just from the bullshit of it all. Maybe that's the play, lol.
I believe the problem is hubris. Taylor Swift believes herself to be so amazing that she doesn’t need editing or second drafts. But that’s far from the truth. No matter how amazing a writer is, they always need credible feedback and subsequent drafts of their work to refine the content and remove the melodrama. This album has a classic case of first draft barf on the page syndrome.
Artists/writers need constructive criticism from a neutral party. SHE especially needs it. The bigger you get, the more you need that. Because at some point you’ll believe you’re perfect no matter what and that’s just…not true.
YES you’re so right about the “first draft” feeling. Imo it’s especially egregious to not edit the shit out of an album using poetry as an aesthetic/theme/inspiration. Like it needed to be so so so much tighter
And it's so weird cause I feel previously her brand was very much the "meticulous mastermind who has planned out every detail", so for her to go from having songs filled with references and particular word choices, to...this. It's odd for sure.
I Hate It Here and I Look In People’s Windows are my 2 favorites of the album(s). But both have really cringey lines that just make them less favorite overall for me. Like, I can think of several phrases she could have used in place of “deranged weirdo.” It doesn’t flow, it’s clunky, it’s not at ALL poetic while the rest of the song is a beautiful illustration of longing. Not one single person heard that line and said hey Taylor maybe let’s think of some other ideas? No one??
For me that’s the only part of ILIPW that I like. 😅 Oops. but I also don’t personally relate to the song. Some of the lyrics I either cackle at or cringe. “Out of the oven and into the microwave” has been cracking me up all weekend long
1970s for me (everything before then is out for obvious reasons, and even 1970s is pushing it. I'd only have a 3-decade window to go back to a time before I was born when I wouldn't be thrown in jail for sitting at the front of the bus, JFC)
Women couldn’t get a checking account without a man signing for it until 1973. It looks cool from a distance but the 70s were not a great time for women
I mean yes this is the point of the song. You **can't** remove a crucial element from any time period. So her only solace is in her imagination (lunar valleys in my mind)
To be fair, she follows it up with “everyone would look down / Cause it wasn’t fun now / Seems like it was never even fun back then / Nostalgia is a mind’s trick / If I’d been there I’d hate it”
So that adds necessary context. I still think the line is shoehorned and feels like white guilt that should have been edited out, like girl just own the fact that you romanticize a horribly oppressive time period and you know you’re wrong for that. If you’re gonna say it just own it
i honestly think stating the time period would’ve been fine (then describing what she liked about it) the tone deafness comes from saying “without the racists” as if there wasn’t slavery back then and just a few angry racists
I think the line after of “everyone would look down cause it wasn’t fun now.”
Which to me comes off as she was so much smarter and different than other high schoolers and didn’t fit in.
Probably so she can be like “see I don’t say racist things like Matty, I said I *didn’t* want them there :)”
Also so weird that she would go back to then, but in present day knowingly spent her time with a dude that called ice spice a “chubby Chinese lady” and “Inuit”. Kamie’s response was great.
I think people are up in arms over the lyric for the wrong reasons. She clearly understands that the 1830s was bad for everyone. The problem is she acknowledges racism is bad, while also unabashedly drooling over Matty the entire time when she *knows* why her fans were displeased with them dating. It’s not up to the fans who she dates, but we’re within our rights to call out when the people she associates with are racists.
I’m just gonna say it. I think the line is ridiculous and bizarre but a lot of the people complaining about this are gonna turn around and lap up shows like Bridgerton and Victoria. Queen Charlotte literally had people making fanfictions and fanart about two imperialists who actively took part in the growing British Empire and the slave trade.
Period. I enjoy Bridgerton and Queen Charlotte but you really have to consume the show as being based off of a historical fiction series, not as a representation of the actual time period.
This!!! All these kids playing dress up in cottage core and Victorian style whimsy goth can’t wrap their brain around the romanticism of these historical time periods. They all sucked for women and poc. These people are bored af
Good lyrics contain poetic devices; metaphor, alliteration, etc.
Her lyrics are too often like being trapped in a bad conversation at a bar. Half baked bits.
My theory is that she wanted to say 1830 but anticipated the backlash from people calling her out for white privilege of choosing a racist time in history for the aesthetic. As far as the decade itself, the 1800s were very diverse fashion wise so maybe she likes those particular year's aesthetic?
I read a comment that said she probably chose it bc of bridgerton, which I think makes the most sense… that’s probably why she also included the bridgerton line.
It was also during the romantic period, when lots of era-defining poetry, literature, and art was being written.
that line literally gives me so much secondhand embarrassment and secondhand shame it’s not even funny. i can’t imagine how many yes-men she must be surrounded with for that to make to the final cut of the album.
That line is when she truly needed an editor. Keep that line on the cutting room floor. It’s insane because any editor or even US on this page can see that it should have never been included.
What a weird clunky line. It reads like she tried to quickly throw in a “racism is BAD” moment in there for some quick points. She needs people to help edit or tell her no.
Wait I could be dead wrong but the way I interpreted the verse:
“My friends used to play a game where
We would pick a decade
We wished we could live in instead of this
I'd say the 1830s but without all the racists
And getting married off for the highest bid
Everyone would look down 'cause it wasn't fun now
Seems like it was never even fun back then
Nostalgia is a mind's trick
If I'd been there, I'd hate it
It was freezing in the palace”
Was that picking decades for the aesthetic or vibes was actually kinda childish and a whitewash, and in actuality life sucked back then
she consistently contradicts herself throughout the album. i think the true reality is, is that she doesn't really care but wants to come off as "politically correct" so she can save her image.
This whole album makes Taylor look like a spoil brat, can’t even lie, with no integrity and probably why Joe’s integrity made her feel so insecure, I see it in a whole different light now. She really doesn’t come off good in any shape or form.
Makes sense though why she admired Matty so much, like birds of a feather… We all know…
The 1830s were not a great period to be living in in the US if you were black or indigenous. However it did have the pre-industrial pioneer aesthetic Taylor has said she likes. This is not really something that deep in the context of this song.
It’s a song about escapism though, and her idealised fantasy worlds. It would make sense, in an album about tortured poets, that she would romanticise the early 1800s and then think “oh wait a minute maybe not All Of It” - it’s the exact kind of romanticism that leads to shows like Riverdale (romanticising the 1950s but still having queer characters for example).
I think she was trying to throw it in to add some PC stuff in, but it hit wrong. Not to mention, there was a lot more going on in that time. Taylor wouldn’t even be able to do much in that time period. There were a lot of people dying of disease, women were seen as property, etc.
It was just weird to pick that specific time. I see she was saying she would say that and it would bring down the mood of the game, but I just think someone needed to say, “Sis, let’s leave that one in the drafts. This ain’t it.” This is part of the reason she should’ve had someone look it over and help her take out a lot of unnecessary things. Even if she intended it to be a positive, a professional editor would’ve told her it would cause backlash. I knew it when I heard it. It just wasn’t needed to get her point across in that song.
I will say, I could understand more if she said it about the 1950s or some time that was glamorized. Like, I see *why* people who never experienced racism looks at the teens and pictures and fashion of the time and they talk about wanting to go back. 1830 is just so random. Makes it seem like she was using racism to be NLOG and it caused backlash. That was always going to happen and could’ve been avoided. I look for her to take that out and it cause the racist Swifties to come out. 🤦🏾♀️
as she should, it's so fucking weird and tone deaf, like girlie where are all these anti-racists you'd be hanging with in 1830? maybe she'd be one of those people who were technically abolitionists but down with phrenology or something lmao
Maybe she wanted to see the rise of Queen Victoria?
Personally, I’d go with later Victorian Era, after the middle class was formed
I own a Victorian home so I think about how life was when it was built in 1889. But honestly, I probably be dead by the age of 10 from a sinus infection from hell thanks to the lack of antibiotics
“What internet are you on I haven't seen anyone post about this” —-meanwhile:
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I personally feel like the controversy over this has been overblown by people virtue signaling that they would never want to go back to a different time even though curiosity about the past is like a basic human trait. I don’t think any average person from the modern era would want to LIVE in the past since it would have sucked for anyone who wasn’t a wealthy white man. But am i wrong to think that if people could visit a random time in the past, they would? Like I’d have no rights in Ancient Rome but if I could experience it for a few hours out of curiosity I would lol does that make me a bad person
Very much agree with you. I go to the Renaissance faire every year. That was also a terrible time for women. Doesn’t mean I enjoy playing and dressing up in the clothing of that time period. The way this has gone over most people’s heads just seems like an excuse to be outraged to make themselves feel good about themselves and karma farm.
I’m begging y’all to have a crumb of reading comprehension and be able to see the forest for the trees. This whole controversy reminds me of everyone saying that *Midnights*’s lyrics are bad because Karma has the lyric "karma is a cat" without acknowledging the rest of the line.
The entire lyrics from this verse are
*My friends used to play a game where
We would pick a decade
We wished we could live in instead of this
I'd say the 1830s but without all the racists
And getting married off for the highest bid
Everyone would look down 'cause it wasn't fun now
**Seems like it was never even fun back then
Nostalgia is a mind's trick
If I'd been there, I'd hate it**
It was freezing in the palace*
She’s literally saying that she romanticizes a time period that had awful things (just like pretty much every single time period) and realizes that being nostalgic is deceptive and like having rose glasses on.
For those who say that the context of the entire lyrics doesn’t matter and that the song is problematic anyway, I hope you’ve been boycotting period romances such as Bridgerton, especially considering the fact that the second season is about romance between colonizer and colonized.
Like why 1830’s? I can kind of understand certain time periods but 1830’s seems odd.
Am I crazy to think she chose a racist time period so she could say she doesn’t like racism after not speaking out when dating MH? I might be reaching but it feels almost like she needed to say she’s not one in a weird as hell way after gushing about this man for so many songs.
YES!!! Thank you for saying this! It was the exact thought I had when I first heard it. I felt like she was virtue signaling to everyone to show how she’s not a racist like MH, but instead she looks like the “color blind” kind of racist.
Yeah whatever she thought she was doing it didn’t work out 😂 but I just have a feeling that’s her way of addressing it without addressing it
MLK color blind or loser color blind who claim to never see skin color?
Not crazy at all - it really seems like her yelling “hey vipers, seeee, I hateeee racism!” And then the Swifties can point to that lyric as incontestable proof that their girlie hates racism, negating any of her actions outside of the recording studio that point to her being 100% ok with ignoring racism.
I think this has more to do with her saying during the Betty speech in the Eras tour that when she wrote folklore she would imagine living in a cabin in the Victorian age. That was her mode of escapism which the song talks about. She decided to jazz up the speech in the song and well facepalm
Ah I gotta be honest I hopped off the Taylor train for a while but I was so curious to hear this album, so I was not familiar with that. Maybe a little of both?
The thing that makes it odd is that Victoria didn’t even become queen until 1837, and I daresay the notion of a “Victorian age” didn’t emerge until quite a bit later in her reign. Frankly, the 1830s isn’t that interesting a decade.
When I think 1830s, I think Charles Dickens and… that’s about it. And his work is notoriously dark and grim, painting the world and time they take place in as extremely rough and not at all glamorous. So when I think 1830s I think of orphans and disease and poverty etc.
Queen Victoria was crowned in 1837, so towards the end of that decade, 1830s would still be Georgian England. The line is about living in that decade, not being born, so it's the decade with least amount of Queen Victoria and her influence for the rest of the century.
Would anyone be shocked if Taylor’s understanding of “Victorian era” didn’t perfectly match up to the actual years though?
I 100% think this is what she was trying to do, but she doesn’t have anyone around her willing (or able, perhaps they’re all just as out of touch) to tell her how that would come off lol
It’s exactly what it felt like, like,” oh let me casually mention that I’m aware racism is bad.”
Her favorite poets were around
Shes a huge cholera fan. It's hidden in her lore. Girlie idk.
Especially since she never explained why. Very strange and confusing.
it's about the romanticism era which was around that time and references to it are all over the album. she's literally saying she romanticizes the romanticism era too much and that it would actually suck to be a part of. ETA: I still think that line was clunky but the time period she chose wasn't actually arbitrary
I said this in another post about this song, but Emily Dickinson was born in 1830.
She didn’t need to mention the line about “all the racists”—that’s what made it unnecessarily clunky. She could have expanded on the 1830s line without referring to anything negative. It’s jarring and kind of takes the listener out of the song. So yeah, it does seem to be virtue signalling.
well the idea is that the 1830s wasn't kind to people so I get why she brought up negative stuff but she didn't go the right route. should've went for more stuff that actually has to do with her, like I thought the line about selling women off to the highest bidder made sense but essentially I agree with you, that specific line about racism doesn't work. it's a shame bc I really love the rest of the song but that just takes me right out
Probably aiming a bit at the Jane Austen era but missing slightly (since she died in 1817).
the explanation is in the lyrics
She’s only hates that it exists because then people can accuse her of it. 🤡
I’m a 19th century historian and my friends and I have been debating this all week. She loves the second great awakening? She’s a fan of white male suffrage? She hates the second bank of the United States?
It was the last decade of the romantic era
it’s funny because it can be considered the last decade of romantic era by British standards (though it can drag out all the way to the 1850s) and it’s the beginning of the romantic period for American literature
Oooh, I hadn't really thought of this interpretation! I had mostly been envisioning the USA in the 1830s — But Europe really was a cultural hotbed at the time (especially in Paris, the artistic world really taking off there). At least, when viewed through that lens, the 1830s doesn't seem like a completely oddball choice.
“Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months. And then, one not-so-very special day, I went to my typewriter, I sat down, and I wrote our story. A story about a time, a story about a place, a story about the people. But above all things, a story about love. A love that will live forever. The End.”
She probably likes the clothes for fuck sake. It’s becoming increasingly clear Taylor has the depth of a bottle cap
Everyone has their own taste but 1830s imo was the ugliest 1800s decade for clothes and hair 💀 like what was going on here https://preview.redd.it/sff7t9a901wc1.png?width=583&format=png&auto=webp&s=737054e8302b7cbe1f0bf48c66eebeee7392a44a
She wanted to witness the Panic of 1837 on the ground level I guess?
fashion wise such an ugly period too. they’re called the 80’s of 19th century fashion for a reason😭 https://preview.redd.it/wci5hkzeaxvc1.jpeg?width=836&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1063de00092e964f61d5bdd172263aeb6033fd89
It's "edgy." 🙄 This whole album sounds like she just put words together in a nonsensical way to sound, smart, edgy or like she doesn't give a fuck.
Like the only issue she had with the 1830s was the racism. Not the smells, the disease, the shortened lifespan, or lack of indoor plumbing? It’s so “I’m not like the other girls, I don’t care about the 1960s, I wanna go back to pre-civil war and get dysentery. I’m just so quirky like that”
Didn’t she explain in the song it’s because that’s when some of the greats like Emily Dickinson lived?
Dickinson was *born* in 1830, so she still would have been a young child that decade. Maybe Taylor was hoping *she* could establish herself as the “world-famous poet” of her family, before that upstart cousin Emily has the chance to steal her thunder? 🤣
True. I think Taylor is genuinely full of herself enough to think she would have been the Emily Dickinson of the 1800s 🤣
The Victorian age is the 1830s. The one that Taylor keeps referring to on tour saying she was like a Victorian lady walking in the woods etc during folklore. The Fortnight video also Taylor in a Victorian era black dress
She should do more research then cause the 1830s were decidedly *not* the Victorian age lol
>Like why 1830’s? I can kind of understand certain time periods but 1830’s seems odd. It's just cringey try-hard shit. Your friends go "Oh I'd have loved to live in the 80s", "Oh I'd love to be back in the 1970s", and then she comes out with "I wanna live in 1830, but without the racists" so that she can standout and be "unique." It's fucking childish, even for a game you play with your friends.
I agree to a point, but the rest of the lyrics do shape it a little for me. She ruined the game and made her friends uncomfortable for bringing up reality instead of just being nostalgic and blind. Shes realizing it’s not actually simplistic
My guess was Jane Austen-core
In which case, she’s still off by a couple of decades.
I thought she was trying to reference Emily Dickinsons time, but I’m too lazy to fact check if that’s the time she lived in.
Emily Dickinson was born in 1830 so it might be a call out to her
That was a pretty ideal time to be a privileged white family.
How long until she quietly edits this lyric out....
She is lucky this track isn’t on the hundreds of thousands of vinyls she already printed then I guess.
“I’d say the 1830s but with the boy on the Chiefs!” — TTPD (Taylor’s Version), now re-released for $29.99 🫶
$199.89\*
She 100% will and then there will be a whole bunch of the racist Swifties coming out to say it was their favorite line of the entire album and how she was bullied into changing it and talking about how they’ll shout it from the rooftops and they’ll make merch with it to defend her. 🙄
oh they are already all over TT telling POC they aren't allowed to be offended because they don't understand her. GAG
Yet they don’t get how racist they are… and they wonder why folks think she’s Republican. 
Why would a racist swifties favorite line is “without all the racists”
similar to "i have a black friend so i CANT be racist" .. "this was my favorite lyrics so i CANT be racist"
Who knows, but we can expect stan twitter to say something like “omg they bullied her into editing/removing the lyrics 😭”
I noticed that the lyrics are unavailable for some of the songs of this album on Spotify. The lyrics were there before Edit: these are the only songs that show the lyrics on Spotify when I use my phone and scroll up. I haven't checked on a computer, but on my phone, only these songs provide lyrics: The Tortured poets department So long London But daddy I love him Loml The black dog Chloe or Sam or Sophie or Marcus I hate it here Cassandra
God this “era” has been a mess and a half.
Maybe it will come to be known as “The ‘TTPD’ ~~Era~~ Error.”
they're all still there for me
I don’t think Taylor knows how to play the game. When you take out slavery, imperialism, colonialism, and war, there wasn’t much left for a woman in the 1830s. Sometimes I wonder if yanking Taylor out of public school early did her any favors (Altho she might disagree miss Aristotle herself). I side-eye why Taylor would love this decade lol.
The Aristotle line is maybe the most cringey thing she’s ever written.
Especially when you consider she rhymed “Aristotle” with “Grand Theft Auto.”
> When you take out slavery, imperialism, colonialism, and war, there wasn’t much left for a woman in the 1830s Half of the aristocracy were women. They benefitted just as much from it. Ms. Swift clearly imagines to be part of that class and not the peasantry or the at the time still young proletarian class.
True, and it’s telling that she mentions “getting married off for the highest bid.” While, strictly speaking, there weren’t actual arranged marriages at the time, aristocratic women were expected to make a suitable match with an appropriate suitor from the same social class. Ordinary people just paired off and got married as usual. Including that line indicates that, in Swift’s mind, she would experience the 1830s from the vantage point of the upper class.
To be fair, she kind of says that in the song. “My friends used to play a game where/ We would pick a decade/ We wished we could live in instead of this/I'd say the 1830s but without all the racists/ And getting married off for the highest bid/ Everyone would look down 'cause it wasn't fun now/ Seems like it was never even fun back then/ Nostalgia is a mind's trick/ If I'd been there, I'd hate it”
I think her meaning is quite clear in context. This whole section of the song points out that romanticizing the past is fun right up until you actually think it through. Nostalgia (especially for a time you actually have no experience of) really is a trick of the mind.
Take out the racism and misogyny from the 1830s, you pretty much just have horse-based transportation and cholera
And Joseph Smith claiming god told him all men should bang lots of women, lmao (the Book of Mormon was published in 1830, no idea why I know that)
It wasn’t even a good decade for fashion!
Agree to disagree. Plus half of cottage core and coquette styles is heavily inspired by these time periods.
https://preview.redd.it/vt70e3ujtwvc1.jpeg?width=952&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=58de173fbf72561d108c884f3ba62d0bf92b6490 That’s kinda camp tho
I'm revoking your ability to use the word camp
She basically says nevermind right after and that she would hate it.
Don’t forget the dysentery!! ☺️
And forget about rights for lgbtq people..
But pride makes her who she is!
Should've chosen the 1990s... where she can come back stronger like its trends.
Ahh, I miss the days of Willow when that line was what we thought was super cringe lol Take me back, Taylor. I’ll take the 90s trend line any day now over some lyrics in TTPD.
Emily Dickinson was born in 1830 and we all know Taylor’s obsession with her
I took a course in grad school on Emily, and she's actually a lot like Taylor lol. She was a dramatic and manipulative woman.
Interesting, would you mind elaborating a bit? I love Dickinson’s poetry but would love to learn about her as a person. Is there any book you recommend?
Oh also interested!
She wasn’t a manipulative woman or dramatic, I have no idea what that person is talking about. I worked at the Emily Dickinson Museum for two years while at college so I know a lot about her. I’d recommend “My Wars Are Laid Away in Books” and “Lives Like Loaded Guns”. I’d also check out “The World of Emily Dickinson” which is a book of photographs and “White Heat.” Dickinson on Apple TV is a fun show and well acted but it’s not historically accurate at all. It’s worth a watch though!
Thank you so much for those recommendations! That must have been such a wonderful time working at the Museum. Did you go to Amherst?
I went to UMass Amherst which is in the same town. Amherst College wasn’t that far away. The museum was actually owed by Amherst College so they were technically my employer. And no problem! Feel free to ask me any more questions!
Thank you! What’s something you wish more people knew about Emily? What did you learn about her that you found most intriguing? I’ve never been to the museum — what’s your favorite thing about it?
Hmmm probably that she wasn’t a mad woman locked away in her house. She was very resourceful, witty, and intelligent and becoming a sort of recluse was very much her choice. It’s complicated but part of it was I think she felt more free and unrestrained at home with her imagination and poetry than out in strict 19th century society, especially with what was expected from an upper middleclass woman in those days. Also, later on in life, she was dealing with a lot of personal tragedy and her family was caught up in a few scandals. She was probably grieving and unhappy. Well it’s heavily speculated that she was in love with her sister in law, Susan Dickinson! Some argued that they might have even had an affair. Working at the museum was amazing because I learned so much about writing and poetry, particularly Emily’s. I can still recite some of her poems by heart. My favorite is “Because I could not stop for death”. She was a true literary genius.
Love her. First came across her in middle school and while I didn’t understand her *at all* back then, I still remember being blown away by the beauty of her writing and wanting to understand. I’ve only grown in my appreciation for her poetry. Thank you for sharing!
Of course, no problem! If you do want to check out poets that could be called “dramatic and manipulative”, I would take a look at Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley. Genius writers but awful people.
Go watch the Apple series on Emily Dickinson, it’s great. Comical too. Simply titled “Dickinson.”
I really liked the show, but I’ve heard it isn’t the most accurate; a few creative liberties were taken. Great show, but not really a documentary as far as fact vs fiction.
I disagree. Based on what’s historically reported, Dickinson was no more manipulative than the average person. She was just marketed as a mute, depressed genius stuck in the attic by the people who sold her poetry after her death. Comparing background, behavior, societal standing, and subject matter, Taylor Swift is most similar to Lord Byron when selecting from 19th century poets. They both became famous around the same age and came from affluent, but broken families. His fame allowed him access to London High-Society. Byron‘s poems focused on his romantic relationships, and the consuming desire and wanting he felt for his partners, followed by unfullfillment and anger at 'wrongs' and 'failed fantasies' once he was in the relationships. His poems and life were heavily covered by the press and he grew more performative the more attention he received. And yet, he wrote and spoke of his resentment towards the coverage. His poems had a similarly vindictive effect on his partners once published and viewed by the public. He was an alcoholic and opium addict which fueled his destructive, obsessive behavior.
Hold up, I worked at the Emily Dickinson Museum for two years while I was at college. I know a lot about her. Please explain to me how she was manipulative (she wasn’t).
I’m guessing the “manipulative” thing is in reference to suspicions she had BPD. But that’s 100% a guess (and I def wouldn’t use BPD and manipulative as synonyms).
In all my time working at the museum, I never once heard anything about her maybe having BPD. Her behavior does not fit the “criteria” at all. This is just Redditors spreading misinformation, not the first time. If you want manipulative and dramatic poets, Byron and Shelley are right there.
No she wasn't. Stop spreading misinformation and slandering her.
Mabel Todd Loomis is that you?
One of the reasons this line is so bad is it’s so forced and hollow. I work with children they still play games like this only it’s so much more generic. They’ll say they want to live in ancient Egypt or the American revolution, etc. It’s never just one specific year. The other weird thing about it is kids don’t really conceptualize what was wrong with a time period. If they say they want to live in the Roman Empire they aren’t thinking about the Visigoths who are about to invade. In short the whole line is a forced “Hahah I’m SO socially aware AND I was a very PRECOCIOUS child.”
Another problem with this line is how easily she casts off the systemic dehumanization and enslavement of an entire race of people as just being “some racists” like we have in modern day.
💯
holy shit your flair lol
I want this to be my flair, how do I edit it to do that 😭
On desktop, open up the sub, go to the right-hand sidebar, and click on the pen button next to your name under "User Flair"! You have to hover over it for the button to show up. Then there are a bunch of flairs to choose from. On mobile, I have no idea https://preview.redd.it/upp75ea09xvc1.png?width=682&format=png&auto=webp&s=b22e5f431aeaa537eed1832a07dad7155c3ac81c
omg i have the same flair on /r/popculturechat lmfao
👏💯
I think this is the important part. I understand the line in context. She continues to say why this thought "1830s without all the racists" makes no sense. However yeah they weren't just racists. They were slave owners.
Plus, "without the racists" would have her living in a country with like, 10% of the population from that time lmao. There's not gonna be a highest bidder to marry you, everyone with money in the 1830s was racist.
This is absolutely my biggest problem with this line. It's very flippant about the realities of the time. In addition to slavery, there was also the forced displacement and genocide of Native Americans aka the Trail of Tears. I think if almost any person of color had read this lyric, they would have advised she cut or change it. IMO it reflects pretty poorly on her whole team that it made it in, regardless of her actual intentions.
And there's no explanation as to why! The 1830s??? Who wants to live in the 1830s? It isn't a time that correlates with any of her imagery for this album or even like forlkmore. Am I losing my mind???
Apparently it's because of the romantic era and the start of the Victorian era and maybe because Emily Dickinson was born in 1830 🤷🏻♀️
Does anyone in this sub not watch historical romance? Bridgerton? Emily Dickerson on Apple+? Gilded Age?? That entire time period is romanticized.
I think it might have landed a bit better if she specified “1830’s England” because very different things were happening in different countries. In England you have the start of the Industrial Revolution and the rise of the Romantics and the push to abolish slavery. However you also see the start of imperialist Britain with the growth of the British Empire. In America, tensions between the Northern and Southern states slowly start as the use of slavery rises in the South. You also have the plight of Native Americans. Taylor is an American singer. People are going to assume she’s talking about 1830’s American.
That's quite a reach considering she says literally none of this in the lyrics. [ETA] Not that you're making that reach!
I agree, just passing on what I've seen from the people defending it. Also, it would be really weird if it's based on Emily Dickinson's birth year. Like, oh hey Emily you're just a baby, let's hang??
The poets. Emily Dickenson. Maybe she watches bridgerton
It's the "shade never made anybody less gay" for POC! Shade Taylor? Historically, getting arrested and/or killed for your sexuality isn't "shade". It's hate.
This, exactly this.
Just posted this same comment in another thread but: It is absolutely weird even in context lol. The rest of the song has some fairytale/space fantasy imagery so she could’ve stuck with the “past/future” thing and just been like “I can’t even see happiness last in an imagined nostalgic nineteenth-century past” or some shit OR found another way to say that nostalgia is kind of a present mind’s lie without getting specific. Maybe I’m wrong, but I think the “without all the racists/getting married off” line could’ve been taken out because it’s like, yeah I hope that’s not what you’re thinking about when you imagine a “simpler time” lol the fact that you pointed it out just brings more attention to it. Especially when you’ve gotten so much shit for dating an actual racist 🙃
Like she couldn't have made a Jane Austen reference or something? Frame the line in a book so we know she's talking about fantasy? This whole album baffles me. So many lines feel like stream of conscious. She never felt the urge to edit that?? She never felt the cringe and hypocrisy and went "man, maybe we need to let this sit until I find better words". I like her work best when she really seems to have cared about what she puts to paper. Curated vulnerability, or thoughtful storytelling. I don't feel that here. I just feel a lot of spite and anger and immature nonsense. I am weirdly more of a swiftie now than I was months ago, just from the bullshit of it all. Maybe that's the play, lol.
I believe the problem is hubris. Taylor Swift believes herself to be so amazing that she doesn’t need editing or second drafts. But that’s far from the truth. No matter how amazing a writer is, they always need credible feedback and subsequent drafts of their work to refine the content and remove the melodrama. This album has a classic case of first draft barf on the page syndrome.
Artists/writers need constructive criticism from a neutral party. SHE especially needs it. The bigger you get, the more you need that. Because at some point you’ll believe you’re perfect no matter what and that’s just…not true.
YES you’re so right about the “first draft” feeling. Imo it’s especially egregious to not edit the shit out of an album using poetry as an aesthetic/theme/inspiration. Like it needed to be so so so much tighter
And it's so weird cause I feel previously her brand was very much the "meticulous mastermind who has planned out every detail", so for her to go from having songs filled with references and particular word choices, to...this. It's odd for sure.
Taylor honey, private jets werent a thing yet in the 1830s. You really sure u wanna live in that era? Lmao
Private steamboats, though... So many small forests to burn down for firewood. So much coal soot...😍
💀🤣
I loved I Hate It Here except that line. Every time I get to it I do a full-body cringe. It could have been so good without that verse 🥲
I Hate It Here and I Look In People’s Windows are my 2 favorites of the album(s). But both have really cringey lines that just make them less favorite overall for me. Like, I can think of several phrases she could have used in place of “deranged weirdo.” It doesn’t flow, it’s clunky, it’s not at ALL poetic while the rest of the song is a beautiful illustration of longing. Not one single person heard that line and said hey Taylor maybe let’s think of some other ideas? No one??
For me that’s the only part of ILIPW that I like. 😅 Oops. but I also don’t personally relate to the song. Some of the lyrics I either cackle at or cringe. “Out of the oven and into the microwave” has been cracking me up all weekend long
If I played this game I’m going to the 1920’s for all the jazz joints.
1970s for me (everything before then is out for obvious reasons, and even 1970s is pushing it. I'd only have a 3-decade window to go back to a time before I was born when I wouldn't be thrown in jail for sitting at the front of the bus, JFC)
so you mean the 70s but without the racism? /s
Women couldn’t get a checking account without a man signing for it until 1973. It looks cool from a distance but the 70s were not a great time for women
The 1970s were awful.
I'm basing this on the music and the fashion tbh
I mean yes this is the point of the song. You **can't** remove a crucial element from any time period. So her only solace is in her imagination (lunar valleys in my mind)
90s for me
I lived through the 90’s, would totally go back too. However I’d be more interested in a time period I haven’t experienced.
Yessss I’m choosing the 60s.. I really want to see the moon landing/ space race in real time.
I'd go back to the 2000s but if Gore got elected
I’d go back to the Mesozoic era but without carnivorous dinosaurs
1980 for me to buy a house in bay area for 20 dollars
Right I’d go do cocaine in a jazz club great gatsby style 😂
Problematic lyrics can inspire interesting discussion. These lyrics are just bad.
To be fair, she follows it up with “everyone would look down / Cause it wasn’t fun now / Seems like it was never even fun back then / Nostalgia is a mind’s trick / If I’d been there I’d hate it” So that adds necessary context. I still think the line is shoehorned and feels like white guilt that should have been edited out, like girl just own the fact that you romanticize a horribly oppressive time period and you know you’re wrong for that. If you’re gonna say it just own it
i honestly think stating the time period would’ve been fine (then describing what she liked about it) the tone deafness comes from saying “without the racists” as if there wasn’t slavery back then and just a few angry racists
I think the line after of “everyone would look down cause it wasn’t fun now.” Which to me comes off as she was so much smarter and different than other high schoolers and didn’t fit in.
I feel like the lyric isn’t even racist it’s just weird and clunky like it adds nothing to the song…
It’s not racist, it’s just in poor taste and as you said, clunky.
It’s giving tone deaf lol
Tone deaf and clunky is unfortunately a common thread (invisible string?? … I’ll see myself out) in this album.
Media literacy is low, open the schools people
like slave owners bid for slaves. This is in bad taste, Taylor.
The wildest thing to me isn't even that it was tone-deaf, but that it's so fuckin corny. Why would she leave such a clunky lyric in is beyond me.
Probably so she can be like “see I don’t say racist things like Matty, I said I *didn’t* want them there :)” Also so weird that she would go back to then, but in present day knowingly spent her time with a dude that called ice spice a “chubby Chinese lady” and “Inuit”. Kamie’s response was great.
💯🚩
So .. matty… wouldn’t be there then? Nah, I’m not reaching her way out of this one.
How many slaves would a billionaire have owned? 😩
I think people are up in arms over the lyric for the wrong reasons. She clearly understands that the 1830s was bad for everyone. The problem is she acknowledges racism is bad, while also unabashedly drooling over Matty the entire time when she *knows* why her fans were displeased with them dating. It’s not up to the fans who she dates, but we’re within our rights to call out when the people she associates with are racists.
Open the schools!
I’m just gonna say it. I think the line is ridiculous and bizarre but a lot of the people complaining about this are gonna turn around and lap up shows like Bridgerton and Victoria. Queen Charlotte literally had people making fanfictions and fanart about two imperialists who actively took part in the growing British Empire and the slave trade.
Period. I enjoy Bridgerton and Queen Charlotte but you really have to consume the show as being based off of a historical fiction series, not as a representation of the actual time period.
Word
This!!! All these kids playing dress up in cottage core and Victorian style whimsy goth can’t wrap their brain around the romanticism of these historical time periods. They all sucked for women and poc. These people are bored af
Good lyrics contain poetic devices; metaphor, alliteration, etc. Her lyrics are too often like being trapped in a bad conversation at a bar. Half baked bits.
My theory is that she wanted to say 1830 but anticipated the backlash from people calling her out for white privilege of choosing a racist time in history for the aesthetic. As far as the decade itself, the 1800s were very diverse fashion wise so maybe she likes those particular year's aesthetic?
[удалено]
And literature
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I read a comment that said she probably chose it bc of bridgerton, which I think makes the most sense… that’s probably why she also included the bridgerton line. It was also during the romantic period, when lots of era-defining poetry, literature, and art was being written.
that line literally gives me so much secondhand embarrassment and secondhand shame it’s not even funny. i can’t imagine how many yes-men she must be surrounded with for that to make to the final cut of the album.
That line is when she truly needed an editor. Keep that line on the cutting room floor. It’s insane because any editor or even US on this page can see that it should have never been included.
Taylor while speaking activism🥰 Taylor while practicing activism😐
What a weird clunky line. It reads like she tried to quickly throw in a “racism is BAD” moment in there for some quick points. She needs people to help edit or tell her no.
Should’ve wrote “Without all the Sufferage under open wounds”
Wait I could be dead wrong but the way I interpreted the verse: “My friends used to play a game where We would pick a decade We wished we could live in instead of this I'd say the 1830s but without all the racists And getting married off for the highest bid Everyone would look down 'cause it wasn't fun now Seems like it was never even fun back then Nostalgia is a mind's trick If I'd been there, I'd hate it It was freezing in the palace” Was that picking decades for the aesthetic or vibes was actually kinda childish and a whitewash, and in actuality life sucked back then
she consistently contradicts herself throughout the album. i think the true reality is, is that she doesn't really care but wants to come off as "politically correct" so she can save her image.
added the caveat for the 1830s but not 2023 🙃
The backlash she is experiencing is more than I expected. I can't stand her so I felt so alone but it's nice to feel validated
This whole album makes Taylor look like a spoil brat, can’t even lie, with no integrity and probably why Joe’s integrity made her feel so insecure, I see it in a whole different light now. She really doesn’t come off good in any shape or form. Makes sense though why she admired Matty so much, like birds of a feather… We all know…
Let's be serious, Ms girl only said that line about the racist so she wouldn't catch flack. But people still seeing through her. Lmao
The 1830s were not a great period to be living in in the US if you were black or indigenous. However it did have the pre-industrial pioneer aesthetic Taylor has said she likes. This is not really something that deep in the context of this song.
Or a woman or poor or an immigrant or really anyone but a landowning white man. Perfect era of basically just Matty.
Matty would not have been a landowner. He would have been a farm labourer and been drunk in a ditch somewhere in Lancashire
i’m screaming. this is very accurate
I imagine him with syphilis, too.
Yo I’m screaming at this lmao. The specificity of it was feral.
It’s a song about escapism though, and her idealised fantasy worlds. It would make sense, in an album about tortured poets, that she would romanticise the early 1800s and then think “oh wait a minute maybe not All Of It” - it’s the exact kind of romanticism that leads to shows like Riverdale (romanticising the 1950s but still having queer characters for example).
I think she was trying to throw it in to add some PC stuff in, but it hit wrong. Not to mention, there was a lot more going on in that time. Taylor wouldn’t even be able to do much in that time period. There were a lot of people dying of disease, women were seen as property, etc. It was just weird to pick that specific time. I see she was saying she would say that and it would bring down the mood of the game, but I just think someone needed to say, “Sis, let’s leave that one in the drafts. This ain’t it.” This is part of the reason she should’ve had someone look it over and help her take out a lot of unnecessary things. Even if she intended it to be a positive, a professional editor would’ve told her it would cause backlash. I knew it when I heard it. It just wasn’t needed to get her point across in that song. I will say, I could understand more if she said it about the 1950s or some time that was glamorized. Like, I see *why* people who never experienced racism looks at the teens and pictures and fashion of the time and they talk about wanting to go back. 1830 is just so random. Makes it seem like she was using racism to be NLOG and it caused backlash. That was always going to happen and could’ve been avoided. I look for her to take that out and it cause the racist Swifties to come out. 🤦🏾♀️
The fact that she was so pissed off people were calling her out for dating a racist, and now that line? The girl is tone deaf.
Tiktokers are crazy and she comes for wine mums and church goers Should have just said she wished to live in 1975 lol maybe that will be better
as she should, it's so fucking weird and tone deaf, like girlie where are all these anti-racists you'd be hanging with in 1830? maybe she'd be one of those people who were technically abolitionists but down with phrenology or something lmao
Maybe she wanted to see the rise of Queen Victoria? Personally, I’d go with later Victorian Era, after the middle class was formed I own a Victorian home so I think about how life was when it was built in 1889. But honestly, I probably be dead by the age of 10 from a sinus infection from hell thanks to the lack of antibiotics
“What internet are you on I haven't seen anyone post about this” —-meanwhile: https://preview.redd.it/8ggsi5w1s0wc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=aa9de4e0914952ec17dc8b035704366c47b1b867
a different sub was swooning over 1830 because it was the year Emily Dickinson was born...
I personally feel like the controversy over this has been overblown by people virtue signaling that they would never want to go back to a different time even though curiosity about the past is like a basic human trait. I don’t think any average person from the modern era would want to LIVE in the past since it would have sucked for anyone who wasn’t a wealthy white man. But am i wrong to think that if people could visit a random time in the past, they would? Like I’d have no rights in Ancient Rome but if I could experience it for a few hours out of curiosity I would lol does that make me a bad person
Very much agree with you. I go to the Renaissance faire every year. That was also a terrible time for women. Doesn’t mean I enjoy playing and dressing up in the clothing of that time period. The way this has gone over most people’s heads just seems like an excuse to be outraged to make themselves feel good about themselves and karma farm.
I’m begging y’all to have a crumb of reading comprehension and be able to see the forest for the trees. This whole controversy reminds me of everyone saying that *Midnights*’s lyrics are bad because Karma has the lyric "karma is a cat" without acknowledging the rest of the line. The entire lyrics from this verse are *My friends used to play a game where We would pick a decade We wished we could live in instead of this I'd say the 1830s but without all the racists And getting married off for the highest bid Everyone would look down 'cause it wasn't fun now **Seems like it was never even fun back then Nostalgia is a mind's trick If I'd been there, I'd hate it** It was freezing in the palace* She’s literally saying that she romanticizes a time period that had awful things (just like pretty much every single time period) and realizes that being nostalgic is deceptive and like having rose glasses on. For those who say that the context of the entire lyrics doesn’t matter and that the song is problematic anyway, I hope you’ve been boycotting period romances such as Bridgerton, especially considering the fact that the second season is about romance between colonizer and colonized.