Taylor swift has allegedly threatened to sue a blog that compares her and her music to Hitler and the alt-right.
PopFront, a blog about culture and politics published a post, titled “Swifty to the alt-right. Taylor subtly gets the lower case kkk in formation” in September, dissecting Taylors hit ‘Look What You Made Me Do’ song lyrics and music video.
Meghan Herning, editor of the blog, wrote “Taylor’s lyrics in ‘Look What You Made Me Do’ seem to play to the same subtle, quiet white support of a racial hierarchy. Many on the alt-right see the song as part of a “re-awakening,” in line with Trump’s rise. At one point in the accompanying music video, Taylor lords over an army of models from a podium, akin to what Hitler had in Nazis Germany. The similarities are uncanny and unsettling.”
“Her lyrics are like an affirmation for everything the alt-right has been feeling for years: oppressed, afraid to come out, and made to look like a fool. And now that they feel empowered, it befits the movement to have a white, blonde, conservative pop star that has no doubt been ‘bullied’ by people of colour in the media, singing their feelings out loud.”
Following this post, Herning has received a letter from Swift’s legal team, demanding that PopFront issue a retraction of their story and remove the story from all sources.
“The story is replete with demonstrable and offensive falsehoods which bear no relation to reality or the truth about Ms. Swift. It appears to be a malicious attack against Ms. Swift that goes to great lengths to portray Ms. Swift as some sort of white supremacist figurehead, which is a baseless fiction masquerading as fact and completely misrepresents Ms. Swift. As further shown below, PopFront is substantially liable to Ms. Swift for defamation”
The non profit organisation, American Civil Liberties Union has responded on behalf of Herning and PopFront, stating “Ms. Herning and PopFront will not in any way accede to your attempt to suppress their constitutionally protected speech. The blog post is a mix of core political speech and critical commentary; it discusses current politics in this country, the recent rise of white supremacy, and the fact that some white supremacists have apparently embraced Ms. Swift, along with a critical interpretation of some of Ms. Swift’s music, lyrics, and videos.”
Meghan Herning herself has said about the issue “The press should not be bullied by high-paid lawyers or frightened into submission by legal jargon. These scare tactics may have worked for Taylor in the past, but I am not backing down.”
