By Caroline Mora
In October 2023, singer-songwriter Taylor Swift and Kansas City Chiefs football player Travis Kelce revealed they are in a romantic relationship. Since then, it’s become a common occurrence to see Swift at almost every one of Kelce’s games. She’s almost always spotted in box seats cheering on her boyfriend while sporting Chiefs merchandise. Swift has even been regarded as Kelce’s good luck charm because the Chiefs have won 76% of the games she’s attended.
However, it has become apparent that football fans have a problem with Swift and Kelce’s relationship, even going as far as to say that the Super Bowl on February 11 was ‘rigged’ for ‘Taylor’s boyfriend’ to win. The most popular grievance that people seem to have is that Taylor Swift receives too much screen time. People wanted to watch football, not The Eras Tour. Many football fans have also taken to shaming Swifties (Taylor Swift’s fanbase) and other young women for taking an interest in football because of Taylor Swift.
Taylor Swift has one of the largest fan bases in all of pop music and the majority of her fans are young women. Since Taylor and Travis went public, teenage girl viewership for the NFL went up by 54% and racked up about $331.5 million for the NFL.
Having common interests in sports can bring people together, even if you’re not always rooting for the same team. It’s a sense of community and it’s not always easy for young girls to break into that scene. If watching the football game just to see a glimpse of their favorite artist eventually leads to them developing an interest in football, then shouldn’t we try to encourage this new interest in the sport?
Swift has been attacked online, across social media, but the most notable has been Fox News. A few conservative politicians have subscribed to the conspiracy theory that Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce are in a PR relationship with the end goal of re-electing the incumbent President Joe Biden.
Benny Johnson, a conservative political commentator and podcaster has commented on this situation, saying, “Taylor Swift is an opp. It’s all fake. You’re being played.”
The theory is backed by the idea that Taylor Swift has immense influence over her fans, which in some capacity is true. However, she uses her platform to spread kindness and talk about important issues such as body positivity and self-confidence, not “spread democratic propaganda”.
Taylor Swift has been in the spotlight since she was 16 and still attending Hendersonville High School in Tennessee. She has received 18 years’ worth of criticism from the public for writing songs about her ex-boyfriends, for being fake or for being overrated. She has heard it all. So now it is no surprise that she is being criticized for her decision to support her boyfriend at his job. Because that’s just wrong, right?
