43. The Ethics of Speculating about Taylor Swift's Sexuality

The B-Sides

Today we’re going to talk about Taylor Swift. We know it’s not ethical to speculate on celebrities’ sexualities. But it feels so intoxicating - and in some moments, righteous - to speculate on Taylor Swift’s personal life, especially when she invites deep speculation into her discography and all the text she puts out into the world. What’s a progressive to do?

We’ll tackle this in four parts:

• Part 1: Why it is actually harmful to speculate about anyone’s sexuality
• Part 2: Taylor’s own history on this issue and what her easter eggs have done to melt our brains
• Part 3: Some history, including the history of closeted celebs and open secrets
• Part 4: Trying to land on some actual truths about Taylor
• Then we’ll end with our new favorite segment, what are you listening to?

Here was the syllabus for this episode, which we dropped a few days in advance in our discord group:

• https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1rE33nMNB8twCdPLVQudM4kN0N5gv7UnnYQfYy0t3ObI/edit#slide=id.g3b692fe12f_0_0
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hp3XS0q06Wk especially minute 2:50
• https://www.teenvogue.com/story/the-danger-with-speculating-someones-sexual-identity
• Extra credit: an episode of taydar pod. Really any, but especially https://taydarpod.libsyn.com/episode-2-we-are-the-foxes-0

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