OPINION: 'The Life Of A Show Girl has me questioning everything.'

I love Taylor Swift. I wouldn't consider myself a fully-fledged Swiftie — I can't identify every niche Easter egg, I don't own any merch and haven't memorised her entire back catalogue of songs — but I adore most of her music.

I scream-sang 'loml' from her last album into my car radio more times than I'd like to admit and I will tell anyone who will listen that she is a once-in-a-lifetime talent.

I have defended Taylor Swift, I have excused Taylor Swift, I have remained loyal to Taylor Swift — I ride for Taylor Swift.

But after enduring the press run, the releases, the movie and, of course, the actual album for The Life of A Show Girl, I'm starting to rethink my view of the pop star.

Let's begin with the album itself because it's drawn mixed reviews.

In response to the not-so-great reaction, Swift addressed this head-on. "I have a lot of respect for people's subjective opinions on art. I'm not the art police," she told Apple Music's Zane Lowe.

'I welcome the chaos'. New conversation with @taylorswift13 out now. https://t.co/RXF1U1vegF pic.twitter.com/IqChUwlquW

— Zane Lowe (@zanelowe) October 7, 2025

But it was a different comment that gave me pause. "If it's the first week of my album release and you are saying either my name or my album title, you're helping," Swift added.

This might be something that could be said by a rising pop star, but in the case of Swift, the comment comes across as tone-deaf with a striking lack of self-awareness.

Is there a week when people are not talking about Taylor Swift aka the biggest pop star of our generation?

This failure to read the room is something that lingers throughout The Life of a Show Girl.

The album was recorded during her Eras Tour, with the pop star flying back and forth to Sweden to record it. The creation of Swift and the Swedish pop music masters Max Martin and Shellback, you'd expect this would generate some catchy pop hits, but the results? Her most uninspired album to date.

This 'show girl' has lost her sparkle.

The lyrics are some of her worst, including a slew of outdated internet slang with mentions of 'trolling and memes', 'keeping it one hundred', 'girlbossing too close to the sun' and 'looking fire', as if it's pulled from the Instagram comment section of 2016.

this is actually the most embarrassing thing i could never have imagined pic.twitter.com/m7j34GxRyR

— li@🔻online (@lllliatttt) October 3, 2025

At best, the lyrics are derivative and cringe; at worst, there are moments where the singer is accused of being racially tone-deaf by dismissing terms like 'bad bitch' and 'savage'.

Swift hasn't always created lyrical perfection, I would love a stern word with 'ME!' and 'You Need to Calm Down' — as did the internet in 2019 — but her stumbles used to be rare, not the norm.

Then there are the themes explored in the album's tracks: namely, her obsession with driving home just how perfect her fiancé Travis Kelce is (and his other body parts) and how he 'saved' her from the mess that her ex left behind (aka the Matty Healy split).

Kelce's presence looms large throughout the songs; the album is tied directly to the NFL player after she announced it on his podcast, New Heights, and they got engaged the same day.

Watch the moment below. Post continued after video.

In Swift's brave new world, the pain of a bad boyfriend can only be healed by getting a better boyfriend.

Then there's the bizarre song 'Actually Romantic', a diss track that many have suspected is a response to Charli XCX's song 'Sympathy is a Knife'. From the lyrics "I heard you call me 'boring Barbie' when the coke's got you brave," to referring to the woman as "a toy chihuahua barking at me from a tiny purse", the messaging comes across as unnecessarily cruel.

Even if the song isn't about Charli — after all, Swift never confirms or denies the subjects of her songs — there's no doubt that the lyrics and song title (Charlie has a song literally called 'Everything is Romantic') are going to feed that narrative, and Taylor knows that.

What made 'Anti-Hero' such a masterstroke in songwriting is the self-awareness and vulnerability contained within its lyrics. The Life of a Show Girl is fixated on an outdated 'fairytale romance' narrative and pitting herself against another pop star — it all feels like Swift has lyrically regressed.

This underdog narrative doesn't make sense anymore; neither does the victim mentality when she has now far ascended the fame and power of the people who potentially wronged her.

Charli XCX previously toured with Taylor Swift (and Camila Cabello??). Image: Getty.

This isn't the first time Swift's album has been divisive. Just last year, the 31-song album The Tortured Poets Department brought a general consensus that while there was great stuff in it, she should have cut down the track list. But lyrically, there's no denying she made some of her best work.

Despite getting five stars from Rolling Stone, The Life of a Showgirl received a mere 5.9 out of 10 in Pitchfork, with the reviewer declaring "her music's never been less compelling."

Many of her fans have defended the album. 'They're still bops, why can't Swift release a frivolous pop album of sugary nothingness?' is some of the online messaging.

But being skilled at songwriting is the glue that holds this show girl's bedazzled costume together. "I wouldn't be a singer if I weren't a songwriter," she told Billboard in 2014.

The album's failings are a much harder pill to swallow because we know she is capable of greatness.

This is the same woman who penned such poetic prose as "You call me up again just to break me like a promise, so casually cruel in the name of being honest." Or the astute social commentary on the sexist rhetoric she endures with "I've got a long list of ex-lovers, they'll tell you I'm insane. But I've got a blank space, baby, and I'll write your name."

Aside from the contents of the album itself, Swift has released a slew of slightly varied CD editions and eight different vinyl variants. In a recent 24-hour flash sale for a 'Deluxe Dressing Room Rehearsal Version', she boasted it included "two songwriting voice memos".

This particular edition is called 'Sweat and Vanilla Perfume Portofino Orange Glitter'. Image: Taylor Swift.

As the new editions keep on coming, even her fandom is questioning her motives. "I am a Swiftie but this is what we mean by unethical billionaires," read one popular comment on an article about yet another album version release.

Over her career, Swift has steadily increased the amount of limited edition albums she releases, a concept which took off with Folklore's multiple editions, but she has only added more with Midnights, Tortured Poets and now her latest work.

For her Midnights release, the pop star excitedly told her fans that if they bought four versions of the vinyl version, the back of the jackets would join to create a clock. Great!

Back in 2023, her own fanbase started affectionately referring to her as their 'capitalist queen' after a string of editions of the same album were dropped.

Then came the 2025 movie.

For a limited cinema run, Swift released The Official Release Party of a Showgirl, a visual accompaniment to her album. And what did fans get? Lyrics videos, blurry behind-the-scenes footage, a Target US advertisement that made zero sense to non-Americans, some vague insights into the songs she would repeat in a slew of TV interviews, and the same single music video played… twice.

All that glitters isn't always gold.

The main draw for the film was that it was the only place fans could watch the music video for 'The Fate of Ophelia', well, until it was released less than 48 hours later.

'The Fate of Ophelia' music video. Image: Taylor Swift.

The 'movie' had a short run and limited cinema release over the span of a weekend but it managed to gross over $50 million globally — not too shabby for a glorified YouTube video that her fans spent at least $20 to watch.

This brings me to the issue with Taylor Swift: the greed of it all.

Fans praise the singer for being a respected business person and she's done a lot of good. She removed her music from Spotify to protest the platform's rates for artists, prompting Spotify to improve its policy. Swift started a powerful movement when she decided to re-record her masters to take a stand against the music industry not giving artists the rights over their own work.

Although to be clear, the latter move made her a lot of money.

But in the last few years, Swift has become increasingly fixated on her income streams. It begs the question: is she giving the fans what they actually want or just taking advantage of her position of power?

If she's going to take so much, you'd hope she would give a little in return.

This isn't to say Swift isn't a charitable person: she's donated sizeable sums to disaster relief efforts, children's foundations, survivors of sexual assault, food banks and animal rescue centres, along with giving funds to countless fans during their most difficult moments.

But sadly, as the pop star's greed has risen, her interest in using her unparalleled power to give a voice to the powerless has only declined.

Taylor Swift has a complicated history with getting political.

She spoke up in 2015 about being sexually assaulted by Denver DJ, David Mueller. After a career of political silence, Swift publicly supported two Democrats in the US midterm elections in 2018.

The next year, she wrote an open letter and released the music video for 'You Need To Calm Down' (albeit conflating a marginalised group's lifelong struggle for equality with a petty pop diva beef) in support of the Equality Act, a bill meant to expand federal civil rights protections for LGBTQIA+ people.

She spoke about this political pivot decision in her 2020 documentary, Miss Americana, where she said that despite her team wanting her to stay out of politics and avoid becoming another Dixie Chicks, she wanted to be "on the right side of history".

Swift later endorsed Joe Biden and then Kamala Harris for president.

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A post shared by Taylor Swift (@taylorswift)

But in more recent years, she hasn't had a lot to say about anything besides her music, merch and famous fiancé.

She's made the occasional comment in the years since, such as spreading awareness on her Eras Tour about recent "legislation that has put people in the LGBTQ and queer community at risk" in 2023, but for the most part, she remains silent.

Swift's refusal to share a single statement or sentiment about the Palestinian genocide is something that has drawn ire from even her own fans. Swifties have set up petitions to call for their diva to speak out, and started #SwiftiesForPalestine to spread the word that this fandom doesn't align with the women at its centre.

Swift's silence on the matter is especially noticeable with her fellow pop stars speaking up on the matter, including Billie Eilish, Chappell Roan, Dua Lipa, Ariana Grande and Olivia Rodrigo.

Swift has also had very little to say on Donald Trump's continued attack on LGBTIQA+ rights, unlike Roan, Lady Gaga and recently Sabrina Carpenter, who have spoken out to protect transgender Americans.

Aside from a vague call to vote at the Tennessee election in March 2024, Swift appears to have done very little with her power.

Taylor Swift and Brittany Mahomes embrace each other at a Kansas City Chiefs game. Image: Getty.

Swift has long tried to distance herself from politics. "I just figure I'm a 22-year-old singer and I don't know if people really want to hear my political views," she said during a 2012 interview.

At 35 years old and with more power than anyone could imagine, this argument is getting old.

Of course, it needs to be said that expectations of male pop stars to be politically active and morally sound are vastly different than what we expect from their female counterparts. But that argument falls down when we think about how much influence Swift has — she has the kind of platform men like Justin Bieber, Drake or Ed Sheeran could never reach.

Back in 2023, after Swift encouraged her fans to register to vote in an Instagram Story, she quickly drove 157,041 eligible voters to the site.

She's one of the most powerful people in the world.

Forbes declared Swift a billionaire in 2023 and said she had a reported net worth of $1.1 billion.

This was before The Eras Tour ended, which is reported to have grossed more than $2 billion, with the movie version earning an extra $267 million in its limited theatrical run worldwide.

I'm sorry but there is no argument that can be made that Swift needs any more money. She doesn't. She just wants more.

Between exploiting her fans with re-releases, rushed albums and nonsense movies — Swift's greed has taken over.

Most recently, some of the singer's values are coming into question after she was accused of using AI in the promotion materials for her album, despite previously condemning the technology.

Do I still love her? Yes. She is still one of the greatest songwriters in history and even a 'bad Taylor Swift album' is still a relatively good time.

But for this generation's most prolific show girl, I hope she starts to put more effort into making a quality show, rather than thinking about the money she can pocket at the door.

If she doesn't, her fans might not stick around for the curtain close.

Feature image: Instagram/Taylor Swift.