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

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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