Taylor Swift's new album is a sharp rebuke of toxic fans. It's about time. (2024)

The dutiful salute to fans offered a convenient transition to Swift's real announcement, the one she co-opted her own acceptance speech for: Her 11th studio album, "The Tortured Poets Department," would be in their hands come spring. "I'm gonna go and post the cover right now backstage," she said.

It was classic Taylor, marrying gracious thank-yous for her success with a treat for her loyal fans. Little did they know that three months later, that gift would also come with a messy rebuke of the Swifties who've become a bit too preoccupied with the pop star's private life.

Taylor Swift built her brand as a friendly and relatable pop star

Over the course of her career, Swift has been careful to cultivate a rapport with fans, building a relatable image through both her lyrics and her public persona as the patron saint of the Everygirl.

She may be richer than almost everyone, but she'll write a check to a Swiftie who needs to pay off her student loans, or a mother who lost her husband before Christmas. She may have a gaggle of famous friends, but she'll invite groups of fans to her home for intimate listening parties. She may be mind-bogglingly famous in a way that's made her life fundamentally abnormal, but she's careful never to make negative comments about fame's downsides despite well-documented intrusions into her personal life.

"I remember when I was a little kid and I used to sit there and think about how lucky I would be if someday, people cared about the words that I wrote," a teenage Swift told reporters at the 2009 CMA Music Festival. "When you spend so much time daydreaming about things like that," she added, "when that actually happens, you don't ever complain about it."

Even when the sheer magnitude of her fame led to a literal argument about the Kanye West lyric, "I made that bitch famous," Swift's issue was never with the word "famous." It was with the word "bitch."

But nearly two decades into her career, the business of Being Taylor Swift has become a billion-dollar industry whose parasocial peanut gallery has grown in size to match. In 2024, the secret messages Swift left in lyric booklets in her earlier albums seem like quaint conspiracies compared to the Marvel-level lore involved in the present-day Swiftie Easter egg hunt, which has gotten granular enough that fans find clues everywhere in Swift's orbit, down to the brand names of her bags and shoes.

"I think the best messages are cryptic ones," she said in 2019.

Fans (and critics) are particularly outspoken about Swift's romantic interests; once she's linked to a potential muse, their relationship is treated as a public forum.

One could argue Swift has encouraged this dynamic with her penchant for Easter eggs, which started out as a way to incentivize fans to study her songwriting. But she has also been careful not to rebuke her fans directly, even when they do things like stake out her home or crash her best friend's wedding to catch a glimpse of her. Thanking and appeasing the fans has become second nature — which is exactly why the harsh tone of some lyrics on her latest album is so fascinating.

With 'The Tortured Poets Department,' Swift is telling fans they don't actually know her

"The Tortured Poets Department" allows a peek into the inner turmoil of Being Taylor Swift, with all the attention, venom, and possessiveness she attracts. As a songwriter who pours raw, personal details into her music, Swift's livelihood — not to mention her mental stability, judging by revelations from her 2020 documentary "Miss Americana" and new "Tortured Poets Department" lyrics — is tethered to the approval of strangers. Thanks to the confessional nature of her work, these strangers believe they know her, and many believe they know what's best for her.

The contrast between the public's perception and Swift's personal reality is a recurring theme in several songs, including "But Daddy I Love Him," the harshest act of retaliation in Swift's entire catalog.

In the first verse, Swift accuses the public of trying to "cage" her while they sit on their high horses. "Sarahs and Hannahs in their Sunday best," she taunts, "Clutching their pearls, sighing, 'What a mess.'"

The chorus paints Swift as a woman in love and on the brink. Her partner is "crazy," but she doesn't care: "He's the one I want."

On its face, the song seems inspired by her much-reviled romance with Matty Healy of The 1975. Following her split from Joe Alwyn last year, Swift was spotted out and about with the polarizing British rocker, whom she's known for nearly a decade.

The backlash was, well, swift. Onlookers criticized Swift for associating with Healy, who'd previously said dating her would be "emasculating." (He later apologized.) Healy was also slammed for laughing on a podcast while the hosts made racist jokes about rapper Ice Spice. (He apologized for that, too.)

Healy's long history of ironic stunts and satirical lyrics were widely misunderstood as sincere — but still, think pieces about his unworthiness flooded the internet. One group of paternalistic Swifties even tried to circulate a petition demanding that she end her relationship and issue "more than a simple apology."

According to reports, Swift and Healy didn't last very long — a fortnight, perhaps? — and at the time, Swift never addressed the outsize reaction to their romance.

But now, through her songwriting, she's left very little doubt as to how this behavior enraged her.

"'Stay away from her,' the saboteurs protested too much," Swift sings. "I'll tell you something right now / I'd rather burn my whole life down / Than listen to one more second of all this bitching and moaning."

By the bridge, the gloves come off, with Swift describing her lover's critics not just as saboteurs, but as "vipers dressed in empath's clothing" and "judgmental creeps who say they want what's best for me."

Later in the album, Swift reinforces this key concept: Her fans don't know her, and oftentimes, they don't even understand her.

"Who's Afraid of Little Old Me?" — solo-written by Swift —is another album standout, which compares the author to a defanged circus freak. No matter what people say about her, Swift can't truly bite back; she's been trained to prioritize a squeaky-clean brand. Choice lyrics recall the demands of the anti-Healy petition: "The scandal was contained / The bullet had just grazed / At all costs, keep your good name."

"I Can Do It With a Broken Heart" echoes the image of Swift as a caged performer, sparkling on The Eras Tour stage and fooling the audience with every grin. "I can read your mind / 'She's having the time of her life,'" Swift jeers. "I can show you lies."

When the album was released last Friday, Swift made sure to clarify on social media that she has healed from this "fleeting and fatalistic moment in time," writing, "This period of the author's life is now over."

The implication is clear: "Dear reader, don't be offended! I no longer relate to the palpable fury in this album." It's a clever move, a safeguard to ensure her sh*t-talking stays contained in the past and doesn't bleed into her current life.

But her fury is still immortalized in the music itself. The Swift we hear in "Poets" is unruly, self-destructive, and self-consciously wild, very unlike the polished pop star we've grown accustomed to seeing. This is the sound of a woman pleading temporary insanity, pleading for her own humanity. Swift is willing to admit she has lost her mind and made some mistakes — yet, in a refreshing change of pace, she is insistent upon her right to make them.