Fair-Weather Fan Disclosure
Full Disclosure: I’ve lived in NE Kansas my whole life other than 2 years in Virginia (“Sic Semper Tyrannus!”). I grew up a “fair-weather” fan of the Royals (who won the World series when I was 5, had Bo Jackson and George Brett etc.), but for my lived adult life of the next 30 years sucked… I saw fair weather mostly because I just didn’t focus on the sportsball, but when they did well, you noticed. And now my kids get to live the same experience, it seems. Similarly, the Chiefs: in my entire lived experience up until about five years ago they were a very lackluster team, although I did have tucked away in my brain the knowledge that they were at the very first Super Bowl.
Then Mahomes and Kelce hit, backed by a rather corpulent, walrus looking fellow who I was told was their coach (I’d heard the name Andy Reid, but couldn’t have picked him out in a lineup probably). Now Chiefs are everywhere.
They seemed to be the darlings a few years ago. The scruffy, underdog team with a couple of absolute star players, who just kept eeking out victories when things looked down. They made it to the Super Bowl…and they won! (And then, a few weeks later, the whole world shut down.) They made it back the next year (and lost), had a rough following year, and then… then this season happened. All of a sudden, Chiefs Mania was everywhere. Something new had been added into the mix. Or rather…Someone new.
Tay-Swizzle
Full disclosure #2: I’m not a lover of her music, though some of her early stuff now hits in a kind-a cute, innocent, nostalgic way. She seemed early on a lovely, clean singer who represened the best of Americana. True story – I have a friend whos grandfather (!) loved her music, and at one point about 10 years ago, some odd string of events happened and Taylor Swift wound up stopping and celebrating Christmas (#Swiftmas?) with the family: Taylor Swift Gave a 96-Year-Old Fan the Ultimate Christmas Surprise (yahoo.com)
So, that earned her a few points in my book. Still wouldn’t listen to her music by choice or buy an album, but felt wholesome.
But then she started to get political. After being intentionally NOT political (she was called out for it in 2018).
Criticized for years for being apolitical, in 2018, Swift got off the sidelines in, for her, an emphatic way. In a post to 112 million followers on Instagram, she denounced Republican Tennessee Senate candidate Marsha Blackburn and endorsed her Democratic opponent, former Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen, as well as Democratic House candidate Jim Cooper. Swift’s link to a nonpartisan voter registration site gave it a major boost in traffic and new registrations, and her foray into politics made headlines.
https://archive.is/D77ZI (Faux News)
That same Fox News Story later shares:
In a scene from the behind-the-scenes 2020 Netflix documentary “Miss Americana,” Swift emotionally told her parents why she planned to step into the political fray with her post against Blackburn. She also said she deeply regretted not speaking out publicly against Donald Trump when he successfully ran for president in 2016.
ibid.
And since September, there has been a BARAGE of Taylor Swift…EVERYTHING. She’s drawn HUGE, non-traditional crowds of women and young girls to Football, as her relationship to Tight End Travis Kelce took center stage.
Some people love it. A friend posted this just yesterday, in the wake of their securing the Super Bowl slot:
Kelce got tons of contracts for endorsements, including unfortunately for the largest drug cartel in the world, which paid the largest fine for fraud and deception in human history. But the memes were great:
Meanwhile, the DailyMail noted that she could be a powerful force to be reckoned with in the election season in a story that broke yesterday: Taylor Swift could sway 2024 election outcome, new poll finds with a FIFTH of voters ‘likely’ to back candidate endorsed by singer | Daily Mail Online
Or, as the memes put it:
Those calling this out…
Political correspondents I’ve followed for years have been calling this out, most notably Jack Posobiec and Charlie Kirk. Posobiec wrote in December of last year:
Just today, in the wake of the Chiefs defeat of Baltimore, securing the AFC title and sending them to the Super Bowl, the NY post put them on the cover. But the HOW of it is… a little appalling.
Other people are noticing this and that it feels a little… Forced.
Even Vivek Ramaswamy says – boldly – what many are feeling and fearing:
This is in the wake of THIS headline from a few days ago: Make Taylor Swift the running mate of Joe Biden and watch the voters swoon. (baltimoresun.com)
One of the conclusions of that story:
Democracy could come to an end in America if Donald Trump is elected. Vice President Kamala Harris should step aside for the good of the nation. Putting Swift on the ticket will dramatically boost voter registration among Democrats.
Make Taylor Swift the running mate of Joe Biden and watch the voters swoon. (baltimoresun.com)
Some people have even INSISTED that the Super Bowl (“Bread and Circuses”) is rigged, though I find those claims dubious. Nevertheless, I hate that at this point, I see a silver lining to “MY” team losing.
But I do.
And that’s silly.
The big problem is we have a media that amplifies voices that don’t really deserve to be amplified about topics they don’t really deserve to be talking about. This is not to say that Taylor Swift doesn’t have a right to be political into talk as she sees fit, but she’s not known for being a cunning political strategist with a shrewd understanding of all of the matters in play (or even for good choice in men, but again good luck Travis).
But of course the media has always done this. In fact the aforementioned Kelce being an “endorser” of Pfizer (or ANY product) falls into the category generally people who have no specific, relevant background speaking about topics they’re not qualified to speak about.
Forrest Gump endorsing ping pong paddles? Makes sense; he (fictitiously) played with them, they were in his purview. Michael Jordan endorsing his own athletic shoes? Sure, makes sense.
But politicians and musicians and actors “endorsing” political candidates and global actors with blanket statements that don’t deal with the merits of the case?
Nah.
EDIT: AS I was finishing this article, Tim Pool put out a thematically related video, so I’ll include it here.
I listened to this piece as I was proofreading the article and I think that at the end of the day tim’s take is probably the most reasonable take. It is probably an ad mixture of some conspiratorial things, but mostly those things moving via the invisible hand of the marketplace trying to make the most powerful and meaningful marketing and branding impacts and nothing more.
But I could be wrong.
Go Chiefs.
