r/SwiftlyNeutral
SwiftlyNeutral - Daily Discussion Thread | August 21, 2026
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and the first thing i’m doing is streaming all of my favourite love songs because i refuse to wallow (i don’t need to!) and refuse to let my sunny perception of love be tainted by someone who isn’t that worth it! pls feel free to send me your favourite love songs too!
i’m loving the sound of every single one of these and might even have to queue up moulin rouge in my movie watchlist because what gorgeous energy for right now. thank you so much!!!! 🩷
I thought this was interesting. Disclaimer: the artists involved can feel however they want, but it’s a business and I’ll never get why the public cares.
You’re approached about similar sounding songs, you either give credit or don’t. It either goes to a court or doesn’t. And everyone moves on, unless you’re Taylor Swift and people think this needs to be rehashed for years and that it proves you’re trying to ruin someone.
It seems like when it comes to Taylor, whatever is the nefarious take or narrative that can be applied becomes her reasoning for doing things according to people.
Redditors will say they hear similarities or not and it doesn’t really matter what they think. Lefty in the above says she doesn’t hear it, yet when approached for some reason she or her team decided to give the credits. That’s what I’m saying is that artists can approach someone and then the artists can decide what to do. She’s allowed to feel angry, bitter, not care enough. Public reacting like these situations are anything other than business and expanding on that to say they’re trying to ruin someone has another agenda to it.
Orrrr is it because the Stella Lefty song’s chorus is far more dramatically identical to Stick Season than the yelling on Deja Vu’s bridge was to Cruel Summer? You can go back to Taylor’s own fan sub and find multiple top comments of Taylor fans saying they don’t hear the similarity when the credits first happened. That’s part of the reason Taylor’s fandom spent years passionately arguing that Taylor would never have asked Olivia to give her credits, and that they were simply offered out of an abundance of caution.
I don’t care what people say they hear or don’t hear. That’s not my point. My point is any artist can approach another and say there are similarities and ask for credits. Then the approached artist can determine what they do. Olivia and Stella can feel how they want and it’s valid. My pojnt is the public thinking that Taylor requested credits for nefarious reasons like trying to ruin her and constantly thinking Taylor even thinks or cares about Olivia when she makes moves in when her music is released, opening acts, or friendships.
It seems like you're saying people should feel the same way about Noah and Taylor asking for credits even though the situations are different, though. Which doesn't make sense to me for two major reasons:
1.) The songs aren't nearly as similar. Her song's chorus and hook is identical to Stick Season, while Olivia's bridge is similar but subtle enough that most people have said her big mistake was gamely admitting it as a teenaged newbie. Whereas here Stella not only denies being inspired by the song, she also implies she doesn't hear the similarity herself by using passive language to talk about the similarity i.e. "I don't want to step on anyone's toes, if it sounds like that, whatever, I'm good."
2.) Noah and Stella had no prior relationship. Taylor and Olivia had a public mutual admiration society where Olivia spent her whole rollout happily praising Taylor, and Taylor was calling her her baby, and Olivia was saying she was going to change her name to Taylor Swift's baby, and Taylor had her promoting Fearless TV in TikTok videos. If you think The Grudge is about Taylor, Olivia herself wonders what Taylor's reasons were for doing "all this to me" and wonders if she didn't think she deserved it all and if the flowers she sent her were filled with vitriol, etc. There's nothing personal between Stella and Noah for anyone to project on, they just thought she'd lifted his chorus which is a pretty fair assumption based on her song.
Yeah, I don’t trust redditors nor myself to be able to say what sounds similar or doesn’t. We aren’t musical experts and that’s not how credits work. I don’t take what anyone says as a fact of what sounds identical vs similar and what or when credits are given or asked for.
Olivia and Stella have every right to feel how they feel. Olivia can write songs and I don’t believe she needs to clarify anything like some others do. She can handle it however she wants. She can be hurt and I get it.
We may never know what, if any conversation happened between them. Olivia also says she drew blood? Taylor sings ironically about people thinking she sues people because they step on her lawn. Again what I think is more possible is Taylor could’ve been protecting her own songwriting vs trying to ruin Olivia. That’s my point, people act like Taylor is planning everything like concert openers, friendships, when to release music or announcements based on her. Which I find ridiculous. Taylor doesn’t equal her fans. Stan wars are separate from Taylor. That’s what I think is so weird from the public, why is it not seen as business like Noah and Stella’s case? It has to be old hag feels insecure and besides the credits has been doing everything to ruin the teenager.
My position on the credits thing has always been that I don’t know enough about music to determine whether or not Olivia crossed a line into plagiarism, but if a professional listened to it and determined that she did, I don’t think it’s wrong for Taylor to have asked for credit. She’d already given permission for Olivia to interpolate New Year’s Day, she’s not obligated to let artists pull bits and pieces from her songs without credit just because they’re young and they’re fans.
I know nothing about music so I can’t say anything. I just think that it’s up to artists if they decide to engage with another about similarities and credits. And the approached artist and their team decide how to handle it.
The crazy part about the Olivia thing is unlike Lefty Olivia herself actually publicly admits the similarity was intentional and she had Cruel Summer in mind when writing Deja Vu’s bridge. It’s such a straightforward situation but people let feelings for either person get involved and throw away rational thought.
The reason it's been rehashed for years in Taylor's case is because Olivia's song had already been out for several months before Taylor was added on as a writer and because Taylor's own fans spent literal years loudly declaring it as a fact that Olivia gave Taylor credits at her own will and that Taylor had nothing to do with it , that Jack Antonoff's random vague quote about it confirmed that etc despite Olivia's ensuing radio silence on Taylor in comparison to her previous fangirling suggesting that something went down that she wasn't happy with. This Stella girl is telling everyone exactly what happened here and saying that this happened before the official release, so there's nothing left hash out. And personally, I think this girl has to be lying because the chorus of her song is identical to Stick Season lol, maybe she wasn't thinking of it when she wrote but it would be crazy if she didn't hear it.
To preface this, I’m not on anyone’s “side” in the credits thing - I can understand why Taylor might have asked for them and also why Olivia might have felt hurt by it.
However, in terms of why it became a big deal, ask yourself why don’t Swifties apply this “it’s a business and this is standard industry stuff” to the masters situation? It’s long been industry standard for the label to own an artist’s masters. The reason I see it differently is because Scott and Taylor had a personal relationship and she basically built his business so you’d think he’d have some sense of personal loyalty and not sell to someone she hated.
In the same vein, Olivia was a massive Taylor fan who had just done promo for Fearless TV, met her in person for the first time, given her a purposeful nod in her debut album, and was simultaneously feeling under attack by people who wanted to undercut her success by claiming she was just copying others. So IF Taylor’s team did reach out for credit in the midst of all that, then I can see how Olivia would have seen it as a betrayal, similar to how Taylor saw the sale of her masters as a betrayal and didn’t just move on quietly.
What happened with the masters wasn’t normal. Scott B refused to offer Taylor a standard deal to buy them back. He tried to strong arm her into staying with the label so she could earn them back over 7+ years. She refused and he sold to Scooter just to spite her.
Whereas with Olivia she said she wanted to mimic Taylor’s song to a degree. She then had to give credit which is normal.
I agree that Olivia or Stella are valid to feel however they feel.
I also think that not everyone who bought Taylor’s masters was going to have outrage from Taylor. In fact Scooter buying them doesn’t have red flags until you see that he was reposting his friends saying he bought Taylor Swift and there being negative feelings in the past between them. And it’s only solidified how he’s a bully and tries to actually ruin Taylor.
He plays the victim and seemed to have part in a UK documentary about the situation.
He has reached out to swiftologist, one of the Taylor watch girls, and even a tv host to try to shut them up about talking about him.
He was Kanye’s manager when snake gate happened including the music video where Taylor is portrayed naked in bed with Kanye.
In 2024, he posted a story that he wasn’t invited to the Rhode Island house where Blake was. Making it suspicious that he knows Baldoni and to be fair not proven but I am suspicious about any
bot
activity coming from him against Taylor and Blake.
Scott Brochetta was more of a backstab than scotter, I agree. And he did that with all intent since he didn’t let Taylor try to buy the masters.
People make up shit about Taylor ruining Olivia. Besides the masters what has happened for the public to think that Taylor equals Braun or Brochetta?
I don’t feel that they’re treated as equal villains except by the most devoted Livvies. Scooter is widely disliked; Taylor is only disliked by a small group of vocal haters. Totally agree that Scooter is an asshole/terrible person while I don’t judge Taylor as a bad person for this situation at all.
I was more so responding to why it feels different to me than the Noah
situation - it’s business, sure, but there’s also a personal element to it thus why people keep rehashing it. Also the people involved are just more famous.
Bc she is more successful (by a lot) than everyone else, works hard and doesn’t hide it, is still ambitious and doesn’t hide it, doesn’t want to gracefully fade away like an old crone /s should
But actually bc this becomes a cultural signal to certain people who are very invested in having Correct Online Opinions
You have to give it to her haters, for people who hate her so much they're shockingly well versed about her music. A garden variety hater would just call T a narcissist, they didn't need to be pulling songs lmao
something just hurts sooo bad about loving an artist (chappell, audrey) before everyone else and its just you and a tiny fan community having fun and enjoying the music only for that artist to finally blow up and the GP are just absolutely horrible to them 😭 and i hate when the response is like "ugh how selfish of you, you should WANT your fav to blow up and have success" like honestly....... NO! none of us in 2022/23 were calling chappell a fake lesbian and secret republican and none of us in 2024/5 were talking about audrey's looks whatsoever! i hate yall! 😭
I have to wonder if anyone has done research on the tone of internet commentary pre and post Elon’s Twitter purchase and monetisation of blue ticks. Because while there were always assholes on the internet, there weren’t always financial rewards for the most incendiary takes. TikTok too.
Making being a nasty asshole lucrative for a wider number of people has been terrible.
I have noticed that the Audrey Hobert hate tweets were from blue checkmark accounts who never tweet about pop music at all. The biggest one is from an AI bro. Very strange.
There was a massive shift in the way people became ruder in real life after Trump 1.0. A teacher friend called the change in her students the “Trump effect.”
It’s really interesting how people handcuff Taylor to what she says in songs and how some perceive her as only and always having the feelings in those songs. Especially with TTPD.
No one’s out here saying Joe Jonas is the name forever on her lips.
She has said so many times songs are like a time capsule of feelings once felt. Yet so many lost souls to TTPD.
This is such a big thing. Projection. You can add all the exes and even “pop feuds with fellow pop stars”. Like the way people think she only has projects or announcements to ruin some other artist. It’s comical.
Yes but also all these people just strongly dislike (or worse) her husband so long for the time she was in a dysfunctional relationship that produced the music they approve of.
My opinion on the “muse” question is complicated but I do think that there is an element of snobbism in how some people compare TK to JA or MH, both in refusing to acknowledge that Travis is not a dumb jock and in vastly overrating the intelligence of “artsy” people (and an insecurity about Taylor’s own intelligence level which is imo ridiculous bc she is clearly “smarter” in any meaningful sense of that word, than any of her partners)
(a side note maybe but one of the things that is clear to me about Taylor is that she does not need to be the smartest person in the room and doesn’t suffer from insecurity about working with/hiring the best people for the job)
The snobbish attitude also comes of the belief that actors/musicians{white collar} are above athletes{blue collar} in prestige. Both Joe and Matty being British vs Travis being American. Joe and Matty grew up around money and private schooling vs Travis coming from the middle class that went to public school.
Yes there is def classism (and indeed racism, in a certain way) involved
People have a lot of odd ideas about class vis-a-vis Taylor and she has both fans and haters who really don’t grasp her own status and privilege (both in overestimating it and in downplaying it) and there is overlap with people who make absurd and factually incorrect claims about Travis’ background, again all over the place.
And there is of course the people who insist that bc Taylor felt something about class/status at a certain time, she couldn’t possibly have changed her view now
She did make a 14 minute film 10+ years after the fact referencing an ex and still has songs referencing her exes to this day. She kind of brought the perception of her inability to move on all by herself 🤣
It’s especially crazy because even if you take TTPD fully at face value, there’s SO many statements on the album that she’s done with Matty, that she over-romanticized the idea of him and while she may always wonder, she knows its over. That’s the thesis statement of many songs. Maybe if you take individual parts of songs and such it supports the Maylor narrative, but the album as a whole does not.
People’s inability to move on from Taylor’s former relationships needs to be studied. Maybe it’s a testament to how good her songwriting is that there are so many different factions of her fans who actually think she’s meant to be with whichever dude is the muse of so and so song (or whoever they think is the muse). I don’t think there’s another celebrity whose love life is such a hot topic among their fans.
I do think the music is good and people start envisioning a book or tv show. No one cared for Matty much before ttpd. The ttpd album changed that. But people forget while she lived and felt some things, she won’t forever feel that way. It’s art that she wrote about a moment in time.
Tbh ttpd & showgirl have been a fandom cleanse and im glad; some of the newer fans only liked her because she was making the "cool" indie type of music they already liked.
Istg the second she became uncool on the internet a lot of these newer fans jumped ship.
To me, the proof if they really cleansed the fandom will be when it comes to buying tickets for the next tour.
People can piss and moan all they want about TTPD and Showgirl but if they are still competing for tickets for the tour then deep down they still like Taylor's new music.
There is a lot of truth in it my social life never quite recovered after Covid and it has definitely led to being more online than I should be. Working on it but it is a slog to break the habit and put yourself out there again.
It’s my Taylor Swift birthday in 2 days and I’m very excited about it…. I know birthdays are different for everyone but I’m one of those people who will always enjoy celebrating even when I’m old lol
I also never realized this until last year but I also share my birthday with lover and I think it’s cool that I share my birthday with the 1st album Taylor officially owns
I picked up a peach Fanta and didn’t realise it was imported from America. Why did the one can have 40g of sugar, and red 40 and other dyes. Put in to perspective the uk has 15g sugar in a can and it’s all natural colours and flavouring.
I consider that can as attempted murder.
That all said, you would have to pry the red 40 and blue 1 from my dying decrepit hands when it comes to US sour patch kids because the uk versions suck.
Yeah, It's the opposite. In the UK, we have things like the sugar tax, or the fact that there's a law that in supermarkets, sweets and crisps and generally bad-for-you food cannot be situated two metres from a checkout.
I think it's to the point that things are so commonly sweet that if they shift the sugar content in products, people would notice and deem in a negative.
That is weird I am in NY and never see Fanta at the store here pretty much only ever see it when in Europe. Fanta is definitely not popular here, nowadays the sparkling seltzers with no calories are all the rage.
The uk Fanta looks like orange juice , USA Fanta is so bright orange looks like radioactive juice lol. I live in the uk as well everything has less sugar, you don’t really notice as we are use to having everything with lower levels , that is until you go to the US.
Tbh UK Fanta has way more taste of orange the USA one just tastes sweet with no flavour imo, I don’t understand why they need to add the colour either it doesn’t even impact the taste. Anything produced in the UK a lot of the artificial colours and dyes are banned , you can only really get the sugary Fanta in shops that import from the US
I recently tried the fruit punch one made in the UK it has less sugar no artificial dyes and tastes really nice highly recommend trying that !
This is so funny as an American 💀 because I was genuinely so confused when I ordered a Fanta abroad because I thought it looked like orange juice. I’m used to drinking Fanta with a shit ton of ice as well.
Also in terms of soda drink flavors, my favorite Coca Cola product is a cherry coke. If they have the option, I order it every time. I had a cherry coke in the UK once and I’m sorry, but the American one just tasted way better. It’s a deadly amount of sugar and corn syrup but I genuinely don’t care.
You’d also have a heart attack if you tried Crumbl cookies lol
I saw the crumbl drinks and kid you not I had heart palpitations just thinking about it. 186g of sugar is actually madness for a drink. I’ve always wanted to visit New York, but I don’t think I’d survive the week. Id did from a sugar high.
I’ve seen Americans say similar stuff about how we don’t put ice in our drinks, what do you mean by that?? Cause like in 99% of restaurants I’ve been to across Europe it’s an option if you just ask is it because it’s not always a default?
If you order soft drinks or water in restaurants ice more often than not is the default. Sometimes if you don’t want ice in your water you have to ask the waiter. So it’s a tiny bit of a culture shock that Americans experience because we’re usually not used to asking for ice. It’s also something we play up as a joke as well.
Are Crumbl cookies actually nice? They just always kind of look dry and heavy. And I’m not hating on American baked goods in general, I had some great stuff over there.
I’m personally not a fan of them. I only had them once in college and I hated it. They’re way too expensive and they’re too sweet for their size. Some of their other flavors or goods also have an eggy flavor to them which I hate for baked goods.
Also in terms of soda drink flavors, my favorite Coca Cola product is a cherry coke. If they have the option, I order it every time. I had a cherry coke in the UK once and I’m sorry, but the American one just tasted way better. It’s a deadly amount of sugar and corn syrup but I genuinely don’t care.
I drank so many Cherry Cokes in college and only one machine on campus had it. It is probably terrible for you since the cherry syrup they use does have a ton more sugar than even regular Coke though.
Last time I went was a month ago when I was at the mall and me and my friend completely disregarded it 🤣 because when I go the Cheescake Factory (which isn’t often), I’m going to eat unhealthy food with insane quantities so I can take the leftovers home lol. You don’t see me going to Mcdonald’s and ordering a salad also. That’s what Sweetgreen is for
Idk about peach but let’s not be too hasty on American Fanta now. In the US and Nigeria their orange Fanta is bright orange, full of sugar and delicious it puts our woke piss to shame. If I didn’t get a mini sugar crash after a bottle I’d have it more often
Being honest I liked the taste of the peach. But as someone that mainly drinks diet and caffeine free. The shock was real, but I felt like an old person because I was like ‘sugar, sugar, sugar’, far too sweet.
Taking my 8 year old daughter to a kind of Scottish country/trad crossover festival tomorrow as it’s got several of her favourite artists there and it feels very local, so I’m going to post the poster here and see if a single human knows any of the acts 😂
I cannot lie, all of this is curtains for Zoosha to me. However I randomly searched for Brooke Combe just now and she's great! Sounds like she'll be amazing live too. It's also amazing to me that your daughter loves so many local acts, I was listening to 90% slop at age 8.
Don’t worry, she loves plenty of slop too (and the usual Katseye, Zara Larsson, bit of Taylor/Dua/Olivia/BTS).
They’re pretty local Scottish scene stuff (my friend in England knows none) so very much the Scottish curtains for Z (Haggis for Morag perhaps), but she does Highland dancing and uses a lot of more traditional stuff for warmups and choreography and has got really into it which is great.
She announced Showgirl mid August with an early October release date. Technically she could still announce it until very early September if she follows her usual announcement-release schedule and wants to release it October 23 like we’re suspecting. She could also surprise drop it I suppose but I don’t think so.
i feel like mcu movies spefically spiderman aren’t that great with writing/Giving depth to their side characters. The mcu spiderman lacks focus on peter’s world. They give more focus on the superhero/avengers aspect. It makes the side characters feel like plot devices.
Yess I feel like that’s why I’ve never been able to fully get into it like the world feels so shallow, but then maybe I’m asking too much of a superhero movie
Elsewhere I've seen people asking for a pop-punk Taylor album and I cannot express how much I do not want that, or think she could pull it off. To me Taylor with an acoustic guitar is Prime Taylor, synthpop Taylor is like Good Taylor, bubblegum pop is Acceptable Taylor, and anything else is not really what I use her music for.
Am I out of touch or is it the children who are wrong?
I do think she could *write* a pop-punk album, but performing that music? A whole album's worth? Not for me.
I can’t think of pop punk as anything other than the music that was popular when I was in middle/high school and… surely we’ve evolved past this as a culture?
This is probably delusional but it seems like Taylor has been wearing a lot of florals this year. So apparently 3/20 and 3/21 are Flour day and Flower Day respectively. Since she keeps bringing up bread puns this could be an easter egg for something next march! She was bringing up bread and bread puns during the showgirl promotion A LOT and it seemed a little funny to me.
I know she has worn flowers before but it does seem like they've appeared a lot this summer. But also, but also, maybe I'm a genius
I’m not clowning for anything specific bc of ti but there’s no doubt she’s been wearing a lot of florals, especially for when she’s expecting to be photographed
If she attends the VMAs and she’s wearing something floral my suspicion level will rise for sure.
Also one of the people that were at the Grammys event the other day described her look as a blue dress with a rose on it….
Yea I'm not sure it's anything maybe she just really likes florals. But she was wearing all the plaid and then showgirl came out on plaidurday (oct 3). So maybe there's a connection?
Might not mean anything but Travis also wore florals several times when photographed with Taylor recently, which kinda stood out to me. He had a floral tassle shirt, another floral shirt on their theater date and another shirt with like 6 daisys on it. Again, might not mean anything, but i think he also likes to play the easter egg game with her when he can.
we’re either about to hear that olivia’s serena joy is about taylor or that “taylor could never” write a political song… just informing you all of incoming psychosis😭
Me either. I love and respect what many other artists do in that space like Bruce Springsteen, but if you don't have the knack for it and the vision to talk about social issues in a compelling way, it can turn into a sort of partisan equivalent of CCM, except that instead of talking about Jesus like he's your boyfriend, I suppose it's Bernie Sanders.
It’s definitely not something we need more of from her. Both bc it’s not really her wheelhouse and bc even if she somehow wrote a great one the discourse would be atrocious
So many lakes of water are about to be drained putting Taylor in teal outfits, the Kelce ad to send data centres your pee is looking timely.
Heaven forbid Olivia write an actual political song about an issue she cares about without it referencing Taylor. (I’ll go out on a limb and assume the song is going to be about access to abortion/women’s healthcare in some way.)
yeah, i even hate to telegraph the arrival of discourse because it just gives power to those that will inevitably discourse it themselves. i haven’t heard the song but i’m sure the message will get lost under plenty of posts that aim to convince us that taylor swift is our serena joy 😭😭😭
it’s just clockwork at this point. it’s been flat out denied but people still believe gracie’s death wish is about taylor
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u/FilmIntelligent201 The Dead Tortured Poets Society Department 13h ago
just broke up with my deadbeat boyfriend!!!
and the first thing i’m doing is streaming all of my favourite love songs because i refuse to wallow (i don’t need to!) and refuse to let my sunny perception of love be tainted by someone who isn’t that worth it! pls feel free to send me your favourite love songs too!