At the same time Forbes was crowning Taylor Swift the top-earning celebrity of 2016, with the other kind of receipts totaling $170 million, cracks were starting to show in the foundation upon which she built her empire.
First there were a few light tremors, triggered by the relationship known as Hiddleswift planting its steel-tipped flag into the ground with a force that our fickle earth was unprepared for. But believers in true love, freedom, privacy and other sanctities quickly set about patching any blemishes on the surface.
Yet while Swift's devoted fan base remained unshaken, the fence started getting crowded with the curious and the skeptical, the unconvinced souls peering through the slats, eager to see if a shoe had indeed been dropped—and if the other would soon follow.
Then, last week—many weeks after the Internet figured out that Swift was "oooh"-ing on the chorus of ex-boyfriend Calvin Harris and Rihanna's song "This Is What You Came For" and that "co-writer Nils Sjoberg" was actually Swift—TMZ put it out there that Sjoberg was totally Swift. And the site also reported that Swift felt totally betrayed by Harris when he said in an interview the day the song came out that he couldn't foresee ever collaborating with his then-girlfriend.
Swift's camp then officially confirmed that she wrote the song and used the alias.
A source told E! News that Swift agreed to not promote her role in the song when it came out so as not to overshadow her boyfriend, and Harris tweeted as much, calling her lyric-writing skills "amazing.
"Hurtful to me at this point that her and her team would go so far out of their way to try and make ME look bad at this stage though," Harris tweeted July 13, presumably referring to the news that Swift was pissed at his interview, as if she had had no idea he was going to deny working together. (Which, if you get into semantics, he didn't do—rather, he said it wouldn't happen in the future.)
"I figure if you're happy in your new relationship you should focus on that instead of trying to tear your ex bf down for something to do," the EDM star continued. "I know you're off tour and you need someone new to try and bury like Katy ETC but I'm not that guy, sorry. I won't allow it. Please focus on the positive aspects of YOUR life because you've earned a great one."
OK, there's a time and a place for everything, and this wasn't it. Because Swift didn't really do anything to him at that point other than just accept her months-old credit for writing a melody and some song lyrics—and she did that rather quietly.
But the aforementioned fence, already crowded with the curious, started to look like a scene out of The Walking Dead. Wide-eyed, gaping faces everywhere, agitated hands rattling the gate, chomping at the bit and declaring the #TaylorSwiftPartyIsOver because—aw, damn—Harris had just called Swift out for being vengeful and manipulative.
Though while this didn't look good for Swift, and the sheer realization that so many people were on the fence about her in the first place was surprising, Harris didn't exactly do himself any favors. He already had his hit record and he's been working, traveling and surrounded by pals since the split. Moreover, it wasn't as if he could be accused of moving on too fast should he venture out on a date.
Harris, though you couldn't really blame him for his Twitter tantrum, came off looking pretty petty.
And then on the evening of July 17, Kim Kardashian set fire to the fence
Off our thumbs trotted to Snapchat, only to find, in snippet after captivating snippet, a video of Kanye talking to Taylor on speakerphone, telling her all about the "I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex" line—and Swift getting a kick out of it. If a part of the talk existed in which Swift warned West about sending a "strong misogynistic message," as she originally claimed, no one got to hear it.
Call it shade, call it tea, call it receipts, call it what you will: Twitter had never eaten a pop star alive so quickly. The fence was no match for the thousands of hungry souls who poured forth to crash the #KimExposedTaylorParty.
By the time Swift's well-thought-out statement (it was pointed out that her screen grab indicated it was something she had searched for because it already existed on her phone) hit the Internet, in which she pointed out that she hadn't heard the finished product and in the end hadn't enjoyed being called "that bitch," the damage was done.
With cracks in Swift's meticulously manicured image already starting to show, Kimye sent the whole construct crashing down.
Or did they?
Now, however, the expert defense isn't so much about how she's a lovely girl, leave her alone. But rather headlines such as "Taylor Swift Is Cold-Blooded and Calculating. That's What Makes Her a Great Pop Star" (Vox) and "I Don't Care if Taylor Swift Lied & Here's Why" (Refinery 29).
Forbes, the actual-receipt counters, stated: "Taylor Swift's Carefully Cultivated Image Is Starting to Crack." Then there's the "Taylor Swift 1989-2016" pictures making the rounds, which is just creepy—and more than a tad premature
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