If Mean Girls taught us anything, it's that no good comes from women pitting themselves against other women. Plenty of celebrities have been accused of attacking their female peers in the industry, and recently the issue was brought up again by none other than pop star Taylor Swift... who was then accused of doing the exact same thing to other women by two alleged subjects of her songs. Yikes.
In case your WiFi has been unplugged all week, here's how all of the drama started. After misreading a series of comments that Nicki Minaj made about the "Anaconda" music video being snubbed for "Video Of The Year" at the VMAs, the "Blank Space" singer called out Nicki for not being supportive of other women.
@NICKIMINAJ I've done nothing but love & support you. It's unlike you to pit women against each other. Maybe one of the men took your slot..
- Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) July 21, 2015
It turns out that Nicki wasn't actually throwing shade at Taylor at all - she was actually bringing up a very important point about lack of recognition for black female artists in the industry. Tay apologized to Nicki (both via Twitter and, according to Nicki, over the phone) and all seemed to be a-okay in celeb-land... until two more stars decided to call out Taylor's hypocrisy.Katy Perry, the alleged subject of "Bad Blood," had this to say about the singer accusing Nicki of not supporting women:
Finding it ironic to parade the pit women against other women argument about as one unmeasurably capitalizes on the take down of a woman...
- KATY PERRY (@katyperry) July 22, 2015
I'm a big Taylor fan, but I don't blame Katy for calling out Taylor in this moment. Taylor is allowed to write about whatever she wants in her music, but "Bad Blood" definitely hints at a dislike for Katy, and the song isn't exactly "on message" with building other women up. It's also not the first time that Taylor has called out another woman in her songs - she allegedly penned the 2010 song "Better Than Revenge" about actress Camilla Belle, who "stole" Joe Jonas away from her when she was 18. It looks like Camilla hasn't forgotten about that - at least, from the look at her tweet to Katy:
@katyperry Couldn't have said it better...
- Camilla Belle (@CamillaBelle) July 23, 2015
Here's the thing: these women are right. Taylor isn't always perfect in supporting women, and she does have a history of using her music to target the women who wrong her. That's not okay, and I don't think that Taylor would say that it is, either. When asked by The Guardian about song "Better Than Revenge," she stated that it was a song she wrote when she was just 18 and believed that someone could actually steal your boyfriend away. Now she knows better. Like all of us, Taylor isn't perfect - sometimes her ideals don't match up with her actions. We don't have to excuse her behavior, but we can hope that she takes the criticism she is receiving and uses it to truly practice what she preaches. Hopefully we'll see Tay extend an olive branch to Katy and to Camilla directly, because for someone who wants to build women up, she could start with the people who feel she has cut them down.