Ep 942 ｜ Is Taylor Swift a Psyop？
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Summary
Is Taylor Swift a PSYOP? Is the Super Bowl rigged? Is there something wrong with Travis Kelsey? We are going through all of these theories about Taylor Swift and her relationship with Travis Kaylor today, and it might seem trivial, but as we will thoroughly explain, it actually matters a lot. It tells us a lot about the cultural, political, moral, and even theological moment we are in.
Transcript
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Is Taylor Swift a PSYOP? Is the Super Bowl rigged? We are going through all of these theories about
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Taylor Swift and her relationship with Travis Kelsey today, and it might seem trivial,
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but as we will thoroughly explain, it actually all matters. It tells us a lot about the cultural,
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political, moral, even theological moment that we are in. This episode is brought to you by
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our friends at Good Ranchers. Go to GoodRanchers.com, use code Allie at checkout. That's
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Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Tuesday. Hope everyone is having a wonderful week so far.
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If you have not listened to yesterday's episode with Stephen Thin Holland, you've got to go listen
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to it. So many of you who did listen to it or watch it, you've reached out to me telling me
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that you were just sobbing the whole time. And if you're like me, your tears changed from
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tears of sadness, tears of gratitude, to tears of joy and happiness. Such a beautiful story of
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God's redemption. So only listen to it if you want to cry. But they are tears of just thankfulness
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for God's goodness, His power, His faithfulness. And so listen to it if you want to be encouraged by
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the gospel and what God does for His people. All right, before we get into today's episode,
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I want to remind y'all that we've got some cute, cute Valentine's Day merch ready for y'all in the
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merch store. Go to AllieMerch.com. We'll put it up on YouTube. We've got our self-love won't save you
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totes sticker, shirts, and crew necks. I still don't have mine in and y'all are getting y'all's merch. So
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take a picture of it, post it on Instagram, tag me so I can see it. I'm super excited to get mine
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whenever I get mine in. I will also post a picture of it. Self-love won't save you. Related bros,
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make sure to get the Related gal in your life. Some self-love won't save you merch. And then also,
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I know Related bros, you're like, when are we going to get our merch? And even though there's some
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stuff on there that I think some Related bros will wear, you know, my brother and my husband,
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who is the chief Related bro, they're always telling me what kind of merch the Related bros
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actually need. My brother says that the Do the Next Right thing black shirts that we met for Related
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bros, he says that for him, they're a little too, it's a little too busy. There are too many words on it.
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So if you're a Related bro, like my brother, and you feel the same way, you can send some ideas.
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We have some ideas, and they'll be hopefully manifesting themselves in new merch soon. But
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if you've got any Related bro, like hat, shirt, sweatshirt ideas, send them our way. Because I
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know we've got mostly Related gal merch in the merch store, but we want to make sure that we have
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something for y'all too. So send any, send any ideas that you guys have. Alliemerch.com. You can
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check that all out there. All right. We're talking about Taylor Swift. Because of course, have you
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guys heard of Taylor Swift? Do you know who she is? She's a pop singer. She's a pop singer from
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Pennsylvania. Now you might have thought that maybe she's from Nashville. And that's because she
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taught this when she first started. But she's not from Nashville. She's actually from Pennsylvania.
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And as you well know, she has amassed tens of millions of adoring fans over the years.
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I am, I think, two years younger than Taylor Swift. And so those of us who were born,
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yeah, no, three, because she was born in 1989, right? Like that's the name of one of her albums.
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I was born in 92. So she's three years older than me. But anyone born in that range, like we can name
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what era of our life or like what was happening in our life when certain Taylor Swift albums came out,
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like the Fearless album for those of us born in that time. That's like when we got our driver's
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license. And so that is a very, that's a very nostalgic album for me. And even as someone,
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I don't consider myself a Swifty, as it were, but I can name you most of her albums and probably no,
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I wouldn't say most of her songs, but a lot of her songs. And I would say that's true of a lot
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of millennial women. It's just been the backdrop of several significant moments of our lives. And I
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think I've said this before, but I gave the commencement speech for my college graduation
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and of course had to quote her, had to quote her. Now looking back, I'm like, oh, the cheese factor
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was 1000. It was just off the charts when I was doing this, but at the time it got good laughs
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because 22 came out around that time. So happy, free, confused, and lonely at the same time. And
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of course I had to use that in my graduation speech, as I'm sure many, many other graduation speakers did
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in 2014. So I am not, I'm not a Taylor, I'm not a Taylor Swift stan necessarily, but I am not,
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I'm also not a Taylor Swift hater. And there is a battle right now going on between the Swifties
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and the anti-Swifties, if you will. And it has to do with these theories about her popularity
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and also about like why she is so prominently in the news right now and why her relationship
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with Kansas City Chiefs player Travis Kelsey is taking over so many headlines. So as I will detail,
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let me just give you like a TLDR. One side, it seems to be mostly like the conservative side,
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basically saying that it's a psyop, that it's manufactured, that her relationship with Travis
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Kelsey like isn't organic. It's not natural. It was all planned for them to start dating and then
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for the Chiefs to win the Super Bowl, for her to have even more prominence and popularity than she
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did before, and then to encourage everyone to vote for Biden this November. So it's all this big
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fed psyop with Taylor Swift at the center of it. And then of course, you've got some other
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analysis out there. You've got some people saying, no, this is such a positive development. One,
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because they're just happy to see Taylor Swift happy. But other people saying that this is a
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really important cultural moment for the young girls who follow Taylor Swift, seeing her get into
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a stable relationship, possibly get engaged, get married and have kids. And she would be a shining
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example of stability and what the goal should be, they would say, for young women. So we've got this
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battle of ideas going on out there. In addition to some people just saying Taylor Swift is stupid
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and boring. And then the other people saying, no, she is literally an angel sent from heaven. So
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we've got a lot. We've got a lot going on here. But I want to go through the theories. And then I
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want to tell you as someone who is neither a stan nor a hater, what I make of her popularity and just
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kind of why she's in the center of the news and what I think about it right now. Because you've also
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probably heard, just to add another perspective that goes around a lot, especially on Christian
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social media, is that she's a witch and that she, Brie, our resident Swifty is laughing behind the
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camera. But people say she's a witch and they're always looking for like satanic symbolism and stuff
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and the things that she says and does. And I'll address that in a second. So, okay, let's go through
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Okay, Taylor Swift, Taylor Swift. So, in case you didn't know, another reason that we're talking
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about this is because the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday won the NFL AFC West Championships.
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Okay, and I don't even know what all of that means. But I did know this because my husband is a football
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fan and he was watching football on Sunday. So, I did know that they won their game. So, this qualifies
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them to compete against the San Francisco 49ers in the Super Bowl in two weeks. My notes say,
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Brie, parentheses, football experts can provide more context if needed. Are you, are you, I knew
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that you're a Taylor Swift expert. I didn't know you're a football expert.
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I'm a football. I know everything about football.
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Okay, tell us. Is there more context that's needed here?
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No, not really. That's pretty, that pretty much covers it.
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Okay. Good to know. All right. So, a very popular account that I really love following also
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always has really interesting information. So, but this is an example of someone saying that this
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is a psyop. The account End Wokeness says, what's happening with Taylor Swift is not organic and
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natural. It's an op. We all feel it. We all know it. And then you've got the picture of this,
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like, wall of magazines with Taylor Swift as the cover on all of them. Is this real?
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It was Taylor Swift really on the cover of all of these magazines at once. Do you know, Brie?
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I don't know for certain, but it would make sense because that was, I'm trying to see when this
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might've been. Yeah. This is like while her tour is going on. So yeah, it would make sense.
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I guess. Although you can't see the names of any of the magazines except for Time Magazine.
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This looks like actually it's in Barnes and Noble, which means they probably specifically
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made this as like a Taylor Swift. Okay. Got it. Wow. That's crazy. Okay. And so then they have a
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picture of Travis Kelsey and Taylor Swift hugging after the game on Sunday. I saw that thought it was
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pretty cute. And then you've got Taylor Swift in the stands and the boxes. She's watching Travis
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Kelsey. That wasn't on Sunday because her hair is different, but it was part of a different game.
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So we have talked about this before, how they started dating. They apparently started dating
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sometime over the summer. He got what a friendship bracelet, which is like a Taylor Swift thing
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and talked about her on a podcast, right? Yeah. And they started dating what the summer or this fall?
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I think it was a little earlier than everyone thought. So early summer, maybe I think.
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Okay. And this is such a big deal. It's, it's not just another celebrity having a relationship,
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which happens all the time, but she has been as prominent in public as she is. She's been pretty private
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about her relationships, right? Like most people don't put it together if I'm correct until after
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the fact. And they're like piecing songs together to try to figure out like what happened in her
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relationships. And she was dating a guy named Joe for a long time. Yeah. For six years. And it was
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like the whole relationship was completely private. Six years. How does she have time to write? How does
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she have time for all these other relationships that she writes about? Like Jake Gyllenhaal and Harry Styles
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and all these things. That was all before. That was all before the six years. Really? So for the past
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six years, all of her songs, her relationship songs have been about Joe? No, but I mean, she,
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I won't go too deep into the lore, but she, she had an album called Lover, which was very like,
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it was a lot of love songs because she was in love at the time. And her albums after that have mostly
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been like imaginative albums where she's writing like not from her own perspective, but from. Okay.
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Okay. But all too well, people did say that that was about Jake Gyllenhaal. That was about Jake
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Gyllenhaal. And that was before, obviously. That's a good song. It's a great song. I mean,
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it's, it's, there's a 10 minute version now. I shouldn't even say that because I'm not encouraging
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you to go out and listen to it because it is a little explicit. Yeah. The, the 10 minute version
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is. Yeah. The 10 minute version is. Yeah. Okay. So I'm not endorsing it. It's a bad song. I should have
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said that it's bad song. Don't listen to it. Okay. So some online commentators are calling
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Taylor Swift skyrocketing popularity and relationship with Superbowl bound Travis Kelsey,
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not just coincidental, but all part of a government psy op psychological operation to manipulate the
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outcome of the 2024 presidential election. In a January 9th segment, Fox news host, Jesse
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Waters described a 2019 Pentagon meeting where officials mentioned the idea of using a person
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like Taylor Swift as a psyop to combat misinformation. Okay. Here's Jesse Waters saying that.
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You came in here wanting to understand how you just go out there and counter in that information
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operation. Well, the idea is that social influence can help, uh, can help, uh, encourage or, uh,
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promote behavior change. So potentially as like a peaceful information operation, I include Taylor
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Swift in here because she's, um, you know, she's a fairly influential online person. I don't know
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if you've heard of her. Okay. So that wasn't Jesse Waters. That was on the Jesse Waters show. That was
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someone from NATO talking about using Taylor Swift as a way to, as a, basically a messenger for the
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information that they want to put out there, which is, which, you know, is weird, is troubling. Like
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I don't really love hearing government organizations talking about battling so-called misinformation. I
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don't think that they're reliable arbiters of truth at all. And typically what they just mean is people
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who disagree with us. And so using Taylor Swift or any prominent voice as a vehicle for their message,
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I do think is troubling. Does that necessarily mean that Taylor Swift is involved with the federal
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government? Not so sure about that. The Pentagon was quick to push back against the claim, this
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accusation that people were making, this is reported by Politico at the beginning of January. They responded
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saying that this is not true. And they were, uh, tried to be super cute about it. Pentagon
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spokesperson, Sabrina Singh, uh, pushed back against Waters' claim, referencing one of Swift's big hits
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by saying in a statement, as for this conspiracy theory, we're going to shake it off. Oh, I'm cringing,
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but that does highlight that we still need Congress to approve our supplemental budget request as
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swiftly as possible so we can be out of the woods with potential fiscal concerns. I wish she would
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grant the administration a supplemental budget request. Okay. See, that makes me think that
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she's definitely an op. Just that statement in and of itself. Like I'm starting to think that she might
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be a battery powered robot. From that, from that statement, that gives me the heebie-jeebies more than
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anything else. I wish you would not talk Pentagon. I wish you would have not done that. Um, okay.
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Jack Posobiec said, thinking about when Taylor Swift called out the Soros family in 2019 for buying the
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rights to her music and then how she became, how she came out, uh, super liberal in 2020. Uh, then
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Vivek, uh, Ramaswamy, he responded to Jack Posobiec saying, I wonder who's going to win the
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Superbowl next month. And I wonder if there's a major presidential endorsement coming from an
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artificially cultural, culturally propped up couple this fall, just some wild speculation over here.
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Let's see how it ages over the next eight months. So of course that is the, uh, that's the theory
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that's going on here. So in reference to what Jack Posobiec is talking about, her calling out the
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Soros family. Um, here she is in 2019 doing that. I had the chance to purchase my music outright.
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My entire catalog was sold to scooter bronze Ithaca holdings in a deal that I'm told was funded
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by the Soros family, 23 capital and the Carlisle group.
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Okay. So she called them out and then some people are saying, I guess Jack Posobiec is trying to say
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that after that she came out as a liberal, I'm reading in between the lines here. I'm not saying
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Jack Posobiec is saying this, but it seems my interpretation is that some are saying that
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she was basically like punished for calling out the Soros family and that to make up for calling
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them out. She is now like a liberal activist. Do you think that's what the theory is trying to posit?
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I think some people have that theory. I think others just don't really understand the context,
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to be honest, because I think they think, oh, the Soros family helped buy her masters and therefore
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now she's like in bed with them. And the reality is she has nothing to do with them because they were
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sold out from under her. So I think some people are miss conflating those. Yeah. I don't know
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that Jack Posobiec is because he is saying that Taylor Swift called out the Soros family. So he
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understands that it's negative. I honestly, I'm not sure what he's trying to imply. Some people might be
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trying to imply that she's trying to like compensate for calling them out or that someone from the
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Soros family said, hey, you can't call us out. And so now you need to be a liberal activist.
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Who knows what what went on behind the scenes? Jack Lombardi, I'm not sure he's someone on Twitter.
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He said, I have never been more convinced that the Super Bowl is rigged with all the unneeded and
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unwanted Taylor coverage at the games. Casey's journey to the Super Bowl totally scripted.
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Next, Travis and Taylor together at the Super Bowl appearing happy and in love in case he wins
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and then later announcing their support for Biden coincidental. No, bought and paid for a couple.
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OK, so it is true. It is true that Taylor Swift became more vocal about her politics, about her liberal
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politics in 2020. I don't know what motivated this, except that there was kind of a meme that was
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going around that was really popular, basically saying Taylor Swift's silence on this is just
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unbelievable. Some people saying that tongue in cheek, like, duh, we don't need Taylor Swift to talk
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about this. And so they were just kind of joking about it. But then others really saying, you know,
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why isn't she speaking out more about LGBTQ rights and about the right to choose, blah, blah, blah.
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And so people were really pressuring her to stand up against Trump and make sure that everyone knew
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that she was liberal because she had so much influence, has so much influence on the younger
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generation, such a big platform. And they didn't like that she wasn't talking about politics.
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So in 2020, she had a documentary that came out called Miss Americana. I remember watching it at
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the time. And there is a scene where she is talking to her dad about Republican Senator Marsha
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Blackburn, who was running for the position at the time. And she was telling her dad why she needed to
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speak out against Marsha Blackburn and why this was such a big deal to her. So here's
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It really is a big deal. She votes against fair pay for women. She votes against the reauthorization
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of the Violence Against Women Act, which is just basically protecting us from domestic abuse and
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stalking, stalking. She votes. She thinks that if you're a gay couple, or even if you look like a gay
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couple, you should be allowed to be kicked out of a restaurant. It's really basic human rights. And
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it's right and wrong at this point. And I can't see another commercial and see her disguising these
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policies behind the words Tennessee Christian values. Those aren't Tennessee Christian values.
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I live in Tennessee. I am Christian. That's not what we stand for.
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Oh, my goodness. Oh, do you really think Marsha Blackburn thinks that a couple that looks gay
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should be kicked out of a restaurant? Okay, this is something about her. And I know I'm not trying
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to come across as rude. I apologize, Brie. But okay, so in she's 31 years old. In this documentary,
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she comes across, I'm sorry, she comes across as so incredibly young and juvenile. Okay, it's one
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thing to be passionate. I'm all for it, even if you disagree with me. And I think that her position
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is absolutely uninformed there. It just shows that she only can imbibe superficial, propagandistic
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talking points about the issues, that she has no idea what's on the line. She's very politically,
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culturally, and I would say morally and theologically ignorant. That entire clip just encapsulated so
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much ignorance. But also, it reminded me of a teenager trying to convince her dad that she can
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stay out past 11. I'm sorry. She comes across to me, and it's not just in this clip, as extremely
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immature, like extremely young and emotionally stunted. And that clip talking about why she
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couldn't vote for Marsha Blackburn and why she needed to speak out against Trump, that just wasn't
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thoughtful, first of all. And she just didn't seem like she was able to... I hate to say this,
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because I know it can sound patronizing, but just calm down and just articulate your position.
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It was just very, I don't know, is very cringe to me. I'm sorry, Brie. It just wasn't. I know you
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don't agree with her. You don't have to apologize to me, because I agree. I think she is a little bit
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stunted in multiple ways because of what her life is and the phases of life that she kind of skipped
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in being famous at a young age. And so I think... And there is actually another part of that documentary
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where she is talking about how she's 31 there. She's talking about how she can't imagine having
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kids right now. Like, I can't even imagine that. My friends are all having kids. I can't imagine that.
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And I remember watching that. I'm a little bit younger than her. And I was like, that's such a
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weird thing to say at age 31. Yeah. I know some people at 31 feel that way. But for her to say it like,
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that's the weirdest thing to be 31 and having kids. I was like, I don't know. Something is a little
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bit immature there then, right? Yeah. I definitely think so. And I mean, I think that's representative
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of a lot of people in our generation who also feel that way. I just don't think that that is
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the best example for people to follow. Okay. So here is my issue with this idea that in 2019,
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she said that thing about Soros. And then in 2020, she all of a sudden became liberal. So even though
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the Miss Americana documentary came out in 2020, the stuff that she was saying in that clip that
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we showed you, it's actually from 2018. So she did start speaking out about politics a little bit
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and Marsha Blackburn in 2018. She actually posted on Instagram, part of what you just heard her say
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in 2018. She said, in the past, I've been reluctant to publicly voice my political opinions, but due to
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several events in my life and in the world in the past two years, I feel very differently about that.
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Now, I always have and always will cast my vote based on which candidate will protect
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and fight for the human rights. I believe we all deserve in this country. I believe in the fight
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for LGBTQ rights and that any form of discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender is wrong.
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And she goes on and on and on about that. And so she is, she advocated for the pro-abortion,
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anti-parental rights in some ways, a Democrat party or Democratic candidate in Tennessee rather than
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Marsha Blackburn. And she wanted everyone to know that. But that was back in 2018. So the timeline
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that some people are saying that she didn't become liberal until 2020 or outspoken about that, that's
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not, that's not exactly true. And then we have in 2020, if you fast forward a little bit, where she
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does explicitly endorse Joe Biden. She gave her reasoning for her endorsement to V Magazine.
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She says this, the change we need most is to elect a president who recognizes that people of color deserve
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to feel safe and represented. What does that mean? What does that mean? And what has Biden done for
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that? And like, what policies are you talking about? What are you talking about specifically?
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Like, let's get down to the details, lady, that women deserve the right to choose what happens to
00:25:15.520
their bodies. Abortion is not your body. And that the LGBTQIA plus community deserves to be
00:25:22.980
acknowledged and included. Oh, trust me, they are acknowledged. And they're not just included.
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Their sexual preferences and gender confusion is absolutely celebrated. Like, it is central to
00:25:34.860
American society now. Everyone deserves a government that takes global health risks seriously and puts
00:25:41.560
the lives of its people first. Do you think the Biden administration, who refuses to guard the
00:25:46.860
border, puts the lives of its citizens first? Of course it doesn't. It actually very much resents
00:25:51.900
the lives of Americans. The only way we can begin to make things better is to choose
00:25:57.760
leaders who are willing to face these issues and find ways to work through them. I will proudly vote
00:26:02.880
for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in this year's presidential election. Under their leadership,
00:26:07.040
I believe America has a chance to start the healing process it so desperately needs. Of course,
00:26:11.820
this is not true. This is not true at all. They have only caused division. They have only caused
00:26:16.940
resentment. They have only ratcheted up the heat in the country. I mean, do you remember that speech that
00:26:25.240
Biden gave in front of a wall that was bathed in blood red light in which he talks about going after
00:26:34.520
MAGA Republicans? I mean, this is an administration that has targeted with law enforcement pro-lifers
00:26:41.800
and has put political prisoners in jail even for peaceful involvement in the events of January 6th.
00:26:49.240
I mean, this is an administration who has taken away school lunches from poor students because the school
00:26:57.680
that they attend will not allow boys into girls' restrooms. That's not an exaggeration. That's not
00:27:04.060
a fabrication. We have talked about that, detailed that new rule instilled by the Biden administration
00:27:12.340
on this show. We can link the episode to that, and you can learn more about it.
00:27:18.660
And so that's what the Biden administration is. They are rabidly pro-abortion. They are rabidly pro-
00:27:26.780
chemical castration of children. They are anti-fairness in women's sports. They are anti-women's privacy.
00:27:33.960
They are anti-women's safety. This woman who just went on this emotional tirade about the importance
00:27:43.660
of protecting women and how Marsha Blackburn apparently is against protecting women, which is
00:27:49.200
not true. She doesn't care at all about men in women's spaces, men going into women's bathrooms,
00:27:57.340
men going into women's locker rooms, men being placed in women's prisons, men being put in women's
00:28:04.900
domestic abuse shelters, and the women who have been raped and beaten and victimized, murdered even
00:28:10.420
because of these policies, and which perverse men who have a fetish that has to do with them dressing
00:28:17.360
up as women are placed in these private and vulnerable spaces with women. Taylor Swift, who apparently
00:28:23.240
cares so much about being stalked and victimized herself, she doesn't care about those women.
00:28:29.080
No, she's going to vote for the administration and the party that advocates for those policies,
00:28:34.920
that pushes those policies, all in the name of being inclusive. Here's a picture of Taylor Swift
00:28:42.580
showing Biden cookies that she probably did not make herself, but she decided to show them on
00:28:52.040
Instagram. Yeah, very cute. And by the way, Marsha Blackburn won her election, even with Taylor Swift
00:28:59.420
weighing in on that. But she might have more influence now, perhaps, than she did in 2018.
00:29:08.480
As she posted in September 2023, she said, are you registered to vote yet? I've been so lucky to see
00:29:15.040
so many of you guys at my U.S. shows recently. I've heard you raise your voices and I know how powerful
00:29:20.420
powerful they are. Make sure you're ready to use them in our elections this year. And then vote.org said
00:29:27.800
that they saw a 1,200% increase in traffic to their site in the course of an hour. So I don't know,
00:29:37.140
maybe she will actually have some influence on this election in the coming year. I'm not sure about
00:29:43.640
that. Do we have the thought of her at her concert and her little monologue about Pride Month? Yeah.
00:29:54.960
And I wish that every place was safe and beautiful for people in the LGBTQ community.
00:30:01.200
I would really wish that. Because, you know, we can't talk about Pride Month without talking
00:30:09.500
about pain. There, there, right now, and recently, and in the recent years, there have been so
00:30:17.600
many harmful pieces of legislation that have put people in the LGBTQ and queer community at risk.
00:30:24.140
It's painful for everyone, every ally, every loved one, every person in these communities. And
00:30:34.600
that's why I'm always posting. This is when the midterms are. This is when these, these important
00:30:42.740
Okay. What recently, in recent years, and recently, and also in recent years, there has been much
00:30:56.600
danger and many trouble for LGBTQ people. Literally, we have drag queens going into public schools and
00:31:05.880
reading books to kindergartners. That is something that's happening. And we're going to pretend like
00:31:10.780
they are being persecuted. Because people are saying, Oh, yeah, I don't think that like the
00:31:15.300
grown man and fake boobs and fishnets should be funded by our tax dollars when they are going into
00:31:22.720
public libraries and reading books about gender confusion and sexual orientation to kids. Oh,
00:31:29.900
yeah, you know, I don't think that these books about pedophilia and sexual predation should be in
00:31:38.040
public school libraries. That's is that danger? Is that the danger that you're talking about? Like
00:31:44.040
when people have the audacity to say, I don't think I want my third grader to be reading about
00:31:49.740
gender switching, and maybe being born in the wrong body? Like, is that the persecution? Is that the
00:31:56.700
danger? Is that the harm that you're talking about? Is the beautiful world that you're talking about
00:32:01.080
creating a world in which like drag queens are reading sexually explicit content in like a public
00:32:08.640
libraries? Like, what are what exactly are you talking about? She doesn't know. She has no idea.
00:32:14.900
She doesn't know. She has no idea. And again, this comes across as someone who has like a grasp on the
00:32:23.400
issues equal to that of like, I don't know, a 14 year old. Really? I mean, her ability to
00:32:30.500
a talented person. Okay, I know that there's people out there who are like, she's not talented
00:32:35.420
at all. I don't get it. Blah, blah, blah. I think that's a boring take. Because obviously,
00:32:39.500
she's amassed 10s of millions of adoring fans. You don't do that if you're not talented. She's
00:32:45.220
talented. Okay. She's talented. She's talented songwriter, pop writer. She never claimed to be
00:32:52.020
like an actual poet, but she's writing pop songs. She's really good at that. I totally see her appeal.
00:32:57.160
I really do. I'm not one of those just like straight up haters. But at the same time, I just
00:33:04.560
and don't think that she is the sharpest tool in the shed. And therefore, I don't think that she's
00:33:10.360
someone that anyone should be going to for any kind of significant commentary. Not when it comes
00:33:16.300
to relationships. Not when it comes to morality. Not when it comes to politics or culture. Certainly
00:33:23.620
not theology. Anything like that. She just comes across as extremely and disturbingly to me,
00:33:30.740
young. Like she has stayed the age that she was when she sang teardrops on my guitar. And that's not
00:33:39.520
good. But you know, Bri, this kind of makes sense because you have talked about Travis Kelsey not
00:33:49.500
being the sharpest tool in the shed. And you always make me laugh whenever you're talking
00:33:54.040
about that. What did he say the other night in his like victory speech? Yeah, when they won the
00:33:59.860
championship, he came up and they're like asking them, you know, for initial reactions. And he just
00:34:05.280
screamed, you got to fight for your right to party. And you hated that. I hated it. I hated that so much.
00:34:12.580
Yeah. And you said you don't think that there's like a whole lot going on there beyond.
00:34:16.960
I think it's just football in his brain. And that's the only thing he's capable of.
00:34:23.680
Yeah. And I think a lot of people see Taylor Swift as like this brilliant and strategic businesswoman,
00:34:29.840
which I think that she probably is a strategic businesswoman. Again, you don't get to where you
00:34:33.920
are without, you know, some form of intelligence. Definitely. I don't I don't think I'm not saying
00:34:43.960
I think she's stupid. I don't think that I think that she has an uncanny ability to write really
00:34:48.280
clever songs. You have to have a lot of intelligence to do that. She's obviously been able to maneuver
00:34:52.800
this industry to the point of success. So I'm not saying that. But I actually don't really think
00:34:58.260
they're intellectually mismatched. I don't know. Bri, do you disagree with me?
00:35:02.980
That is that's a hot take. That's a take. Because I don't think they're intellectually
00:35:06.980
mismatched. I don't. The memes when this relationship started were that like she's had
00:35:11.860
intelligent, artistic reader boyfriends in the past. Yeah, that's been the problem.
00:35:16.260
And now she's just, you know, she's gotten to a point where she's dating someone like him.
00:35:21.840
And I think she I mean, I disagree. I think she's intelligent in a way.
00:35:30.360
Well, that's what I said. I think so, too. Yeah, she's intelligent. I don't think she's stupid.
00:35:35.040
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes. I think there's a certain ignorance probably that most celebrities are
00:35:40.320
blinded by. But yeah, no, I don't think they're intellectually matched. I really don't. I have
00:35:47.180
no idea what they could possibly talk about at night. I don't. Yeah. But I think the displays of
00:35:54.140
intellect that she gave us in those past two clips, which, okay, I understand not everyone
00:35:59.960
has their best moments. But like, if you can't talk about it, don't talk about it. I just was
00:36:06.520
stunned at her inability to be able to express a coherent thought. Even if you don't know that
00:36:12.700
much about politics, I expect you to be able to say something a little bit more informed or a little
00:36:19.500
bit more compelling. But that was Kamala Harris. That was no better than Kamala Harris. So my hot
00:36:25.200
take is that Travis Kelsey, he's got his expertise. You know, he is he you have to have some form of
00:36:31.240
intellect to be good at football and to understand football and to be really skilled at it. You
00:36:35.460
obviously have to have a form of intellect to be able to be as successful as Taylor Swift is.
00:36:40.400
So they've both got their arenas. But when it comes down to talking about serious stuff,
00:36:44.420
I personally think that they're on the same level. That's my that's my hot take. That's my
00:36:49.060
hot take about that. That's probably fair. I probably agree with that. Actually, seeing those
00:36:55.260
clips because she did have time. Like both of those cases, she had time to think about what she was
00:37:00.640
going to say beforehand. And it does seem like she didn't. So probably could have even somehow set up
00:37:06.980
like a teleprompter. She could have someone else write it for if she wanted to. And yeah, I just think
00:37:14.080
that. But but you know, a lot of progressives, especially progressive women are extremely and
00:37:20.160
I'm not saying emotions are always bad or it's always wrong to be emotional, but are extremely
00:37:24.780
emotionally driven, extremely emotionally driven. They suffer, as I said on Twitter, and I'm writing my
00:37:32.720
book about they suffer from pathological empathy, where they just feel so much and only feel that they
00:37:40.880
are just completely ignorant of what's true. And they don't really want to know what's true. And
00:37:46.820
you could say you could argue whether it's actually empathy or whether it's narcissism, savior, complex
00:37:51.500
ego, things like that. I don't know exactly what it is. It's probably a mixture of the two.
00:37:58.080
But there is a complete unwillingness to think through the complexities of an issue like abortion,
00:38:08.260
like immigration, like justice and race and all of these things, because there's no incentive to do
00:38:14.140
that, by the way. There's no incentive to do that. Like she knows that she can say all of these things
00:38:18.820
and that she's still going to get people who are conservative to listen to her. She knows that.
00:38:25.120
And that's probably true. Conservatives, we are way more willing to just appreciate the talents of a
00:38:31.320
person, even if we disagree with them, whereas liberals are really not. And we kind of have no choice.
00:38:37.260
Like, it's just what it is. But yeah, so I don't know if you have anything to add there,
00:38:45.320
Brie. Tell me, well, OK, sorry. Sorry to interrupt. I want to hear that. But then also adding on to
00:38:51.300
that, tell us again your prediction of what's going to happen with Travis and Taylor this year.
00:38:56.600
Well, I think they're going to get engaged. I don't think it's going to everyone's like at the Super
00:39:01.060
Bowl. And I'm like, no, I don't think she wants that. I think I think it will be a little bit more
00:39:07.060
private than that. But I do think they're going to get engaged. And to be honest, I think she's
00:39:11.860
going to settle down a little bit, at least a little bit after her tour is over at the end of
00:39:16.360
this year. So. But you did say that you don't think that they're going to get married.
00:39:21.380
I know I did say that. Maybe. I don't know. I may have changed my tune a little now that I've seen
00:39:29.360
clips of them actually together seeming to like each other.
00:39:33.760
Yeah. So. So you think it's real. What do you think about these? What do you think about the
00:39:40.200
I think it's a lot of people who don't know everything. And I'm certainly not saying I know
00:39:48.440
everything, but I think there are a lot of missing pieces that they're not seeing. I think there's a
00:39:54.260
lot of conservative panic that sometimes happens with celebrities that are this big. And I don't
00:40:00.760
agree with it. I think she's just a celebrity and I think she just has huge influence. It's not really
00:40:06.340
news to me that someone this big would have influence over an election. I don't know why
00:40:11.080
that's making headlines, really, because of course, of course, she's going to influence her younger.
00:40:16.400
She's liberal. Yeah, of course, she's liberal. Of course, she believes those things. And
00:40:20.180
in comparison to other celebrities, she actually doesn't talk about it as much as
00:40:24.380
a lot of them do. She's just bigger. So when she does, it's amplified more. So I don't know.
00:40:31.180
I don't. So what do you think is behind all of this hate? Like,
00:40:34.260
why do you think people are assuming it's a psyop and like, it's this contrived thing?
00:40:40.000
I think because there's so much fascination with her, like she's always on. Well, she's not always
00:40:47.240
on screen in football games. She is. People are pressed about that. It's a small fraction of
00:40:51.780
the time she's on screen, but she is on screen when the Chiefs are playing. And I think that core
00:40:56.780
audience, the NFL core audience hates that because she's not their core audience. And that has,
00:41:02.960
I think that has amplified things a lot. And now people are like, she's everywhere. We can't get
00:41:07.360
rid of her. She's at football games. She's at concerts. She's on magazine covers because she's
00:41:12.080
kind of at the height of her career right now. And you see clips of her everywhere when she's on tour
00:41:16.860
and now she's at football games. And I get it. She is everywhere. And you can feel like you can't
00:41:22.120
get rid of her. But I'm going to make people mad and I'm going to make the other side mad now.
00:41:27.480
People who are mad that she's being shown at a football game because it apparently trivializes
00:41:36.540
football. Football is trivial. Football is trivial. Okay. Like I'm not saying that it's not a great
00:41:46.060
thing to care about. That's great. I understand the importance of sports, but it's a football game.
00:41:54.280
It's a football game. At the end of the day, it is a game where a bunch of guys are passing a ball
00:42:02.000
down a field. Okay. That's what it is. It's impossible to trivialize it more than what it is.
00:42:09.440
And so I don't understand the big stink about Taylor Swift being shown on camera. On the other hand,
00:42:17.780
I also don't understand why she is so offended by people caring about that. At the award show
00:42:25.680
the other night, Joe Coy, I think that's his name. He's the comedian. He made a very, I thought,
00:42:32.620
lighthearted joke about Taylor Swift being shown on the camera at Chiefs games. And the camera
00:42:39.640
pan to her and she was just sitting there, stone-faced. I cannot believe this is what I'm
00:42:46.520
imagining she's saying. I cannot believe he would make a joke about me being shown on camera. It would
00:42:52.320
have been great for her to just be like, ha, ha, ha, ha. That's so funny. Everyone knows she doesn't
00:42:56.040
have control over it. Why didn't she laugh? I know it was a joke at the expense of the NFL,
00:43:01.640
not at her, which I was also really confused by that. Why be offended by that? It's possible also
00:43:07.920
that they cut away before she could react. And that was just her like hearing it. I don't know.
00:43:14.820
I don't know. But true. That's true. That was my initial reaction too. I was like, why are you?
00:43:19.420
Yeah, maybe. Yeah, maybe. Who knows? Maybe it was like a timing thing and she actually did laugh at
00:43:24.960
it and now it's gone viral on social media and she just doesn't feel like defending herself,
00:43:29.360
which is fine. There is a clip though from the last game and we don't know what she was saying,
00:43:35.200
but it looks like she's looking up at herself being shown for a long period of time. And at the
00:43:40.920
very end, she goes, go away, please. That's what you think she's saying based on lip reading. And
00:43:47.560
I mean, I would feel the same way, honestly. Stop showing me then if you're all complaining about it.
00:43:53.440
Yeah. But I think the NFL probably likes the chatter. Oh yeah. Whether it's people are arguing,
00:43:59.960
happy, mad about it. They like the chatter about it because it does make people like you and me
00:44:06.420
talk about it. Whereas typically we wouldn't be talking about football right now. So that's fair.
00:44:12.420
I just don't really care. I, well, we just spent an hour talking about it, but I just mean like,
00:44:18.740
it doesn't make me feel super happy. It doesn't make me feel super angry. Maybe I would care more
00:44:25.880
if I were a football fan. But okay, I've got some more. I'll give you to finish this. I didn't think
00:44:32.740
we were going to spend the whole episode on it, but here we are. I'll finish it with my thoughts
00:44:37.460
about her influence. Could she actually impact the election? Should she be someone that people
00:44:42.780
look up to in any regard or not? Okay. Um, here's, here's my thought. Uh, Taylor Swift
00:45:02.120
is extremely influential, but I don't think she is going to convince anyone or at least very many
00:45:11.000
people to vote Democrat, uh, who weren't going to already. I mean, maybe like maybe Mary Margaret,
00:45:21.780
the uninformed 22 year old UGA grad from Alpharetta in her first year in her big girl marketing job,
00:45:26.500
whose parents voted Republican, but who's now feeling like a little rebellious and is thinking
00:45:30.980
of voting for Joe Biden. Maybe, maybe her, like maybe she'll be convinced by Taylor Swift,
00:45:36.020
but also like give her five years. Mary Margaret will be married and her husband will,
00:45:40.500
set her straight. Um, now will Taylor Swift cause a baby boom? That's what some people are saying
00:45:46.160
that they are going to like, she's going to encourage women into this stable, like domesticated
00:45:53.220
life of having kids. Maybe, maybe that would be a positive development. Um, or maybe she will
00:46:00.680
convince women that having a long series of seemingly toxic, unhealthy long-term relationships until you
00:46:06.420
find the rich man of your dreams when you're 34 and everything just falls together is normal and
00:46:13.060
good, but it's not, that's not a goal to aspire to not for anyone, but especially, especially not
00:46:19.880
for the Christian. Now I'm not talking about the getting married in your thirties part. I'm not saying
00:46:26.320
that is, uh, in itself negative. Most women I know who are single in their thirties or unmarried in
00:46:33.420
their thirties have wanted to be married for a long time. I'm talking about the apparently poor
00:46:39.340
judgment in men, the relationships that are so high emotion that are turbulent, that are sexual,
00:46:45.040
that always end in so much heartbreak. That is not the thing to aspire to. And it's not just Taylor
00:46:51.460
Swift. It's Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo, Selena Gomez, Billie Eilish. I mean, so many other artists
00:46:57.220
that romanticize like the codependent, deeply involved dating relationships that end up going
00:47:03.540
up in flames. And that not only should not be romanticized, it shouldn't be normalized. That's
00:47:09.660
not normal. It's common. It's not normal. It's the same effect that like Nicholas Sparks movies and
00:47:15.140
Colleen Hoover books have. They normalize and then glamorize instability. And then they mistake
00:47:21.340
lust for love that has really big, bad consequences. And what I want you to know, whether you're a
00:47:28.420
Taylor Swift stan or a hater, wherever you are, is that you're better than that. Like you're better
00:47:35.120
than the example that someone like Taylor Swift sets for you. God wants better for you. Whether you get
00:47:41.000
married in your twenties, thirties, forties, not at all. God wants peace for you. He wants joy for you.
00:47:46.740
He wants healthy relationships for you. He wants sexual purity for you. Married, unmarried,
00:47:52.620
mother or not, you can have a life that is peaceful, that is emotionally stable. You can have
00:47:58.580
self-control. You can honor your body and your integrity. I know the dating scene from what I hear
00:48:04.980
is rough out there. I understand. But it has always been difficult and countercultural to be a Christian.
00:48:12.500
The gate is narrow, but it is better. It is worth it. Taylor Swift, at least from what she has shown
00:48:20.100
us, has largely not been very happy much of her adult life. She seems to not really know still who
00:48:28.000
she is, who her real friends are, what her beliefs are. So don't fall for the lie that this kind of
00:48:33.900
juvenile confusion is normal and good as a 33-year-old. It is not. It's not normal and good.
00:48:41.180
For some reason, Taylor Swift's version of, at least what I see in a lot of her songs,
00:48:46.920
narcissism, pettiness, immaturity, feminism, promiscuity, awkward sexuality, is categorized,
00:48:52.520
is cute and harmless and even inspiring for Christian women. It's not. Now, I will also say,
00:49:01.220
hopefully as a voice of reason here, I also don't think that she's as harmful as others think that
00:49:08.360
she is. Like, I don't think she's harmless, but I also don't think she's as harmful as some people
00:49:12.560
make her out to be. I think people obsess way too much about things like symbolism and psyops.
00:49:19.560
I just think that she's a person, like a very influential person, a talented person,
00:49:24.500
not a very smart person, IMO, not the person on whom the Western world will rise and fall.
00:49:31.240
But also, she's not a great role model for young girls. I mean, I like her music. I think you can
00:49:38.260
enjoy some people's talent without idolizing them or endorsing their worldview, but she's just not
00:49:44.640
someone I would, you know, hoist up and say everyone should be like her and you should be
00:49:49.760
taking your teen girls to her shows. No, no. I think because she seems so young and juvenile and
00:49:57.080
she's not as sexual as some other artists like Beyonce or whoever else, people think that,
00:50:03.040
oh yeah, it's good to take my 13, 14-year-old to her shows when like, oh my gosh, the messages that
00:50:09.600
she is relaying in some of her songs, while those of us who are older are able to filter them out,
00:50:15.300
I'm not sure that a 13-year-old should be listening to a song like Karma. I don't. That's a horrible
00:50:21.220
theological message, like a horrible worldview. It's always all about her and everyone who has
00:50:28.060
wronged her and other people's like misunderstanding of her intentions and things like that. The closest
00:50:34.320
that she got, I think, to like wisdom, discernment, and self-awareness is when she said, it's me,
00:50:39.740
hi, I'm the problem, it's me. And that is a good message for all of us, actually, because at the end
00:50:45.340
of the day, we're not responsible for everything that happens to us, but we are responsible for
00:50:50.840
the choices that we make. And a lot of what happens to us is actually dependent upon the choices that
00:50:57.260
we make. Not everything, but a lot. And so I appreciate that. Maybe that was like a glimmer of
00:51:02.020
hope, of maturity for Taylor Swift. But I guess that's where I fall on it. I'm sure other people
00:51:08.260
have had the same stance. Like, I don't think that she is as influential as some people think. I also
00:51:14.040
think that she is more influential than others think. I don't think that she is talentless. I
00:51:19.880
don't think she's the most talented person in the world. I don't think that she is a psyop. I do think
00:51:25.120
that she will have political influence to maybe push one segment of the demographic to being more
00:51:33.480
liberal than they would have been already. I still have my doubts about that. There have been a lot of
00:51:38.800
influential celebrities out there who have tried to sway elections and it just hasn't worked. I think
00:51:44.860
of like Beto O'Rourke. I think of Stacey Abrams and all of the Hollywood voices and dollars that were
00:51:53.380
flooded into their campaigns and they ultimately lost. And so, yeah, I mean, would I rather her not
00:52:00.060
be like a diehard pro-choice advocate? Would I rather her not make songs that say like,
00:52:06.260
you need to calm down and depict all people who are for biblical marriage and the reality of the
00:52:13.200
gender binary as like backwoods hicks who don't brush their teeth? Yes, I would prefer that. But
00:52:19.520
it's also just like, it's what basic celebrities do. And I'm sorry, it's popular shit. She's a basic
00:52:24.660
celebrity. She has no grasp of what's going on. She has no theological wisdom whatsoever. And therefore,
00:52:30.020
she should not be emulated, especially by Christian women. So that's my take on it all. And Taylor Swift
00:52:37.120
took up the whole time, the whole time. That's something, I mean, that's impressive that she is able
00:52:43.740
to command so much attention from so many people. But there you go. That's my take on that. And we've
00:52:50.160
got a lot to talk about this week, especially since we didn't cover the other stories that I wanted to talk
00:52:53.880
about today on today's episode. So we'll be covering a lot of that tomorrow. We'll be talking
00:52:59.000
about Rip Curl, the surfing company, cutting ties with Bethany Hamilton and going with a guy who
00:53:06.140
pretends to be a girl. I will also respond to what I responded to on Instagram about the lie that
00:53:16.580
rapes are up because of abortion bans. If we have time, I'll respond to Alistair Begg and what he's
00:53:24.340
been saying about attending gay weddings. And gosh, there's just so much. There's so much to talk
00:53:29.380
about. And I'll try to get to all of it in the next couple of days. But thank you so much for
00:53:34.360
listening and watching. And we will be back here tomorrow.