Taylor Swift releases new single 'You Need to Calm Down' right in time to diss homophobia for Pride Month
Impeccably timed for the Pride Month, Taylor Swift has released what just might become the pride anthem of the month. Her brand new single came out (get it?) just hours ago on June 13, and sorry Taylor, but we can't calm down!
From boosting the GLAAD awards to dissing the nasty ideas of homophobia, the Grammy-winning singer just reached newer heights of being woke with her new song, which was released just hours after she revealed the title, cover art, and launch date of her seventh studio album - Lover.
If you thought the Reputation era was over with pastel shades and the vibrant tones in Taylor's last single 'Me!' that featured Brendon Urie, boy, you're about to be proven wrong. The tune is light and cheerful, but the tone of Taylor's remarks on the concept of homophobia - both active and internalized - throws some serious shade. In one particular line, Taylor sings “You just need to take several seats and then try to restore the peace/And control your urges to scream about all the people you hate/‘Cause shade never made anybody less gay.”
She is feisty, she is snarky, and she is sassing homophobes, without being mean. Like millennials would like to profess, Taylor is just spilling outright facts like the piping hot tea it is.
Taylor had teased the song on her Instagram not long ago, but back on June 1 - the first day of this year's Pride Month - Taylor penned an open letter to Tennessee’s Republican Senator Lamar Alexander in support of the Equality Act, which prohibits employers from discriminating against people because of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity. “The fact that, legally, some people are completely at the mercy of the hatred and bigotry of others is disgusting and unacceptable,” she wrote in the letter. And clearly, this song is just an extended version of how she feels about the unabashed and uncontrollable brazen homophobia that still somehow manages to plague the word in 2019.
'You Need to Calm Down' arrives just two months after 'Me!' Her last album, Reputation, dropped in 2017, and a new music video for 'You Need to Calm Down' is slated to arrive this June 17. In a brief video posted on Twitter by Beats 1, Taylor opened up about her new single explaining the idea behind the lyrics. “I’ve observed a lot of different people in our society who put so much energy and effort into negativity,” Taylor said in the clip. “And it made me feel like, ‘you need to just calm down.’”
