A Feminist Reading of "Would've, Could've, Should've" by Taylor Swift

      When it comes to pop culture, I am absolutely obsessed with Taylor Swift. I love her music, and resonate deeply with so much of it. I’m very interested in the evolution of her career, her genre/sound, and her aesthetics. I’m definitely not immune to feeling incredibly parasocial about her, and this is to no surprise: she’s been carefully crafting a unique relationship with her fanbase since the Myspace days. However, I’m adamant about never becoming the type of person to gloss over her flaws (many of which make her a compelling figure, anyway) or to pretend like she’s incapable of doing harm. 

      Taylor is not just a songwriter: she’s a brand. She’s a global empire. She’s a near-billionaire white woman, and as such, it’s no surprise that her attempts at activism are often critiqued as being white feminist/girlboss feminist in nature. Of course, Taylor’s music is largely confessional, and most always from her very personal perspective. I don’t think anyone should expect an intersectional perspective in her songs, but it makes sense that people are disappointed that her activism outside of her music has historically been focused on white, upper class women, as well. In more recent years, she’s improved at attempts of inclusivity when it comes to public statements and actions. She’s used her social media platforms to condemn racism, for instance, as seen in the tweet below, and has made efforts to provide more representation in her music videos, casting queer people, trans people, and people of color, and hiring more female directors and cinematographers.

      Of course, it’d be fair to say that this is the bare minimum one can do, and like I said earlier: Taylor is a brand. Her intentions may be in part motivated by a true sense of justice and desire for equality, but profit and positive PR will always be a driving force in her decision making processes. As the article “Commodifying women’s rights” by Catherine Rottenberg puts it: “Scholars call this brand activism, where corporations attempt to improve their reputation by using some popular and often progressive cause in their PR and advertising campaigns. The businesses and corporations thus give in order to get” (Rottenberg). The Person and Brand are inseparable in this case, and any attempts of making “feminism” a part of her brand is inherently commodifying. A huge example of this is the song of hers that is so desperately trying to be a girlboss anthem: “The Man”. With lyrics like “What's it like to brag about raking in dollars / And getting bitches and models? / And it's all good if you're bad / And it's okay if you're mad” (Swift and Little), Swift is calling out the sexist double-standards that women face, but comes off as surface-level and unrelatable. It’s the sort of perspective that asks “Why can’t I, a white wealthy celebrity woman, have a seat at the man’s table?”, without interrogating why the exclusionary table, where bad behavior is excused, exists in the first place. 

      I think Taylor has much more interesting work than this, and I think it arises when it doesn’t feel like she’s clumsily trying her hardest to make a political statement or act like her experiences are universal. Often, when she writes candidly about her personal and specific experiences, her work ends up feeling more authentically universal anyway, and her statements more substantive. For instance, I’d love to present a feminist reading of her song “Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve”, from her tenth studio album Midnights. 

      “Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve” is a song reflecting, many years later, on the relationship between our nineteen-year-old narrator and a much older man (due to context clues, many people infer it’s referencing John Mayer, who was 32 at the time), referred to as the devil: “And I damn sure never would’ve danced with the devil / At nineteen” (Swift and Dessner). Throughout the track, even more religious imagery is used, such as “Ooh, you’re a crisis of my faith”, “God rest my soul / I miss who I used to be / The tomb won’t close / Stained glass windows in my mind”, and “If you never touched me I could’ve / Gone along with the righteous” (Swift and Dessner). Swift uses this imagery to talk about purity culture, and how the effects of purity culture have caused her to blame herself in wake of the trauma.  

      As the article “‘Purity’ culture: bad for women, worse for survivors of sexual assault” by Jill Filipovic states: “This culture tells women that their bodies aren't really theirs; bodies are only bargaining chips, which can be devalued like a new car driven off the lot. Women aren't inherently valuable, the thinking goes, except so long as we have untouched vaginas to give our husbands (because our partners are always husbands). Virginity trumps intelligence, humor and compassion” (Filipovic). So often, purity culture and slut-shaming are a huge factor in women feeling guilty in cases of assault or abuse. Our narrator is haunted by the internalized messaging of a culture that tells her it is her fault she was manipulated by an older man, and that she is worthless after having been sexual with him. 

      The song’s exploration of how harmful age-gap relationships can be to young women is very interesting to me. Legal yet immoral age-gap relationships have been a very topical discussion as of late, especially in online spaces. Countless teenage girls and women have come forward, talking about how turning eighteen doesn’t immediately make someone immune to being taken advantage of. In the first verse, the narrator comes straight for the man’s throat: “And if I was some paint, did it splatter / On a promising grown man? / And if I was a child, did it matter / If you got to wash your hands?” (Swift and Dessner). She flips the phrase “promising young man” to “promising grown man” and references how he gets to wash his hands of the situation, making a point of how men get to be positively infantilized by patriarchy and never take accountability. “He was so young when that happened, though!”, so many women have heard people dismissively say. “Why are you speaking out and trying to ruin his reputation? He has so much potential!”

      Perhaps the most poignant lyric in the entire song “Give me back my girlhood, it was mine first” (Swift and Dessner), a pained and candid lament. She might’ve been 19-years-old, but she still feels like she lost her youth to this relationship. The whole song calls to mind one of my favorite essays ever, “the pain gap” by cultural writer Rayne Fisher-Quann. The essay, a retrospective on dating older men at age eighteen, perfectly captures how women’s pain over legally nebulous situations is dismissed. “when the question of this grey zone is brought up, scrutiny almost always falls upon the woman; we wonder why she entered the relationship, why she chased older men, why she didn’t listen to her gut. by admitting hurt, she becomes guilty until proven innocent; men, on the other hand, are exonerated by their nonchalance.” (Fisher-Quann). As men get older, their societal value doesn’t decrease in the eyes of patriarchy , but women’s do. A man’s success is measured in wealth and status, and a woman’s success is measured in finding a husband and bearing children. An older man pursuing younger women is societally sanctioned, seen as natural and desired. There’s nothing wrong with it! But at the same time, if a young woman ends up getting hurt by it, she should’ve known not to date them in the first place. Yet another double-standard in a world of infuriating double-standards. 

      By writing this song and exploring these ideas with brutal honesty, Taylor is saying “My pain is important, my side of the story is important, and I deserve to write about it”. This is a fascinating and important feminist statement, in my eyes, and doesn’t feel hollow or seeking to capitalize. 

Works Cited

   Filipovic , Jill. “‘Purity’ Culture: Bad for Women, Worse for Survivors of Sexual Assault .” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 9 May 2013, www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/may/09/elizabeth-smart-purity-culture-shames-survivors-sexual-assault. 

      Fisher-Quann, Rayne. “The Pain Gap.” The Pain Gap - by Rayne Fisher-Quann, internet princess, 21 Nov. 2021, internetprincess.substack.com/p/the-pain-gap?utm_source=profile&utm_medium=reader2. 

  Rottenberg, Catherine. “Commodifying Women’s Rights.” Al Jazeera, Al Jazeera, 8 Mar. 2019, www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2019/3/8/commodifying-womens-rights. 

Swift, Taylor. Aaron Dessner. Lyrics to “Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve.” Performed by Taylor Swift, 2022. Genius, https://genius.com/Taylor-swift-wouldve-couldve-shouldve-lyrics

      Swift, Taylor. Joel Little. Lyrics to “The Man.” Performed by Taylor Swift, 2019. Genius, https://genius.com/Taylor-swift-the-man-lyrics

      Swift, Taylor [@taylorswift13]. “Racial injustice has been ingrained deeply into local and state governments, and changes MUST be made there. In order for policies to change, we need to elect people who will fight against police brutality and racism of any kind. #BlackLivesMatter” Twitter, 9 June 2020, 2:09 p.m. https://twitter.com/taylorswift13/status/1270432961591205888