By my basic definition, it means that you hope for equal rights and opportunities for men and women. It’s an issue every day that I read a headline that says, “Careful, guys. She’ll write a song about you.” Meanwhile, I have best friends who are male musicians and songwriters, who write songs about their girlfriends and their ex-girlfriends, and that joke is never made about them. As women in public eye, our relationships are tallied up in ways that they aren’t for men. And if men have a lot of relationships that are tallied up, it’s thought of as mischievous, cheeky. “Oh he’s just out again with another girl.” It’s somehow done with a wink and a smile and for us, and it’s supposed to be shameful, if we’ve had a few relationships that haven’t worked out. When I open up a magazine and it says, “Who’s the hotter mama: J-Lo or Beyoncé ?” You don’t see, “Who’s the hotter dad: Matt Damon or Ben Affleck?” It just doesn’t happen. And if we continue this perception that women should be compared to other women and there’s a winner and a loser, we’re doing ourselves a huge disservice as a society.
— Taylor Swift on feminism (
x)