6 Celebs Who Aren’t Afraid to Shade Taylor Swift’s Squad
If you care about pop culture to any extent, then you have an opinion on Taylor Swift’s squad, the young, gorgeous, relevant, and mostly caucasian celebrities Taylor publicly hangs out with at award shows and holidays.
While some people can’t see anything wrong with Taylor’s focus on promoting the female friendships in her life, there are people out there whose eyes immediately start rolling at the mere mention of the word “squad.”
Maybe it’s because once T Swift touches anything it becomes uncool overnight, or maybe it’s because all her friendships seem kind of fake and elitist — a way for Taylor to capitalize on society’s current obsession with girl power and feminism while also helping her shed her boy-obsessed, mean girl image, even as she becomes an increasingly visible figurehead of America’s most prominent clique.
T Swift’s squad may stand for girl power, but it also stands for feuds, evidenced by her squad’s public debut in the music video for “Bad Blood.”
And yet, somehow T Swift’s squad remains a national touchstone of friendship goals.
It’s genuinely perplexing and complicated, but here are six celebs who aren’t afraid to shade T Swift’s squad publicly.
1. Hailey Baldwin
“I don’t know what having a squad means. I just have my friends and that’s it,” Hailey Baldwin shared in her exclusive interview with the well-known outlet Yahoo7 Be. “I don’t think that you need to create a public squad. I don’t know what that proves. So I don’t really understand the Taylor Swift squad at all.”
2. Miley Cyrus
“I’m not trying to be in the squad,” Miley told the NY Times. “None of my friends are famous and not because of any other reason than I just like real people who are living real lives, because I’m inspired by them.”
Of course, this isn’t strictly true. Some of Miley’s friends are actually famous, at least in some circles — Stella Maxwell, Wayne Coyne, Zoe Kravitz — but whatever. She’s just being Miley.
3. Demi Lovato
“I’m also ready for self-proclaimed feminists to start speaking out or taking action for women’s rights,” Demi said, giving Taylor some thinly veiled shade in an interview with Glamour. “Take something to Capitol Hill or actually speak out about something and then I’ll be impressed.”
4. Troian Bellisario
I’m so appalled by what I consider to be her false feminism. It seems like she’s this person who’s like, ‘Sisterhood!’ and then she does nothing but tear down the women that were once her friends,” Troian told Cosmopolitan.
5. Rowan Blanchard
“Of course female friendship is a beautiful thing. It’s insanely powerful. Sisterhood is something so valid and important when you are growing up that I literally think the essence of it should be taught in schools,” the always wise beyond her years star told Just Jared JR. “But, the ‘squads’ we see in the media are very polarizing. Feminism and friendship are supposed to be inclusive, and most of these ‘squads’ are strictly exclusive.”
She continued:
“It makes feminism look very one dimensional. Feminism is so multilayered and complex that it can be frustrating when the media and the celebrities involved in it make feminism and “squads” feel like this very happy, exclusive, perfect thing. There’s so much more than that. ‘Squad goals’ can polarize anyone who is not white, thin, tall and always happy.”
6. Chloe Grace Moretz
“I agree with having a good core group of friends, but the issue I have with squads is it creates exclusivity,” Chloe explained to Nylon. “I was never included in those things when I was a kid. I was the weird one that chose to do movies, so now I go out of my way to be nice to people and make them feel included.”
Granted, that’s exactly the line that Taylor Swift would probably use — remember, she still wants us to think she’s the dorky ugly duckling and not the popular, beautiful swan who gets Hot Topic makeovers from Anna Wintour just because —but at least this is one Chloe Grace Moretz position only makes us want to roll our eyes a little.
