Celebrity

The Taylor Swift-Joe Alwyn Breakup (Fan’s Version)

We will all grieve this in different ways.

by Catherine Bouris  13 April 2023

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It’s been a tumultuous time for Taylor Swift fans.

Just last month, she kicked off the “Eras Tour”, her largest to date. With 52 three-and-a-half-hour shows in 20 cities across the US, Swift is paying tribute to all of her “eras” (albums). 

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Seven shows into the tour, several celebrity guests had been spotted in attendance, including Selena Gomez, Emma Stone, and Laura Dern, but there was one notable absence: Joe Alwyn, Swift’s partner of six years. While some fans voiced concern and confusion, others waved their concerns away, explaining that Alwyn is a working actor and is probably busy. He would undoubtedly make an appearance at one of her shows eventually. (Alwyn is starring in a film alongside Adrien Brody and Guy Pearce that is currently filming in Hungary.) 

On the Easter long weekend, however, disaster struck. Entertainment Tonight shared an ‘exclusive report’ on Saturday afternoon revealing that Swift and Alwyn had split after six years together. A few hours later, People, citing “a source close to the pair”, seemingly confirmed the news. At this point, online Swifties were in an uproar, with many fans cycling through the five stages of grief simultaneously. 

Denial

Denial was the dominant emotion over on TikTok and Twitter, where the fanbase skews slightly younger. Fans decried the news as fake, dismissing ET and People as tabloids, and agreed they would wait until Taylor herself confirmed the news. Of course, seeking out a primary source is a good idea, but generally, “a source close to the pair” is code for “a member of the celebrity’s team”. In this case, we’re probably talking about Swift’s well-known and always in-control publicist, Tree Paine.

One fan referenced the images of Swift out on the town on Monday night as proof the news was fake, because Swift was wearing the “‘J”’ necklace she often sported (in Reputation’s ‘Call It What You Want’, Swift sings: “I want to wear his initials on a chain round my neck, chain round my neck / Not because he owns me, but ‘cause he really knows me”). Despite receiving 105,000 likes and plenty of support in the comments, the same user posted a follow-up less than a day later, admitting defeat, accepting the break-up as fact and asking people to stop telling her to “take delulu (delusional) pills”. 

Anger

For the Swiftie, denial was often paired with anger. Whether it was anger at the media for “lying” about Swift’s relationship status, or anger at the world for yet again proving that long-lasting love isn’t possible, it was largely expressed through memes rather than more destructive means. 

Bargaining

Next was bargaining, with Swifties turning to both conventional (prayer) and unconventional (lighting candles depicting Taylor Swift as Mary, mother of Jesus) means in order to convince the universe to right this catastrophic wrong. 

Depression 

When that didn’t work, and more traditional news outlets like CNN seemingly confirmed the news, many entered the fourth stage: depression (if they weren’t already depressed). For New York City-based Swifties, this manifested in visits to Cornelia Street, where Swift lived and immortalised in a track on 2019’s Lover, to lay flowers and pay their respects. While many of these videos were tongue in cheek, particularly the Duolingo Owl’s contribution or the video of a girl stealing some of the flowers, others argued that it was creepy for anyone to visit the street at all, ironically or otherwise. Duolingo, a language learning app, came under fire last year for another video participating in a trending topic — Johnny Depp and Amber Heard’s lawsuit — which many saw as insensitive and inappropriate. So this was a bit less controversial. 

Elsewhere, cries of “love is dead” flooded the internet. A Vox reporter joked that her editor vetoed the headline “This Love is dead”, a reference to a track off Swift’s 2014 album, 1989. Over on Reddit, where the overall response to the news was far more subdued owing to the slightly older demographics on the r/TaylorSwift subreddit, one user pleaded with fans to stop saying that love was dead, reminding everyone that “love does not have to be forever to be real”. Essentially, a bit of an impromptu therapy session was taking place. 

After a moment of shock, acceptance was the step I jumped to after hearing the news. While I’ve loved the songs Taylor and Joe (as William Bowery) wrote together, I was never particularly invested in their relationship, though the romantic in me does continue to hope that she finds her “happy ending”, whatever that may look like. 

Other fans took to the subreddit to call out those who seemed overly invested in the break-up, asking why people were mourning as if they were the ones who’d been broken up with. Parasocial relationships with celebrities have come under significant scrutiny in recent years, but with Swift there’s an added layer because of the way she cultivates these parasocial attachments. She held “secret sessions” with fans at her home ahead of the release of 1989, engages with Swifties on Tumblr, Twitter and now TikTok, she sends personalised cards and has hosted free meet-and-greets after concerts with audience members. 

Acceptance

As the weekend wound down, more and more fans seemed to enter the final stage: acceptance (while still relying on memes to express themselves). It probably helped to see Swift out at dinner in New York on Monday evening with Jack Antonoff and Margaret Qualley after spending the weekend in Liverpool filming a music video. If she isn’t sitting at home wallowing, it doesn’t make much sense for fans to be doing so on her behalf. Reports that the break-up was Taylor’s decision also played a part in assuring fans that she was fine, and letting them know Joe did not dump Taylor and is thus not an enemy on par with Jake Gyllenhaal or John Mayer, which will hopefully convince fans not to deal with their grief by sending him hate. 

Given Swift’s often autobiographical discography and ongoing cultivation of parasocial relationships with her fans, the mass outpouring of grief did not come as a surprise to anyone familiar with how fandom culture functions in 2023. From the outside looking in, the emotions displayed may look melodramatic and excessive, but this is a group of fans who still call themselves ‘children of divorce’ because Swift and Harry Styles, two of their heroes, briefly dated and broke up 10 years ago.

It speaks to the power and ubiquity of fandom culture, which some might describe as mass hysteria. But despite Swift’s attempts to keep her personal life as private as possible, it doesn’t seem likely that her next relationship will escape similar levels of scrutiny and fixation.

Catherine Bouris is a freelance writer and editor specialising in internet culture and communities.