Based purely on my streaming statistics on Spotify and the general air of indieness that I try to exude when discussing music, most would assume my position on Taylor Swift before I open my mouth: that I would write her off as a corporation as opposed to an artist atop my under-100k-monthly-listeners-on-Spotify soapbox while championing the death of capitalist art machines. 

I’m here to thwart expectations and say that I enjoy several capitalist art machines, Taylor Swift being one of them. In fact, I would go so far as to say that Taylor Swift is my favorite mainstream artist, and by a long shot. I remember listening to “Fearless” on my older sister’s hand-me-down laptop, having my mind blown that she could read my 9-year-old mind. 

Rather than have her tried for witchcraft, I instead began to worship her from that point on, with my finger on the pulse of each of her ill-fated relationships with the acuity of a trained EMT. When she became obsessed with the Kennedys? I was there. When she dated Jake Gyllenhaal? I remember it all too well. When she and Tom Hiddleston had their beachy love affair? I wanted that “I <3 T.S.” shirt. 

And now, with that new rock on her finger after her engagement to Travis Kelce was announced Tuesday, I’m here for Killatrav’s legally binding entrance into Taylor’s world. The couple announced their engagement on Instagram with the caption, “Your English teacher and your gym teacher are getting married.” However, Taylor’s most recent moves as a musician read more like a CEO than an English teacher who actually appreciates the art behind words.

I’ve always understood criticism about some of her personal and business decisions. I’ve tsk-tsked when she alluded to cheating in several of her songs. I’ve used paper straws in an attempt to offset even a molecule of her jet-setting ways. I’ve rolled my eyes at her incredibly vague, though seemingly well-intentioned, political takes. 

I’ve been able to do this and remain a fan of her discography because I know she’s a flawed person and a talented, popular artist who, regardless of the orbiting moneymakers — the endless merch, the record-breaking Eras Tour, the Capital One commercials — started her journey as a young person obsessed with storytelling through music. I’ve always understood the kernel of artistic innovation that lies in all earnest storytellers as someone who loves to write.

That is, until “The Tortured Poets Department” came along. Like all albums, it’s got its highs and lows. Unlike most of her discography, it felt more like a cash grab than an artistic undertaking to reveal something new about her. For every moment that felt new and exciting, there would be unfinished hemlines in underbaked melodies, threads sticking out of superfluous lyricism and visible stitching in the production.

I wouldn’t mind this album as much if it weren’t for the slew of merchandising and even more unfinished songs that followed the release of the original tracklist in the form of “The Anthology.” 

I’m no business mogul. I’m no songwriter. I knew that I could just be missing something, missing a sign that would clearly indicate that this record would grow on me. But even as a fan of Taylor’s, I felt mowed into the ground by the tidal wave of mediocre music and vinyl variants and meh-looking sweatshirts. It no longer felt like I was in a musical space, it felt like I was being drowned by the pursuit of profit. 

Which brings me to her engagement. This announcement comes a little over two weeks after the announcement of her forthcoming album, “The Life of a Showgirl.” In the past, I would have felt that Taylor was just having a good run — a new album and a fiance? Good for her! 

I still partially do feel that way, but that wasn’t my first thought, unlike how it would’ve been my whole life. My first thought was that the timing was suspicious. It seemed like an attempt to maximize the impact of both announcements with careful timing so that each bomb dropped would feel like a massive cultural shift. 

This cynical thought only sharpened when Ed Kelce, Travis’s father, publicly stated that the couple had been sitting on this announcement for two weeks — around the time she first announced her new album, which had an explosive rollout. In comparison, the announcement of Swift’s engagement was lackluster and hammy.

The slightly drab color palette of the proposal’s photo shoot made me feel like I was looking at a high-quality Instagram post from a girl I went to high school with. The whole thing felt manufactured.

I’m not so naive as to think that timing isn’t a heavily scrutinized aspect of being an artist who wants to make an impact. We operate in a system that rewards knowing when to raise your voice and when to keep quiet, an art that Taylor has always kept close to her chest. But with the direction that her music and branding are heading, the engagement announcement felt like another reveal of an album cover variant.

The photo shoots that she’s revealed as alternate covers to “The Life of a Showgirl” felt as emotional as the proposal announcement; both felt like advertisements. Her engagement wasn’t a moment in her life that we were sharing with her, like an album, but a product to be bought, like one of many album variants. 

I hope she proves me wrong. I hope the album is fun and honest and polished like her previous pop work. I hope she returns to her pen and not the MIDI keyboard for more muted synths. I hope her life is colorful and candid, not muted grays and greens consciously posed into a smile.

Anna Jordan is a junior writing about pop culture controversies in her column, “Chronically Online,” which runs every other Thursday. She is also an arts and entertainment editor at the Daily Trojan.