Look What We Made Taylor Swift Do
nytimes.comIn 2006, the year Taylor Swift released her first single, a closeted country singer named Chely Wright, then 35, held a 9-millimeter pistol to her mouth.
Queer identity was still taboo enough in mainstream America that speaking about her love for another woman would have spelled the end of a country music career.
But in suppressing her identity, Ms. Wright had risked her life. In 2010, she came out to the public, releasing a confessional memoir, “Like Me,” in which she wrote that country music was characterized by culturally enforced closeting, where queer stars would be seen as unworthy of investment unless they lied about their lives. “Country music,” she wrote, “is like the military — don’t ask, don’t tell.” The culture in which Ms.
Wright picked up that gun — the same one in which Ms. Swift first became a star — was stunningly different from today’s. It’s dizzying to think about the strides that have been made in Americans’ acceptance of the L.G.B.T.Q.