What a joy it is, seeing Taylor Swift and Tom Hiddleston canoodling. If you don’t know what canoodling means, it’s what American celebrity journalists say to class up descriptions of famous people groping each other. In the case of Hiddleston and Swift — or “Swiddleston”, which I am only using in this piece now so that no one can ever use it sincerely — canoodling actually fits whatever it is they’re doing in the newly released photos that confirm their relationship.
Looking at these pictures, one gets the sense that they were staged for our prurient benefit. Each photo has a sickly sweet injection of performative chivalry. Tom helps Lady Swift up on to the rocks. Oh, and here he is giving her his coat. Now they’re posing for a selfie — which should be called a “couple”, since there are two of them. God, they even hold hands. It’s nauseating, but it accomplishes their goal. They’ve outed themselves as a wholesome, impeccable source of romantic inspiration for people around the world. Are these even real people? I’m not convinced. What we are actually witnessing is the equivalent of two internet memes dating — featureless avatars for our own hopeless need for human connection. It’s as though someone went to the Meme Generator website and searched for “happy couple” and it spat out “Swiddleston”. Granted, this is not the first time she has played dress-up for the cameras and dragged someone out to manipulate the media narrative around her. An entire biography of Swift could be cobbled together exclusively from allegedly candid photos of her canoodling. An article from Us Magazine’s website from back when Taylor and Calvin Harris were together is titled Taylor Swift, Boyfriend Calvin Harris Hold Hands on Glamorous Date Night. Even more obnoxious is the tail end of the URL for the article, which reads Taylor Swift, Calvin Harris Are the Cutest for Date Night.
Are they? Have you seen my wife and I walking to Ikea lately? It’s telling that in order to really make their break-up complete, Harris and Swift had to delete the entire cache of couple photos from their social media accounts. Their relationship seemed to only exist on the internet anyway.
What Swift, Kim Kardashian and countless other famous people have figured out is that it’s better for them to exist as vessels for our own personal expression. At any given moment she can be a “badass feminist” or “sullen and melancholy” or “hopelessly in love”, because all we have is a photo of her making a face. Something about her makes people want to type a bunch of junk all over her picture in order to make some grand statement about life or gender relations or the nature of existence.
But then so does Hiddleston.
Swift is a genius because she’s decided to date the Internet’s ideal boyfriend, and of course, the photos show him doing ideal boyfriend things. They’re even snuggling on the beach like they’re in a Chris Isaak music video, but wearing significantly more clothing.
Then there’s me, the “real person” in this equation. To be honest, I’ve placed myself in this equation without the consent of Swiddleston, but the media is the silent partner in this thruple. Swift and Hiddleston give us greeting card romance and, in return, we give them attention. We’re just the same as the people writing “and the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate” on a photo of Swift holding a stereo. It’s like being given one of those Magic Eye posters and having someone ask you if you see the sailboat.
When I look at photos of Swift and Hiddleston, I see nothing. I see the jumble of dots and wavy lines on that Magic Eye poster. I see the static from a busted analogue television. I see the hours on a clock ticking away. I see my life slowly drifting out of my body until one day, I am nothing but an empty husk of rotting meat clutching an iPhone. I might as well be staring at a gif of Pedro the frog’s wet, tired eyes locked on a unicycling Dat Boi or Chewbacca Mom and James Corden going for a ride in a rental car.
Actually, if I can suggest some post-Swiddleston relationships for a moment, I would probably enjoy writing about Swift dating James Corden and Hiddleston canoodling with Chewbacca Mom. I mostly want this to happen because I would gladly listen to a Swift song about Chewbacca Mom.
