A student at the University of Calgary has dumped her “perfectly good and gentlemanly” boyfriend after listening to Taylor Swift’s new pop song, “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together.”
History major Sophie Collins, who is going into her third year this fall, told the Gauntlet, “He was like, a really good guy, but, like, I listened to that song over and over, because, like, it’s so catchy. And so I dumped him. I felt compelled.”
Collins said the song, released Aug. 14, made breaking up sound like, “just so much fun.”
“I was singing along, going ‘we are never, ever, ever getting back together. Ooooooh ooh ooh ooh ooh,’ and I just got caught up in the evers, there were, like, so many evers in the song,” said Collins.
There are reportedly 28 uses of the word ‘ever’ in the song. There are also 13 uses of the word ‘never,’ which conveniently rhymes with ‘ever.’
“We didn’t really do the whole, on and off again thing, but, like, the song just got stuck in my head. I just, like, love Taylor Swift. So I told my boyfriend, ‘I’m telling you, I’m telling you, we are never, ever, ever getting back together. Like, ever.’ And he was like, ‘We haven’t even broken up,’ in like, this hurt and confused voice, but I was like, ‘you go talk to your friends, talk to my friends, talk to me,’” said Collins.
Collins has been with her boyfriend, U of C engineering student Landon Short for five months. They enjoyed movie nights, coffee shops, wandering around Kensington and study dates. Their friends reported the couple as being “cute.”
“I did you know, really like him. I was happy. But, well, it was the song,” said Collins, who could barely stop humming the song to do an interview.
Collins reported listening to previous Swift songs, but never acting on what they said. She has, however, been a faithful Swift fan since her first single, “Love Story.”
“Taylor Swift is actually my idol. I want to be like her, and I guess that starts with ending all relationships with songs,” commented Collins.
Short has been heartbroken by Collins’s sudden move.
“I thought we had a good thing together. It was that song. It’s sad that Ms. Swift’s tragic love-life is affecting other people,” moped Short. “Is there another girl at the U of C who would like to go out sometime and not listen to Taylor Swift?”
Short said he likes listening to “real” music.
U of C pop culture researcher, Dr. Lance Morgan said, “Pop culture has a deep impact on society. Sometimes the effects are hard to quantify, but this breakup seems like a new phenomenon. The girl broke up with her boyfriend just because of a song. We have to ask ourselves, how stupid is she?”
Morgan, however, sadly expects the trend to continue. His research has found that students care much more about celebrity lives than, for example, philosophers, critical theorists, mathematicians or scientists.
“They would rather emulate a celebrity instead of actually making a contribution to civilization,” said Morgan.
Morgan was not shocked when he heard about the song-initiated breakup.
“Students just don’t think for themselves these days,” commented Morgan. “Like, ever.”