Charli XCX addresses fans at concerts who chant “Taylor Swift is dead”

Sometime Over the years, the online pop fandom has turned into a war zone, with album sales, chart positions and celebrity interactions used as ammunition. It’s rare to see musicians themselves on the front lines of these battles between fandoms, where toxicity often runs rampant. Charli XCX’s fanbase recently targeted Taylor Swift, criticizing the singer online and chanting “Taylor Swift Is Dead” at concerts. Now that the attacks are taking place offline, Charli is shutting them down.

“Can the people who do this please stop. Online or at my shows,” she wrote in a recent Instagram story, referencing a video of fans reciting the chant at her recent performance in Brazil. “It’s the opposite of what I want and it bothers me that anyone thinks there’s a place for it in this community. I will not tolerate it.”

In the caption of the original post, a fan who shared the clip wrote: “Hey @charli_xcx your Brazilian fans have been engaging in toxic behavior by yelling “Taylor is dead!” at your concerts and events related to you. Could you do something about it? We don’t believe that’s what music should be about. @taylornation13 please take note of that too.”

It’s safe to assume that Swift is subject to criticism at any given time. Most recently, fans of artists such as Billie Eilish and Charli accused the singer of strategically planning the release of additional versions of her latest album. The “Tortured Poets” section to block other albums, like Hit me hard and soft And bratfrom reaching certain chart positions in the USA and Great Britain

Swift fans, on the other hand, clashed with Eilish fans after the younger musician criticized artists who release multiple vinyl versions of the same album to boost sales and chart positions. She didn’t name the more experienced artist, but hit dogs often cry. “It would be so great if people would stop putting words in my mouth and actually read what I said in that Billboard article,” Eilish clarified shortly after the interview. “I wasn’t singling anyone out, these are industry-wide systemic problems.”

Lately, Charli has become fascinated with a widespread practice that goes beyond the confines of the music industry and into the general experience of being a woman. Last week, she released the “Girl, So Confusing” remix with Lorde, in which the two singers dissect their misperceptions of each other and come clean once and for all. “Sometimes I think you might hate me/Sometimes I think I might hate you,” Charli sings in the first verse. Later, Lorde describes the bouts of self-criticism she has experienced privately, explaining, “I was caught up in hate/And your life seemed so great/I never thought for a second/My voice was in your head.”

During a recent interview with The guardCharli spoke at length about this dynamic between women. “We’re past the point where the media always pits women against each other. In the mid-to-late ’00s, it literally sold anything in magazines and newspapers: ‘Britney versus Christina,’ ‘Paris versus Lindsay,'” she explained. “Then feminism became a popular marketing tool. In the music industry, it became the idea that if you support women and like other women, you’re a good feminist. The opposite of that is that if you don’t like every other woman that exists and breathes on this earth, you’re a bad feminist. If you’re not a girly girl, you’re a bad woman.”

She added: “It’s just such an unrealistic expectation of women. Relationships between women are super complex and layered. You can like someone and dislike them at the same time; you can be jealous of someone but they can still be your friend; you can have the time of your life on a night out with someone but not be that close to them at all. You can pose with your arms around a person at an awards show but in reality you feel worthless or small – or really cocky or confident or have a huge amount of different emotions. One day you can feel on top of the world; the next day you can feel like your career is over. The song says sometimes it’s really confusing being a girl and that’s OK.”