I had a Taylor Swift Problem.
Freud's "displacement" and a wedding venue.
Like him or not, Freud invented some pretty interesting and provocative psychological theories, like displacement, for example.
While I do not agree with him on many concepts, and there are certainly some problematic “issues” with him and his material, I find many of his defense mechanisms to be extremely relevant and helpful in my day-to-day life.
Here are a few types of defense mechanisms:
Repression: Pushing unacceptable thoughts, memories, or desires out of conscious awareness entirely. For example, a person might completely forget a violent experience in childhood. “I don’t remember that!”
Denial: Refusing to accept reality or acknowledge the truth of a traumatic or challenging external event. For example, a person might act as if a partner who betrayed them never cheated at all. “He would never cheat on me, I know it!”
Projection: Attributing one’s own unacceptable, threatening, or uncomfortable thoughts and feelings onto someone else. For example, an individual who secretly dislikes a colleague might instead insist that it’s the colleague who doesn’t like them. “Are you kidding? She hates me!”
Rationalization: Creating logical, justifiable, but inaccurate explanations for irrational or unacceptable behaviors. For example, someone who gets fired for making too many errors at work claims it was a “It was a blessing in disguise” rather than acknowledging their poor performance.
Reaction Formation: Behaving in a way that is the exact opposite of one’s true feelings, often to suppress an undesirable emotion. For example, acting overly rude or ignoring someone you actually have a crush on.
Displacement: Redirecting pent-up emotions—usually anger—from the real source of stress to a less threatening target. For example, a partner yelling at their wife when they walk into the house after work.
Photo by Resume Genius on Unsplash Displacement and Taylor Swift.
Let me please qualify how I feel about Taylor before we start talking about displacement.
I adore her. I saw Taylor at the Era’s Tour with two of my adolescent children, and it was one of the highlights of my life.
I’ve never felt my girlhood joy as much as I did that night, standing in- between my daughter and son, and thousands of beautiful fans, as we sang and danced our faces off in the nose-bleed section, standing for three straight hours.
If Taylor can call Travis “a human exclamation point,” I would call watching Taylor perform at the Staples Center the human dancing emoji or the little yellow face with the big red heart eyes.
But, since her marriage at Madison Square Garden, I’ve read, watched, and listened to many different perspectives on her 4th of July weekend MSG nuptials, ranging from absolute love and support to total judgment, hate, and even disgust.
“Tone deaf, selfish billionaire depriving NYC locals of income, hopeless romantic, tacky wedding venue choice, lyrical genius, just another girl wondering if her love is ‘gonna be forever or go down in flames?’”
Before I go any further, let me also say that I don’t believe anyone is above feedback — particularly the ultra-rich, in a world filled with literal and rightful scarcity, on a massive scale. But the TS vitriol seems much bigger than Taylor herself, and frankly, the hate she gets always has been, if you ask me.
When it comes to Taylor, I am going to be on her side, until proven otherwise.
But to be honest, I had some thoughts about her wedding that I really needed to examine.
I started getting annoyed with the idea of her wedding at MSG, and I found myself scrolling past the algorithm’s knowledge that I normally love to be served up some hot, swift gossip.
But was it the venue? Was it the marriage? Was it the insane display of wealthy, privileged humans?
I began to examine why it was bothering me so much.
It turns out that my issue with Taylor’s venue was not an issue with Taylor’s venue.
Hi. I’m the problem, it’s me.
Or rather, it was me displacing my feelings onto the choice of the MSG venue, and the wedding themes and ideas emerging online.
Upon reflection, I had a lot of feelings about marriage, weddings, promises, fears, and around scarcity, security, and safety — feelings that were the complete opposite of a wedding costing millions, filled with a thousand beautiful stars, and others who appear to “have it all.”
Classic Examples of Displacement:
In displacement, a person redirects a negative emotion, such as anger or fear, or annoyance, etc., from its true source to a less threatening, safer target.
Displaced Aggression:
Your husband yells at you, but you struggle to confront him, so instead, you slam doors or overreact and yell at your kids, who were playing too loudly in the living room.
Everyday Objects:
Instead of addressing deep-seated anxiety, a person might displace that nervous energy onto an object, such as aggressively smashing a video game controller, or by engaging in compulsive physical behaviors, like binge eating, when they feel depressed or bad about themselves.
Societal Scapegoating:
On a broader scale, collective societal frustration or economic fear is sometimes redirected toward marginalized or less powerful groups.
Taylor’s Wedding and Displacement
So, my theory is that most of the negative, vitriolic “takes on Taylor and Travis’ wedding” say more about where we are individually and collectively, as a society.
While I know it doesn’t take a rocket scientist or psychologist to identify that the Taylor hate is usually not really about Taylor, I would encourage you to apply these concepts to other places in your life — especially when you feel negative, judgmental feelings, annoyance, irritation, sadness, or anger —but you just can’t seem to sort out why you feel that way.
Questions to ask yourself:
Examples:
Why did I yell at my kids when they didn’t really do anything that was a big deal?
What made me snap at my partner just now when they didn’t do anything wrong?
Where does my annoyance with someone I don’t know connect to my own fears, or even envy, that their life looks so much easier because I am really struggling right now?
How can I challenge myself to make changes in my own life when I find myself getting stuck focusing on someone else?
How does it help to identify when we’re engaging in displacement?
It helps by forcing us to look at ourselves in the mirror and to ask, “Is this more about me? Are there some feelings, fears, or dreams that feel unmet or unseen that need my attention? What do I need right now? Would it help me to examine my emotions so I can get to the true source?”
When you stop engaging in the negative energy of displacement, you can find the energy to focus on yourself, because after all, you are the only one who can book, decorate, toast, and dance to your own venue in life.
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This is an amazing article.
Absolutely agree! I don’t even want those things specifically anymore but all of it is hard to witness at times -especially given where things stand rn in terms of losing rights, wars, economy, our kids’ future, amid fears of safety for so many.