The comeback kid?

It’s been a rough year for Taylor Swift. After a very public breakup involving hit songs and Tom Hiddleston, America’s sweetheart has become the victim of a Snapchat truth bomb by way of Kim Kardashian. Will this be the end of the queen bee’s reign, or is this simply another thing to shake off?

YES, SHE CAN!

Before I put the Taylor-Kimye feud into perspective, I’ve got to confess that I was a hardcore, sequined Keds-wearing Swiftie in my later high school and early college years. Taylor’s been a sketchy figure to me ever since I heard about how she sued fans selling Etsy merchandise on Twitter and when she started advocating a version of feminism that seemed to only benefit herself. But I still continued to follow her.

When the whole cringe-worthy Nicki Minaj Twitter feud happened last year, she bounced back pretty quickly by tweeting an apology and even performing with Nicki at last year’s MTV VMAs. Things aren’t very different this time around. A quick scroll through Instagram and Twitter shows that her fans are standing by her, posting long declarations of their loyalty.

I get that she lied and that she definitely isn’t as innocent as she paints herself to be, but years of religiously reading her tweets and watching her interviews have convinced me that this can’t be the end to the issue. It would be way too un-Taylor-like for her to get on with life without responding properly.

Entertainment and culture sites like E! News and Vulture have already reported on how Kim’s exposé, however scandalous it was, won’t do much to damage to Taylor’s overall success. Thanks to her loyal fan base, she’s still guaranteed to shatter album sales records and sell out entire arenas.

But shaking it off with a simple apology won’t work this time — she has to take action if she wants to earn back everyone’s trust. If Taylor Swift wants to play the victim again, she needs to sound off on issues that don’t just concern herself. In that scenario, she would do good deeds without making us suspicious of her calculated intentions.

Then again, that might be giving her too much credit. For all we know, all that’s being said is the truth. In that case, she probably is what Katy Perry’s warned us of all along: a conniving Regina George in sheep’s clothing.

And that’s the point. Mere mortals like us will never understand what celebrities are truly like. Whether we’ve all been played and she’s been in cahoots with the Kardashians planning this whole stunt for who knows what crazy end game, or whether this is her real self, we should already be used to public figures playing the PR game by now. After all, this is Taylor Swift — she’s probably at home, laughing it all off while sitting on her couch beside a table with her 10 Grammys, stroking her cats and resting her head on Tom Hiddleston’s lap. Regardless of what she ends up doing to salvage her reputation, I’m pretty sure she’s still the lucky one.

HMM... MAYBE NOT.

There was a time when I could have loved Taylor Swift. As a Kanye fan, this is very hard for me to admit but it was around the time when she released “1989,” started hanging out with cool girls and for a while was almost mistaken for a lesbian. It was the year of “cool girl” Taylor Swift — the one who prioritized her friends over boys, made amends with Kanye and wrote about “How to get the girl.” I was relieved because it was a time in my life when my love for Kanye and the need to play Style at nightclubs were not mutually exclusive anymore.

All this changed when Kanye West released “The Life of Pablo” which contained the song Famous. I’m not going to get into the specifics, because you probably know what went down during National Snake Day anyway, but to cut a long story short, a Snapchat ended my already questionable love for Taylor Swift. The facade that she had carefully cultivated since the beginning of her career collapsed faster than you can say “bad blood” and, just like any scorned lover, I was forced to ask “Would our relationship survive this betrayal?”

Taylor Swift and Kanye West have always shared a common love for airing their dirty laundry in public. The difference was Kanye West always admitted that he was the bad guy, flaunting his successes as much as his failures. Taylor Swift chose to play the victim card, refusing to own up to the fact that the men she put on blast for hurting her may have helped make her famous. Herein lies the reason why Taylor Swift will never make a comeback. Don’t get me wrong, she will continue to sell albums, date handsome boys and have the devotion of millions of basic baes long after Yeezy Season 4. But it won’t be the same Taylor Swift; the old country girl we once knew is dead. Celebrities like Voldemort — I mean, Taylor Swift — don’t get vanquished overnight. They will spend their time in the darkness, gathering strength, until they’re powerful enough to make a return. Her comeback will be tainted with the blood of the innocents she had devour to regain her power. She will be a shell of the Taylor she once was and we will be unable to enjoy her songs without remembering the day she broke all our hearts.