After online flak, 'Fat' reference removed from Swift's 'Anti-Hero'

LOS ANGELES: The music video for Taylor Swift's Midnights' lead single 'Anti-Hero' has been edited to omit a sequence in which she steps on a bathroom scale that reads "fat." After facing flak online, Taylor Swift removed the "fat" sequence from the song.

According to Variety, Swift's anti-hero clone no longer looks at her with a disappointed expression in the song video on Apple Music. However, the scale still reads "fat" in the song video on YouTube. As per Variety, speculation about the reasoning behind the removal of those frames stems from internet debate about the scene, which has subsequently been characterized as "anti-fat" by some due to the suggestion that being fat is a bad thing.

Swift has previously spoken about her struggles with an eating disorder, most notably in her 2020 Netflix documentary 'Miss Americana.' Swift said in the film that she had seen "a picture of myself where I felt like my tummy was too big, or... someone commented that I looked pregnant... and it'll just prompt me to just starve a little bit -- just stop eating" ("It's only happened a few times, and I'm not in any way proud of it").

The other songs that Swift has so far unveiled are 'Mastermind,' 'Maroon,' 'Midnight Rain,' 'Question,' and 'Vigilante Shit' (closing track 13). A Target deluxe version will add a 14th original song to the standard 13 songs and two remixes. According to The Hollywood Reporter, on Friday, Spotify announced that Swift's LP is officially the most-streamed album in a single day in the platform's history.

Swift has soared past previous record-holder Bad Bunny, whose 'Un Verano Sin Ti' had 183 million day-one streams in September of 2021. The feeding frenzy on the Swift album started right at midnight, as Spotify crashed in some locations, according to Downdetector, reported Deadline.