The Devil You Know with Sarah Marshall One more helping, for good measure: Satan (Taylor’s Version)
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Dec 13, 2025 Yvonne Eadon, an assistant professor in information science, dives deep into the fascinating world of fandom conspiracies, particularly the Gaylor theory surrounding Taylor Swift. She explains how alternative expertise forms within conspiratorial cultures and traces the grassroots movements that shaped them. Eadon also discusses the emotional connection fans feel, the queerness in Swift's lyrics, and the hope for an upcoming coming out. The intertwining of desire-driven and fear-driven conspiracies reveals a complex landscape of identity and community in the age of online culture.
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Conspiracy Defined Broadly
- A conspiracy requires agents working together, secrecy, and a goal, so fan theories can qualify when they posit coordinated concealment.
- Yvonne Eadon shows Gaylor treats PR teams, friends and muses as conspirators keeping Taylor Swift 'in the closet'.
Conspiracies Build Their Own Expertise
- Conspiratorial communities build alternative expertise and repositories of evidence instead of rejecting evidence outright.
- Eadon calls this populist expertise or folk sociology that scaffolds a separate knowledge culture against mainstream consensus.
Women Archivists In JFK Research
- Early JFK researchers, often women, individually amassed clippings and notes and later connected to form a collective archive.
- Eadon recounts a housewife who reportedly road-tripped to Dallas to investigate the grassy knoll as an example.
