While accepting her Grammy for Album of the Year, Taylor Swift offered some thoughts on success and feminism and imposter syndrome—and a none-too-subtle jab at Kanye West. The artists’ relationship has, of course, been fraught ever since West infamously interrupted Swift’s acceptance speech at the VMAs, and the subsequent beef-and-forgiveness narrative has proven to be fruitful marketing fodder for both artists over the years—most recently at the 2015 VMA’s. West recently reignited the feud with his new The Life of Pablo song “Famous,” which includes the lyric “I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex/ Why? I made that bitch famous.” For his part, West said Swift gave the lyric her blessing, but Swift’s camp insists otherwise.
In her speech, Swift alluded to the controversial lyric with a not-so-veiled message to West:
As the first woman to win Album of the Year at the Grammys twice, I want to say to all the young women out there: There are going to be people along the way who will try to undercut your success, or take credit for your accomplishments, or your fame. But if you just focus on the work, and you don’t let those people sidetrack you, some day when you get where you’re going, you’ll look around and you will know that it was you and the people who love you who put you there. And that will be the greatest feeling in the world.
