#question anon

[ohdorothea]

do you feel like 'Question...?' is super queer only as it relates to Taylor or as a standalone song? And if you feel it's super queer as a standalone song, can you explain why please?

Good question… (hee) this is probably (definitely) gonna be a much longer answer than you were looking for anon but I have a lot of thoughts!!!!

So I do think for me the song reads as queer without relating it to Taylor at all!

The first lyrics that point me towards a queer reading of the song are:

“I swear that it was something

'Cause I don't remember who I was before you

Painted all my nights

A color I've searched for since”

All of these lines for me read very much about a queer relationship!

‘I swear that is was something’ makes me think of a relationship that either wasn’t seen a ‘really something’ to outsiders (I think this interpretation is backed up in later lyrics!) or that had to be kept secret and so now the narrator has to affirm to themselves that this was something important and real!

Then the narrator goes on to say ‘cause I don’t remember who I was before you painted all my nights a color I’ve searched for since’.

The narrator was transformed so much by this relationship that they don’t remember who they were before they met this person and had this relationship! This to me reads as a first queer relationship or the relationship that cemented queerness in the identity of the narrator. They can’t go back to who they were before!

‘you painted all my nights a color I’ve searched for since’ could be my favourite lyric from the whole song because I think it says so much and paints such an evocative imagery. There is a lot going on in this one line! The first thing that jumps out to me is ‘nights’ rather than days, again to me that paints the picture of a relationship that had to be kept quite literally in the dark.

And then the imagery of those nights being painted this specific colour that the narrator has been searching for since. To me this evokes imagery of films like Wizard of Oz where the film transitions from black and white to colour. The narrators world was in black and white/monotone grey and then this relationship came along and painted their world technicolour and now the narrator is desperately searching for anything to make their world technicolour again!!!

Moving on to the chorus, the first thing about the chorus that reads queer to me is the chorus being based around the word question. This evokes the idea of questioning both the subject of the song but also underneath it all the narrator is questioning themselves, questioning if their memory of how this relationship unfolded is in line with reality.

“Can I ask you a question?

Did you ever have someone kiss you in a crowded room

And every single one of your friends was

Making fun of you

But 15 seconds later they were clapping too?

Then what did you do?”

The imagery this part of the chorus creates honestly feels so close to the bone for me as a queer person. ‘Can I ask you a question’ is such a loaded phrase anyway right? But within the context of all that comes before the chorus I can’t help but think of those conversations you have as a young queer person, where you are trying to figure out if the person in front of you (that you’re maybe crushing on) is accepting of your queerness or maybe even queer like you??

And on the flip side the stomach drop when you are closeted and someone drops their voice in a private conversation and says ‘can I ask you a question’ and you have to decide where to trust this person with something so delicate and new within yourself and you have to calculate your own safety all at the same time!

“Did you ever have someone kiss you in a crowded room”

So this line is telling us that it was the narrator that kissed the subject of the song in a crowded room right? It paints the narrator as perhaps the more confident or the one more willing to risk it all for the feeling of kissing their love in a crowded room? And why is that a big deal?

“And every single one of your friends was / Making fun of you”

Which the narrator answers in the following line! The subject’s friends response to the two kissing is to make fun of the subject! I imagine two people kissing and the crowd around them laughing and pointing. The imagery is hidden within a very upbeat chorus but it’s devastating! And unfortunately I think a lot of queer people can relate to this experience, of their love being a joke to outsiders (perhaps especially queer women?)

“But 15 seconds later they were clapping too?“

I think there are two ways to interpret this line. The first being the literal, that 15 seconds after the kiss began the crowd switched from making fun of the subject to clapping and cheering them on. If you actually think of what it would be like to be kissing in a crowded room being laughed at for 15 seconds that 15 seconds becomes an excruciatingly long time.

So if we take the line less literally, I think the idea being put forward is that when this couple first got together the subjects friends made fun of the relationship, and then after a long time they came around and were supportive. But it seems like the damage was done, to both the subject and the relationship.

“Then what did you do? / Did you leave her house in the middle of the night?” In the aftermath of the kiss in the crowded room (either metaphorical or literal) the subject leaves the narrator, in the dark, the place where they once shared, alone. But then we learn more about the split in the next line…

“Did you wish you'd put up more of a fight? / When she said it was too much?” So this implies the narrator said ‘it was too much’ and the subject didn’t fight her on it and then left. I personally interpret this to mean the narrator in the fallout of the kiss in a crowded room felt like the negative attention and mocking was too much to move past even if this people then came around. But really she wanted the subject to push back against that, and say it was worth the fight.

“Do you wish you could still touch ...her? / It's just a question�� For me regardless of the rest of the reading I’ve always heard these lines as flirting, then trying to cover it up with the deflection of ‘it’s just a question.’

But I also interpret the pause between ‘touch’ and ‘her’ as both signalling queerness and like the narrator is almost about to say ‘me’ rather than ‘her’, but then stops herself, like she needs to keep the distance from the narrative by using she and her rather me I or me. Like she’s still not sure she’s ready to claim this story as something that happened to her.

Ok so this is already so long I’m just skip the next verse and go into the bridge, but let it be known I also have thoughts about the second verse!!!!

“Does it feel like everything's just like second-best after that / Meteor strike?” For me this is the narrator asking the subject if this relationship meant as much to them as it did to her. But she is also upping the stakes of the previous metaphor in the first verse.

In the verse all her nights were painted a colour she has searched for since, but here she is comparing the relationship to a meteor strike, something destructive and dangerous that literally changes the landscape around it. For me reading this as a queer song this feels like a metaphor for coming out.

“And what's that, that I heard, that you're still with her / That's nice, I'm sure that's what's suitable / And right”

What’s ‘suitable’ and ‘right’ feels very much like a way to say straight to me in like a kind of bitchy way (which I love)

“But tonight... Can I ask you a question?”

And then it comes right back to the question, the questioning!!!! Even after re-hashing the whole story the narrator still keeps coming back the moment everything fell apart.

Ok yeah so this got soooooooo long but I hope I answered your question…?

[ford-between-dimensions]

Candy isn't healthy enough, Pines, plus, that circles back to the 4th question, have you brushed your teeth recently?

- ❓

Candy is perfectly filling. Its nutritional value is…well, I haven’t had them in years. Let me indulge.

[deeranon]

Just saw your art, and I just LOVE IT.

Don't ever, EVER, say that you can't draw or say that your art is ugly, okay ? Or me and 🦝anon will come at your home and beat you/j/wearen'tviolentweswear

-Question anon

What is it whith anons threatening me? This is two now.

I promise not to demote my artwork 😭

[runnning-outof-time]

Question anon: Do you think he would have accidentally gotten Lizzie pregnant if he was still married to Grace? Like do you think Tommy would have cheated on Grace with May and Jessie Eden?

Hey there again, question anon!! 👋🏻☺️ I’m sorry I didn’t respond to this one when I answered the first…work got busy and I couldn’t sit down again until now.

This is a good question…..

I really don’t know if all the things that happened after Grace’s death would have happened had she still been alive. I do think that their marriage would have cracked after the honeymoom phase fizzled out — because let’s face it…those two really weren’t meant to be together forever and things definitely would have gone belly up once they started recognizing the differences between them.

Now would Tommy have still went with these other women to better his chances at his business?…that’s a strong maybe — especially if what I’ve just said was happening within their marriage. I’m not sure if he would have gotten Lizzie pregnant…he only really went back to her and sought her out again because Grace had died, right?

So I think if the means were there, and that he could think of a way to justify why he should do it (which is sick, I know but we saw what when on with Diana) I think he would……he’s a man after all 🙃🙃

Thanks for sending this in! Like I said before, it’s so fun chatting with you! 😁

[real-total-drama-takes]

too late

-?

[sweetheartvalle]

if you could have any power, what would it be?

time travel so i can be in my max caulfield era

[mo0n-water]

i’m not bathilda but i have a question, what would you name your kids?

you are bathilda actually

if it was a girl ruth, & if it was a boy martin. haven’t thought beyond that

thank you for asking xx

[genshin-impact-writings]

Happy birthday! 🥳

-question anon

Thank you so much, dear 🥰

[cornerihaunt]

now that tour has officially kicked off let’s do a taylor question this round! if you could have any outfit of taylor’s that she’s worn (tour outfit, award shows, music videos, candids, etc) which would you pick? - 🧐

from the top of my head (and my camera roll) these !!! also like. everything else from the midnights photoshoot + THE RED PHOTOSHOOT HOW COULD I FORGET ABOUT HER!!!!

[imhereonthekitchenfloor]

Question time! Ignore the fact that it’s march already what’s on your bucket list this year? - 🧐

Hmmm.... you are asking me if I have any goals for the future or aspirations

Solve the mystery of Cain's Jawbone. Take ice skating class again. This is the most I can give you😭

[ohdorothea]

hi hi i'm Question anon! I LOVE how thorough you were, thank you! Also, I'm happy to hear your second verse thoughts as well if you do want to share them. Additional question for you: do you tie 'Question' to 'Illicit Affairs' due to the lines: "Look at this godforsaken mess that you made me You showed me colors you know I can't see with anyone else". She's made many references throughout her work to having life altering romances/feelings/relationships by referencing changes in colors or lack of colors so obviously that's not new but those 2 songs seem to overlap even more so. Just wondering your thoughts! p.s It's lovely to hear the thoughts of someone else who also interprets Taylor's music through a queer lens so thank you for being that person for me! p.p.s off topic: But Daddy I Love Him is SUCH a queer song for me and I imagine you feel that way too? (the list of songs that feel VERY queer to me is long lol)

Heyyyy Question anon!!! 🫶🫶🫶🫶 Yay I’m so glad you saw my response and thank you for reading!!

As for the second verse of Question there are three lyrics that particularly jump out for me in terms of a queer reading out of context from Taylor;

“It was one drink after another / Caught in politics and gender-roles” this one I think is pretty straight forward when it comes to a queer reading: the narrator and the subject of the song feel trapped within politics and gender roles and it’s making them miserable, it’s leading them to drink to numb those frustrations! At least that’s what it means to me and so for me these are one of the most overtly queer lines.

“And you're not sure and I don't know” it always comes back to the questioning! In this line the narrator is admiring both her and the subject could admit or express what they really wanted, or even perhaps we’re unable to know their true feelings at the time!

“Got swept away in the gray / I just may like to have a conversation” and here she continues the colour metaphor! I will go into this further below…

In response to your question about the illicit affairs lyrics: yes I do very much think they are connected! For me the illicit affairs lyrics you quoted and the Question…? lyrics are in a set with ‘You took a Polaroid of us / Then discovered / The rest of the world was black and white / But we were in screaming color” from Out of the Woods!

Not that I necessarily think all of those song are about the same experience or even muse but for me they all explore the same idea of a life with colour as something she experienced in the context of specific relationship, a colour that was lacking in her life before/after those relationships and hat reads as very queer for me!!!

p.s It's lovely to hear the thoughts of someone else who also interprets Taylor's music through a queer lens so thank you for being that person for me!

🫶🫶🫶🫶🫶�� I am so so happy to be that person for you!!!

And you know the last part about But Daddy I Love Him might be the final push I need to finish writing up my thoughts on that song that I started ages ago because yeah same!

I think she’s doing something very interesting with story telling on that song

[ford-between-dimensions]

And I would like the other 3 questions answered, Dr. Pines.

- ❓

Well, I’ll be eating candy later tonight.

[milfygerard]

so you'll condone cannibalism?

sure why not

[weirdo09]

What would you personally say is your best or most attractive feature?

my most attractive feature would be my eyes or lips

[runnning-outof-time]

Hello! Anon who likes to ask too many questions ahaha: I keep thinking about how Tommy treats Charlie vs Ruby. I would have thought that he would be a decent father to Charlie considering it was his and Grace's child. And if he really loved Grace wouldn't he treat Charlie better? Seems like he liked Ruby a lot more, he was more affectionate and softer with her. Might have been the whole father and son relationships are a more complicated thing. But it irked me the way Tommy was with Charlie in season 5 & 6. He was the last remaining piece of Grace, a product of their "love". Why didn't he treat Charlie better??

Hello, lovely question anon! ☺️☺️ it’s nice to see you in my inbox again!

This is yet another interesting point (you’ve got so many…keep sending them my way!!) —

It’s interesting to see the difference in how Tommy treats his kids — he’s always so outwardly affectionate towards Ruby in the scenes we’ve seen him with her, whereas with Charlie that affection seems more reserved.

The point of Charlie being the last remaining memory of Grace is interesting, and I guess it could be like a double-edged sword to him. On one hand, he’s all that’s left of Grace and you may think that he should cherish him because of that…because he does have that reminder of her and the love that he shared with her. But on the other hand I guess it could also be a painful reminder as well…maybe each time he sees Charlie he’s reminded of how Grace met her end (and of how it should have been him) …. I wish we could have gotten more of an outlook on that in the show.

Another major thing, that you’ve also pointed out, is the nature of father/son relationships. If I’m remembering correctly, fathers were more closed off to their sons during this time period….I don’t think they were doing much interacting with their children to begin with (that was the mother’s/nanny’s sphere) and the views towards masculinity probably led them down a colder path. That isn’t to say that he was always outright cold towards Charlie (although there were some scenes where I felt incredibly bad for that boy) … we got sprinkles of affection in there, but again…not as much was out in the open as there was towards Ruby.

The final season (specifically the final two episodes - I think) really irked me as well…yeah you can use the excuse that he thinks he’s dying, but I don’t believe that gives you a pass to be an ass towards your last living child…Charlie seemed to consistently get the short end of the stick, and I truly feel bad for him in that regard.

Ok…I think I’ve babbled long enough……I hope some of that makes sense 😅😅 like I said before, I love that you’re sending these thoughts/questions my way - it’s fun to take a deeper dive into the show and try to make heads or tails of my own thoughts while also seeing the events in a different light. I appreciate you coming into my inbox again!! ❤️

[real-total-drama-takes]

praying to god I don't get impersonated like last time

-?