There’s been a peculiar story swirling around the Taylor Swift universe over the past few days.
Earlier this week, a video from a charity auction surfaced. In it, an older-looking man buys a guitar, supposedly signed by Swift, for $4,000. Then, he proceeds to smash it with a hammer. It was later pointed out that the guitar wasn’t actually signed by Swift, but that they simply glued a signed photo from a vinyl edition of Swift’s album Midnights.
Why Did A Fan Smash A Taylor Swift-Signed Guitar They Bought For $4,000?
Gary Estes, the man who bought and destroyed the guitar, later explained what happened, saying:
“There was nothing malicious or anything about it. It was just a joke at an auction that we had to raise money for kids, right? And that’s all it was. There was nothing mean about it, nothing bad about it. It was just a joke that they were making up on the stage, and we just followed through with a joke.”
Craig Meier — a spokesperson for the Ellis County Wild Game Dinner, the event where the auction took place — said, “I know maybe it seemed to be malicious, but everybody was laughing. There were people there, at the time, who joked around that he’s mad because he doesn’t know how to play the guitar. Taylor Swift, it became a political thing, and that was kind of the gist of it, just a light-hearted bit of a dig at Taylor for coming out politically and entertainers using their influence to influence politics.”