“This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things” Meaning: Line By Line
A huge theme running throughout Taylor Swift’s iconic reputation album is revenge: how to do it, what makes her do it, and what the results are.
Her thirteenth track (her lucky number) narrates a long-standing feud, attempts at forgiveness, and getting stabbed in the back. This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things may seem like a simple diss track, but it’s so much more than that.
Here’s my complete English teacher analysis of Taylor’s This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things meaning, line by line and vendetta by vendetta.
This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things by Taylor Swift
- Title: “This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things”
- Written by: Taylor Swift, Jack Antonoff.
- Track: 13, Reputation (2017)
- Pen: Glitter Gel Pen, with some fountain
- Lyrics from Genius
This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things Narrative Summary
In a lot of ways, This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things is a sister song to Look What You Made Me Do. The titles are both very long, and they both revolve around revenge and holding grudges.
But what this track does differently is shows a playful side. If Look What You Made Me Do was written in the heat of the moment, then This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things was written after the immediate pain and trauma subsided, seeing it with the clarity of hindsight.
This track embodies the point after a heartbreak where you can finally laugh about it.
- Setting: In the present, looking back over a past (and current) feud.
- Characters: Narrator (Taylor), Subject (“you,” person who has wronged her).
- Theme: Revenge and karma.
- Mood: Playfully vengeful, karmic.
- Conflict: Someone backstabbed Taylor, while pretending to be her friend.
- Inciting Incident: The subject ‘rained on Taylor’s parade’.
- Quest: Bring some karmic retribution to the subject.
- Symbolism, Metaphors & Deeper Meanings: “big parties,” “champagne sea,” “no rules,” “bass beat rattling the chandelier,” “Feelin’ so Gatsby,” “rain on my parade,” “locking the gates,” “nice things,” “stabbed me in the back while shaking my hand,” “took an ax to a mended fence,” “he-said, she-said.”
- Lesson: We can’t “have nice things” because immature people like to ruin everything.
What is This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things About?
reputation’s track 13 narrates a past feud, in which she learned some painful lessons about who her real friends were and are.
She approaches this traumatic subject with a lighthearted, satirical tone, infantilizing the subject of the song and teaching some karmic lessons.
Who is This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things About?
Pop culture believes it’s about the Kanye/Kim feud, in which the then-couple purposefully disparaged and gaslit Taylor. But as we know, Taylor rarely confirms or denies who specific songs are about.
As we dig into the lyrics, I’ll point out what clues lead to “Kimye” and how they relate to their history.
This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things Meaning: Line by Line
Right off the bat, Taylor is setting up an ideal, living-it-up setting – but it’s in the past. Wasn’t it so nice when we could have big, lavish celebrations, with no rules? It’s a metaphor for where her life or career was before the incidents that will come later in the song.
“It was so nice throwin’ big parties,” she says of the metaphoric “party” of her 1989 era, “Jump into the pool from the balcony / Everyone swimmin’ in a champagne sea.” Before this person came along and ruined all the “nice things,” she was having the time of her life, at the (then) highest point of her career.
“And there are no rules when you show up here,” she says of this pedestal of celebrity. Once a person enters a certain stratosphere of fame, it’s like the rules of common decency no longer apply. But Taylor knows that for her, that will never be true.
“It’s Been Waiting For You”: Dissecting Taylor’s “Welcome to New York” Lyrics“Bass beat rattling the chandelier,” she says of the thumping rhythm of her then-fabulous life. Everything was celebratory, and everything was going according to plan.
She was “Feelin’ so Gatsby for that whole year,” referencing F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. The novel describes a lavish and superficial lifestyle, where the protagonist tries to obtain the American dream. He does, but he learns that money and popularity don’t buy you happiness.
She was feeling on top of the world, having attained the American dream. But then, because of this feud, she learned the same lessons as Jay Gatsby.
The first verse sets up a lovely scene; everything is perfect and carefree. But it will all come crashing down in the pre-chorus and chorus that follow.
Pre-Chorus & Chorus: “Why’d You Have to Rain on My Parade”
“So why’d you have to rain on my parade?” she says in the pre-chorus. This is, of course, an common (if old-fashioned) idiom that means a grand time being ruined. But it’s also a reference to Funny Girl, a musical in which Barbara Striesand sang the iconic Don’t Rain on My Parade.
Similarly to Swift’s “bass beat rattling the chandelier,” Streisand sings, “I’ll march my band out / I will beat my drum… at least I didn’t fake it.” Whether or not this reference is intentional on Taylor’s part, it’s apropos: the beat of her heart and her ambition will conquer all.
“I’m shaking my head and locking the gates,” she says, holing up in her mansion (or her castle/kingdom of her career, a commonly used Taylor metaphor in songs like Long Live, Look What You Made Me Do, Call it What You Want, and many more).
She’ll no longer let in false friends, and, as she told us in Why She Disappeared, she’s now “Wary of phone calls and promises, charmers, dandies and get-love-quick-schemes.” She’ll lock her heart – and her social circle – up tight.
“This is why we can’t have nice things, darlin’,” she says in the chorus, but this person is not her “darling.” She takes on the tone of a parent scolding a child, wagging a finger and saying, “Because you break them, I had to take them away.”
“This is why we can’t have nice things, honey,” she says, belittling the subject with the sarcastic use of “honey.” “Did you think I wouldn’t hear all the things you said about me?” she asks, the gossip and slander hitting her in a devastating blow.
What this likely refers to is the long-running back and forth between Taylor, Kim Kardashian, and Kanye West. What began with “the mic-grab seen round the world” evolved into an elaborate “he-said, she-said,” with the then-couple releasing edited footage that painted Taylor as a liar.
“This is why we can’t have nice things,” she closes the chorus, taking away his metaphorical “toys” (her attention) and locking them away.
Verse 2: “Took an Axe to a Mended Fence”
Verse two circles back to a time of forgiveness.
“It was so nice being friends again,” she says, “There I was, giving you a second chance.” She let this person back in, maybe against her better judgment. This likely refers to the first Kanye incident: the 2009 VMA mic-grab. Afterwards, he apologized and they were cordial.
She also alludes to second chances in Why She Disappeared: “May your heart remain breakable,” she says in reputation’s opening poem, “But never by the same hand twice.”
“But you stabbed me in the back while shakin’ my hand,” she says of this deceptive, cold, and calculated person. This is a Jekyll & Hyde-type character, who says one thing and does another.
“And therein lies the issue, friends don’t try to trick you,” she says, learning they were never really friends. But this, too, uses an infantilizing tone, scolding this immature person.
Friends don’t “Get you on the phone and mind-twist you,” she says, likely alluding to the infamous Kanye phone call. Kanye never revealed his full intent, or relayed the entirety of his derogatory lyrics, in the call.
Afterwards, the then-couple released doctored footage of the phone call, portraying Taylor as agreeable to the “Famous” lyrics. This began Snakegate, and imploded Taylor’s reputation.
“And so I took an axe to a mended fence,” she says, severing all ties with this person. Their fragile truce is over, and they’re sworn enemies once again.
The pre-chorus twists the knife sarcastically: “But I’m not the only friend you’ve lost lately,” she says, “If only you weren’t so shady.”
She’s not the only one who has turned on him (or them). Hmmm….I wonder why this person keeps losing allies?
Bridge: “Forgiveness is a Nice Thing to Do”
The chorus repeats, then the bridge looks on the bright side.
“Here’s a toast to my real friends,” she says, raising a glass (maybe from the “champagne sea” era), “They don’t care about the he-said, she-said.” Her real friends have stuck by her no matter what the tabloids and Twitter are saying. Her nemesis was never a “real friend” – he was always two-faced.
“And here’s to my baby,” she says of the new love she’s found, “He ain’t readin’ what they call me lately.” This likely alludes to Joe Alwyn, with whom Taylor holed up post-Snakegate, and has likely been described in many of reputation’s love songs (like Call it What You Want, Delicate, End Game, and more).
As she told us in Why She Disappeared, when she stood back up from her lowest point, “Standing broad-shouldered next to her / was a love that was really something, / not just the idea of something.”
Her “baby” is a real, solid love, who stands “broad-shouldered”, and doesn’t pay attention to all the chatter surrounding her reputation.
“And here’s to my mama,” she toasts her mother Andrea Swift, “Had to listen to all this drama.” She confides in her mother like a best friend, and she helped Taylor navigate this treacherous situation.
Andrea also surfaces again in another song (likely) about Kimye, thanK you aIMee: “Everyone knows that my mother is a saintly woman / But she used to say she wished that you were dead.”
“And here’s to you,” she says in a faux-toast, “’Cause forgiveness is a nice thing to do.” This is, of course, satire. Taylor uses humor to cope with this traumatic situation, laughing, “Haha, I can’t even say it with a straight face.”
This humor reflects Taylor’s coping mechanisms in the face of hurtful people. As she said in an interview in the reputation era, “I learned that disarming someone’s petty bullying can be as simple as learning to laugh.”
The entire song, in fact, is humorous, and makes a heavy situation a bit lighter by joking, reframing the narrative, and scolding the perpetrator.
Outro: Never Forgive, Never Forget
The final chorus rehashes all the things we’ve already learned, but now that we’ve learned more about the narrative, the “nice things” mean something a bit different.
In the final repetitions of “This is why we can’t have nice things,” the “nice things” mean a multitude of things: forgiveness, trust, honesty, kindness, and truth.
What was the first “nice thing” that Kanye broke? Taylor’s first VMA award back in 2009. Over the years, he and Kim Kardashian have broken a lot of Taylor’s “nice things,” including the biggest and most important of all: her reputation.
“Because you break them, I had to take them away” now comes to mean, ‘you broke me, so I removed myself from the narrative.’ But instead of laying shattered on the floor, she reframed the narrative, harnessed that snake energy, and re-emerged with one of her most iconic albums and eras to date.
She closes with some more toasts, to her actual “nice things”: her “real friends” and “my baby,” who “didn’t care about the he-said, she-said.” She may have lost many “nice things” along the way, but she’s learned who is most important to her.
“This is why we can’t have nice things,” she closes the song, which is akin to saying, ‘I will never forgive, and I will never forget.’
But not to worry: Taylor will get the ultimate revenge: living a life, and creating a career, that will overshadow every bully, every lie, and reclaim every “nice thing” that was yanked away.
This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things Meaning: Final Thoughts
In reputation’s prologue, Taylor said: “We think we know someone, but the truth is that we only know the version of them they have chosen to show us.” We now see that Taylor is referring to both sides of the coin.
On one hand, she doesn’t show or reveal everything. But on the other hand, neither does anyone else. She learned some harsh lessons in this era, and seems to lay them all out in TIWWCHNT: “I don’t trust nobody, and nobody trusts me.”
From here on out, she’ll be more wary, more guarded, and more calculated. But the result? She gets to keep her peace and her reputation, which is the most important “nice thing” that was ever taken away.
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