The Jan. 28, 2024 fight for the NFC Championship title came down to the San Francisco 49ers and the Detroit Lions, as they battled it out at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California, the home field of the 49ers. Things were not looking good for quarterback Brock Purdy and the 49ers, as they found themselves at a 17-point deficit by halftime, but they persevered and performed a miraculous comeback, outscoring the Lions 27-7 in the second half. The 49ers clinched the NFC Championship with a final score of 34-31, advancing to the Super Bowl.

The Kansas City Chiefs faced off against the Baltimore Ravens at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore for the AFC Championship game. Many people doubted the Chiefs’ ability to stop the Ravens’ explosive offense, but the Chiefs’ defense, coached by Steve Spagnuolo, was able to put pressure on quarterback Lamar Jackson and hold the Ravens to 10 points, tied for their season low. Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes along with tight end Travis Kelce made an unstoppable duo, with Kelce scoring the first touchdown of the game to give the Chiefs an early lead. The game ended with a final score of 17-10 with the Chiefs claiming the AFC Championship title and moving on to compete in the Super Bowl yet again.

As Super Bowl LVIII approaches, we can look back and see what happened the last time the Chiefs and the 49ers competed against each other in Super Bowl LIV. Patrick Mahomes became the Chief’s starting quarterback in 2018 and has since led his team to the Super Bowl in four of the previous five seasons, winning two of them. Super Bowl LIV was Mahomes’ first appearance in the Super Bowl, and though the Chiefs were down early, Mahomes’ offense scored 21 unanswered points in the 4th quarter to win 31-20. 

This will be a challenging matchup between two teams led by talented young quarterbacks and two of the league’s top ten defenses, with both teams proven to be able to handle comeback situations. Chiefs fans hope to see their team win their second consecutive Super Bowl, while the 49ers aim to win their first Super Bowl since the 1994 season. Super Bowl LVIII will be played at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada on Feb. 11 at 5:30 p.m. (CT) with Reba singing the National Anthem and Usher performing for the halftime show.

While there is some debate over the estimates of exactly how much money Taylor Swift’s Eras tour has made, it is expected to break the record for the highest-grossing tour of all time at over $1 billion, with shows that impacted local economies to an extent comparable to The Super Bowl. Her concerts have become so sought after that the average resale price of tickets has reached $3,801 apiece. Due to the sheer number of fans expected to tailgate, legal guidelines have been put in place preventing fans without tickets from gathering outside of concert venues in multiple locations as a safety precaution. This was largely prompted by her performing three sold-out shows at The Linc in Philadelphia to an estimated 200,000 ticket holders, during which an unprecedented estimate of 57,000 people without tickets gathered outside the venue to hear the artist perform. Even the Taylor Swift’s Era’s Tour concert film has already made $129.8 million in just the first two weeks in theaters, breaking a record for the first independently released movie to break $100 million in the first two weekends in theaters.

Taylor Swift holds other records as the youngest artist to receive a Grammy for Artist of the Year in 2010, the first artist to sell over a million copies in the first week for five consecutive albums and the first female artist in history to reach over 100 million monthly listeners on Spotify. According to Billboard, 1 of every 5 vinyl records sold last year in the U.S. was a Taylor Swift album. Her influence is so large that NFL tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs, Travis Kelce, saw a 400% spike in jersey sales after Taylor Swift was photographed with the football player’s mother at a game. 

Not only is this artist breaking records in popularity, but she is also completely changing the industry and setting a new precedent for artists and record labels for years to come. Most notably, Taylor Swift has become widely known for re-releasing her own music to take ownership of her art, which is conventionally owned by the record label rather than the artist. Along with setting a new precedent for what is possible as an independent artist, Taylor Swift has used her platform to champion artists’ rights and advocate for others. For example, she leveraged Apple Music to pay royalties to artists during their initial launch by threatening to keep her music off the platform if they refused. Taylor Swift has also taken a direct approach to combating what she sees as unfair practices in the music industry, such as when a New York judge denied popstar, Kesha, permission to record new music outside her record label, prompting Swift to donate $250,000 to Kesha to assist with any court costs or financial needs during her legal battle. 

Taylor Swift has not only taken a novel approach to music distribution but to fan engagement too. Swift has used unconventional methods to promote her work and interact with her listeners, such as meetup treasure hunts, a bingo-themed release announcement via social media livestream, and connecting with fans directly both online and in person. Taylor Swift made a notable appearance on Once Upon a Prom in 2008 when she was 18 years old, escorting a fan to his senior prom. 

What makes Taylor Swift so unique is not only her level of influence, popularity, wealth, or even her progressive business model but what she does with her status as a superstar. Specifically, Taylor Swift has exhibited a long-running pattern of using her wealth to help fans. Some examples of this include donating $10,000 to cover a fan’s cancer treatment, another $10,000 to a fan with autism to cover suggested service accommodations, $15,000 to a 19-year-old fan to help pay her mother’s medical costs, $50,000 to a single mother of five grieving the loss of her husband, $70,000 in books to her hometown library and a whopping $1 million to tornado relief efforts in Nashville. 

In addition to these isolated instances, Taylor Swift has made payments towards student loan debt amongst fans and various charitable donations to victims of sexual assault, hurricane survivors, animal shelters and food banks. One food bank reported they can provide nearly double the food after receiving Taylor Swift’s donations. Swift even secretly donated rent assistance and stimulus money to fans during the COVID-19 pandemic, which was only made public after one recipient revealed via Twitter that she received $3,000 from Taylor Swift after posting about her financial stressors during the pandemic.

In addition to charitable donations, Taylor Swift has been known for offering unusually high compensation for crew members and staff. Following the Eras Tour, Taylor Swift offered each of the fifty truck drivers on tour a bonus of $100,000 each, as well as offering bonuses to other tour crew members. While the amounts of some of the bonuses are currently undisclosed, some sources estimate their sum to be around $55 million when including the bonuses provided to truck drivers.

Taylor Swift’s continuous effort to responsibly distribute her wealth is not the only social contribution the artist hopes to make. In recent years, Swift has used her influence to encourage fans to engage in electoral politics and bargained with her family, management team and label to break her political silence. This transparency was especially courageous given the death threats and security risks she faced. In recent years, the artist has defended LGBT+ rights and endorsed Joe Biden in opposition to Donald Trump in 2020. On Sep. 19, 2023, Taylor Swift posted to Instagram encouraging her fans to register to vote, which contributed to more than 35,000 new registrations that day. This figure shows a 23% increase compared to the previous year. 

On account of Taylor Swift’s popularity, widespread appeal, artistic merit, connection to fans, acts of philanthropy, respect for workers, political advocacy, and forward-thinking approach to music distribution and artist rights, it is reasonable to expect Taylor Swift’s name in headlines for years to come. A new precedent has been set for artists, labels, and fans alike as Taylor Swift helps shape the future of the industry.

Every guy loves sports, because sports are something only men can enjoy. Women don’t like them because they’re not related to fashion or shopping, so they’re either bored or they hurt themselves because they’re too delicate. But sometimes, there’s always that one girl that claims she loves sports.

It is of general knowledge that no woman actually likes sports, it’s not in their nature. They only say that to get a guy’s attention – everyone knows that. Girls try to trick guys all the time, and pretending to understand sports it’s just one of them.

“Yeah, I’ve met one of those before. She wasn’t that cute, but she was okay, that’s why I talked to her. At first, when I asked her the players’ names and positions she knew the answers. But I knew that she was just trying to impress me when I asked her the blood type of the dog of the second cousin of the Chiefs quarterback from 1975 and she didn’t know the answer. You just can’t trust women, dude” shared anonymous frat guy with the Monitor.

Some women dare to try to be like men and play sports too. But it is a known fact that they will never be as good as men – they’re too emotional and don’t know how to play as a team, because that’s just how women are. No one would rather watch a female team play than a male team. Women should stick to what they were made for, which is not sports.

Most men would agree with the statement, but for some reason, a few guys disagree.

“This one time I was watching TV and they had women’s soccer on. First I was surprised to see that women knew what soccer was. Then, I was confused on how they the game came to be aired on TV. You can imagine how I felt when I realized that that game was their World Cup. After seeing that I thought, maybe girls like sports too?” said another anonymous source.

Some sources have seen the same pattern going on the video games world. It is quite understandable for women to go after athletes, but there is no rational explanation to why they were pretending to like video games to impress nerds.   

“It is obvious they’re only doing it for attention. They know they will be the only girl online, so they’ll will be the center of attention. They’re are usually ugly, for sure. That’s why they’re online, so no one knows how they actually look like” shared a confidential source, that lives in his mom’s basement.  

Overall, it is still not a confirmed fact if females are capable of liking sports or not. Most of the male population claims that it’s impossible, but there are studies in progress right now to determine if women are capable of doing something such as liking and playing sports for self pleasure, and not to impress guys.

Hopefully, with the conclusions of those studies, it will be clear that women don’t have the capacity to do anything without the intent of getting male attention.