Ok, so the Taylor Swift backlash is now well under way.

The blog The Fab Life had its top five reasons for hating her. Not five reasons for finding her mildly annoying or five reasons why she might be overrated, but five reasons why she should be hated. Number one is “Her ‘OMG! I can’t believe I just won this award! I mean, I’ve been nominated for over 87 awards and have won 59 of them, but seriously, OMG! I AM IN SHOCK!’ reaction every time she wins something.” By contrast, Chris Brown beat the shit out of Rihanna before last year’s Grammys, but whatever; fight the real enemy.

I can sort of understand why people hate Britney Spears or Katy Perry or Ke$ha or whatever pop star of the moment, but to really hate (not a word I’m putting in anyone’s mouth) someone like Taylor Swift seems a little unnecessary and goes far beyond any issues a twenty-year old musician might have.

Swift was arguably the biggest pop star in the world before Kanye West interrupted her prom at the MTV Video Music Awards but she got that way by writing and singing songs people like. If the most damning thing a person can do is be a little more precocious than you’re comfortable with, then maybe it’s not Taylor Swift that has the problem. As a story on MTV.com put it:

Still, I’m sort of amazed at the acrimony with which Swift is being assaulted. Yes, I’m aware that the Internet has much to do with it … after all, it provides not only the stage but the secure blanket of anonymity. The allure of the “comment” box is that it allows you to say the nastiest things imaginable — things you would never dream of saying directly to someone — without fear of direct retribution. And yes, I’m aware of the fact that negativity and pettiness are the cultural currency of the day, that they drive page views and sell magazines, and that we are all competing to see who can get to the bottom the fastest.

…

And, like I said, all of this seems a bit, well, harsh. After all, what, exactly, is Taylor Swift’s biggest sin? Faux earnestness? Bum notes on national TV? The fact that she’s sold a whole lot of records and now gets to reap the awards? I suppose it’s all of those things, though none of them seem to be all that important.

So, the question begs to be asked: Why, all of a sudden, are people hating on Taylor Swift? While her rapid rise certainly is the main reason, it was amplified by Kanye West, who inadvertently made her into an underdog when he crashed the stage at the MTV Video Music Awards last year. It was impossible not to feel sympathetic towards her, and we carried that sentiment with us, as Swift made the rounds on talk shows (“Oprah,” “The View”), and took home trophy upon trophy at the American Music Awards and the Country Music Awards. We were happy to see her do well. After all, she deserved it.

But you could argue that the incident turned Swift into something she may never have intended to be: a bona-fide mainstream celebrity. Her songs were suddenly being played on pop and adult-contemporary radio she was on every TV channel imaginable and her rumored relationship (with “New Moon” star Taylor Lautner) became tabloid fodder. And this exposed her to a much larger audience, a more judgmental one. And here’s where things began to change.

Because that was the audience who began catcalling whenever Swift won another award, started to wonder how she could genuinely be that shocked each and every time she strode to the podium (a fair point, I will admit). They saw her not as a sweet gal who penned her own songs — because they didn’t know her as that; they knew her as a celebrity. And the acrimony built steadily.

“As the awards began to pile up, she went from the underdog to the over-dog. She became just another celebrity,” Entertainment Weekly music critic Leah Greenblatt told me on Tuesday (February 2). “And the cycle of celebrity, it will always come back to a takedown. Some people are mad because she seems too perfect. Some people are mad at her for dumping Jacob from ‘New Moon.’ And a lot of people are mad because she wiffed so hard with Stevie Nicks at the Grammys.”

Of course, people are free to like and dislike anyone they please and I’m not going to make any effort to convince anyone else that Swift is a great and important artist (although I believe she is) and this alleged hate is often overblown, especially on the internet. But, at least one person thought that Leona Lewis, another harmless, if bland, pop star deserved to be punched in the face.

Pop music is easy enough to ignore (although not entirely: my grandma knows who Beyonce is) and rather harmless, but if there’s so much hatred that you genuinely hate pop’s least offensive figure (let alone one that is actually divisive), well, I just don’t know what to say beyond that.