BBC Journo Chris Packham Urges Taylor Swift to Ditch Her Private Jet: Do Better!

Celebrities have always been held at a higher standard than regular Joes and Janes, and treated accordingly. Since the early days of showbiz, movie stars and famous singers could not just command high paychecks but also certain perks that only first-billed names could: better accommodation, finer dining, and speedier and more luxurious transportation.

Today's celebrity is not the same as the celebrity of yesterday, if only because the Internet can make anyone a star, for more or less than the proverbial 15 minutes. Influencers can vouch for that, both for the good and the bad of it.

But if there's one thing that hasn't changed, it is that celebrities still get all these perks, down to their owning or regularly chartering private jets to cover distances they might just as well travel comfortably in a car. Over the past couple of years, as environmentalists and scientists stress we're nearing the point of no return as regards climate change, we've seen increased attention on the topic of celebrities and their private jet use.

For once, it's not the kind of attention they normally court. Pop star Taylor Swift, arguably the most successful and popular female entertainer in pop right now, knows that only too well. In the summer of 2022, she was dubbed "the real climate criminal" for her outrageous carbon footprint from flying private alone.

And the attention hasn't let down since. Student Jack Sweeney, the same one who attained worldwide notoriety when he revealed Tesla CEO Elon Musk has contacted him with a $5,000 offer if he removed the Twitter page that was tracking his private jet, is also tracking Swift's planes.

Just recently, he revealed that she'd covered over 178,000 miles (286,463 km) in 2023 alone. The fact that she'd just threatened to sue him if he didn't stop posting her flight data online clearly hadn't discouraged him, as neither did her plea for privacy and personal safety.

Packham chimes in

Chris Packham believes that Swift's reaction to Sweeney's going public with her flight data was wrong not because she got defensive but because she missed the point. She also missed a good opportunity to send a brilliant message to her fans, but for that to happen, she would have had to lead by example.

Packham, who is not just a BBC reporter but also a multi-awarded nature photographer, TV presenter, author, and environmental activist, says Taylor should have just ditched her private jet altogether when she was thus "shamed" for her carbon footprint.

"We know that private jets are the single greatest contributor when it comes to jet aviation fuel and the least efficient because they're carrying one person," he tells one British publication. "And so [Sweeney] called her out and she threatened to sue him. And I just thought, 'You really missed the trick there, Taylor'."

"What you should have said is, 'You're right, times have moved on. I've got to change my practice. I'm going to sell my private jets'. And that would have been such a powerful thing for her to say to an audience. And I mean, her audience is primarily a young audience, isn't it? I mean, you can't say she's responsible for climate breakdown. But she's an icon. And as a consequence of that, she should be leading."

Packham's argument sounds brilliant on paper, especially coming from someone who doesn't own a private jet. He also hopes that, next time they're both in the same place at the same time, which should happen in June this year, in London, Swift will approach him to let him know that she's decided to sell her jet. That's some major wishful thinking on his part, but who are we to argue.

Swift has actually curbed her private jet use

But here's the thing that Packham is probably ignoring: Swift did curb her private jet use since the first time she was called out for it.

At the time, Swift owned not one but two Dassault Falcon private jets, a $54 million Falcon 7X and a cheaper (and older) Falcon 900. She sold the latter in January this year and has only been flying in the custom longer-range Falcon 7X since then.

Another issue that Packham doesn't consider is that most of the flying Swift has done recently is for her Eras tour, a worldwide insanely high-grossing event that boosted U.S. economy in ways no other artist ever did before. That's not a joke, either. The Federal Reserve credited Swift's tour for contributing $43 billion to the GDP of the country, boosting the hospitality industry and tourism.

Sure enough, she splurged by flying from Japan into Las Vegas for the Super Bowl, but wouldn't you have done the same for your boo if they invited you?

In conclusion, sure, it would be nice if celebrities could be shamed into ditching high-polluting behaviors like flying private, so the rest of us normies wouldn't feel bad about doing our own part just to have it all undone by a single one of their flights. But it's highly optimistic to expect it to happen.