Taylor Swift received barely any VMA nominations - and fans are outraged

Taylor Swift fans have shared their frustration on social media after the pop star's single Look What You Made Me Do was snubbed for Video of the Year at the 2018 VMAs.

The number one hit did receive three nominations for technical awards: Best Art Direction, Best Visual Effects and Best Editing, however, it is noticeably absent from many of the major categories.  

Fans believe the star has been unfairly deprived of any major nominations for the single, despite the fact that upon its release last August it dominated headlines and broke YouTube's record for most global streams in 24 hours with 43 million views. 

The single was the first release from Swift's sixth studio album, Reputation. It also premiered at the 2017 Video Music Awards.

The nominees for the 2018 Video of the Year award are Childish Gambino's This is America, Drake's God's Plan, Camilla Cabello's Havana, Ariana Grande's No Tears Left to Cry, The Carters' Ape---- and Bruno Mars for the remix of Finesse featuring Cardi B. 

The Carters' nomination for the single Ape----, means that Beyoncé has now earned her fourth nomination for Video of the Year in the past five years. The video was filmed at the Louvre in Paris and was the lead single from her and husband Jay-Z's first joint album under the alias, The Carters, Everything is Love. 

British stars nominated for multiple VMAs include Ed Sheeran, Dua Lipa, Calvin Harris and Liam Payne. Swedish DJ Avicii, who died in April, has also earned a nomination for best dance video with his single Lonely Together, which features Rita Ora.

The 2018 VMAs will take place on August 21 in New York City, a UK air date has not yet been released.

Part of Swift's videos infamy was due to its allusion to many of the controversies Swift has courted during her career, including her feud with Kanye West and his wife, Kim Kardashian.

Fans believe that a scene that sees Swift lying in a bathtub full of jewels was in reference to Kardashian being robbed at gunpoint in a hotel room in 2016. Meanwhile the predominance of snake imagery in the video was thought to refer to Swift being labelled a 'snake' by Kardashian.

Swift stated that she did not give West permission to refer to her in the line: "I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex, why? I made that b---- famous".

But, Kardashian then went on to provide audio footage that seemingly confirmed that Swift was aware of some of the lyrics West would go onto use about her, but did not feature the pop star explicitly approving the controversial lyric.

The famous feud has led to bitter rivalries between fans of both West and Swift, with many referencing the rapper in angry tweets targeted at the VMA snub. 

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This of course not the first time that Swift and West have come to blows. When both Swift and Beyoncé were nominated for best female video at the 2009 VMAs, Swift was the winner of the award for her single You Belong with Me over Beyoncé's Single Ladies.

West then ambushed the stage during Swift's acceptance  speech and famously stated, "Yo, Taylor, I'm really happy for you, Imma let you finish, but Beyoncé had one of the best videos of all time."

Swift last won the VMA Video of the Year award in 2015 for her single, Bad Blood. The video featured appearances from supermodels Cara Delevingne and Cindy Crawford, as well as actresses Ellen Pompeo and Lena Dunham.