Swift's music is entertaining for many. She should absolutely be able to use any location as a backdrop. But she packages our continent as the backdrop for her romantic songs devoid of any African person or storyline, and she sets the video in a time when the people depicted by Swift and her co-stars killed, dehumanized and traumatized millions of Africans. That is beyond problematic.
I was pretty appalled that she decided to make a video in Africa and not include any black people, but then seeing that she made a fucking colonial fantasy brings it up a notch. Astoundingly tone-deaf.
What's the alternative, if we're already romanticizing colonialism? Portray some natives as porters and guides? Servants? If you're going to do a colonial video, it's probably less racist to leave the natives out, because that could only add insult to injury.