Taylor Swift Splits: Age Difference And Jealousy To Blame?

After news surfaced last night of Taylor Swift's split with One Direction's Harry Styles, fans are speculating once again that Swift's penchant for younger men isn't working for the 23-year-old singer who reportedly likes to dominate in relationships.

"So wait...Taylor swift went to the bvi wit dude n end up dumping him in the bvi??? Lmfao! Them VI men! Wha ayo do???? #fb" Alton Berie (Altn B @_alt01) tweeted on Tuesday morning.

Perez Hilton is siding with Swift. "Think what you will, but @taylorswift13 is a sweet girl and seems to me like @Harry_Styles PLAYED her! https://perez.ly/Zz1lzo  Date older next!" he tweeted.

"Date older" seems to be the recurring refrain on the Web today. Despite Swift's love of younger men - Conor Kennedy and Harry Styles were both 18 when they dated Swift - fans say that Swift is too successful, and has too much relationship experience, to waste her time with younger men who just want to have a good time.

In the last 24 hours, the tale of Swift's and Styles' now-infamous fight in the British Virgin Islands has replayed like a broken record.

In December, Swift traveled to England during the holidays to spend time with Styles' family. And we're hearing that Swift assumed that that meant they were getting serious.

Styles, who is known to be sweet and unassuming, was happy to go along with Swift's plans. But a serious relationship? Maybe not. His One Direction bandmates have been warning him that Swift wants too much, too quickly. And that she has a reputation for making sure things go her way.

"Loads of his friends told him to be careful and that it was never going to last, and he feels a little foolish now that it's fallen apart so quickly," a source told Life & Style Weekly. Styles would have been happy to continue dating Swift, we hear. But her terms were pretty strict. Basically: Cater to me.

Despite the fact that Haylor met one another's families in December, fans wondered what was up when they walked the red carpet separately at  Z100's Jingle Ball at Madison Square Garden on Dec. 7. Styles clearly wasn't ready to come out as a couple - or do those dreaded joint interviews, for that matter.

"I'm happy that they're good friends," Louis Tomlinson of One Direction told reporters backstage. "I've met [Taylor] before and she's a lovely girl." 

Yet friends of Styles were reportedly concerned that Swift wanted a lot more than he did, in large part because of their ages and where they are in their lives. Swift is also known to be extremely intense.

She's been accused of crashing a Kennedy wedding and kidnapping Conor when she missed him. "How did I kidnap him?" she asked in Rolling Stone. "You can't kidnap a grown man! These are serious accusations, now! It's an interesting way to spin something into a story. See, this is why I don't read stuff."

"The way I look at love is you have to follow it, and fall hard, if you fall hard. You have to forget about what everyone else thinks," she continued. "It has to be an us-against-the-world mentality. You have to make it work by prioritizing it, and by falling in love really fast, without thinking too hard."