The Setup, The Punchline, The Hungry Masses Yearning to be Free
Britney went to the mall. Britney went crazy. Britney went wherever she was told.
Like her onetime "soul mate," Madonna, she's beginning to lose her need for a last name as the nightly news reports on her degenerate exploits as though she was a better indicator of national wealth and stability than the economy and crime rates combined. The way Rolling Stone magazine waxes poetic, it might even be true.
Maybe she is the new distraction to keep us from really noticing the body bags coming back from Iraq and the local pharmacy. Maybe she's the stock-market crash dressed up in crotchless fishnets and bad weave, sipping Purple Monster moonshine.
Maybe she just fascinates the nation because she's the collective bad habits of the masses. She's our bad parenting. She's our weight gain. She's our prescription drug problem. She's our spiraling careers. She's our money problems. She's our messed up love life. And she's our favorite poster child because she still goes further than we do. She puts it all on display. She shows off all our problems and disasters at once. She's the one left on stage after the others quietly saw the reviews and went home. She's the one so far gone she makes most of us feel like, no matter what, we're still not that bad.
Maybe she really is the "canary in the coal mine of our culture, the most vivid representation of the excess of the past decade...[not thinking] there was a tomorrow worth saving for...and blaming everyone else for her problems...[while relying on her] sense of entitlement." (Rolling Stone, Issue 1046). If that's true, how many of us will back off, get out of the mine, step off the stage before we end up like the canary?
Like her onetime "soul mate," Madonna, she's beginning to lose her need for a last name as the nightly news reports on her degenerate exploits as though she was a better indicator of national wealth and stability than the economy and crime rates combined. The way Rolling Stone magazine waxes poetic, it might even be true.
Maybe she is the new distraction to keep us from really noticing the body bags coming back from Iraq and the local pharmacy. Maybe she's the stock-market crash dressed up in crotchless fishnets and bad weave, sipping Purple Monster moonshine.
Maybe she just fascinates the nation because she's the collective bad habits of the masses. She's our bad parenting. She's our weight gain. She's our prescription drug problem. She's our spiraling careers. She's our money problems. She's our messed up love life. And she's our favorite poster child because she still goes further than we do. She puts it all on display. She shows off all our problems and disasters at once. She's the one left on stage after the others quietly saw the reviews and went home. She's the one so far gone she makes most of us feel like, no matter what, we're still not that bad.
Maybe she really is the "canary in the coal mine of our culture, the most vivid representation of the excess of the past decade...[not thinking] there was a tomorrow worth saving for...and blaming everyone else for her problems...[while relying on her] sense of entitlement." (Rolling Stone, Issue 1046). If that's true, how many of us will back off, get out of the mine, step off the stage before we end up like the canary?