She's a slave (to her own psychosis)

Because my mail gets forwarded, I'm probably a little slow on the uptake. But I just read this month's Rolling Stone cover story, The Tragedy of Britney Spears. After chasing the Britney circus around for six weeks, the closest the reporter can get to an interview with Ms. Spears is duping her inner circle into thinking she's going to pay them $2 million until the very last possible second. What results is basically a summary of Britney's lurid downward spiral. With pictures.

Now back in the day I had much less tolerance for Britney Spears then most people. But that doesn't make the unfolding craziness any easier to watch. It's disturbing on a level that's hard to articulate. Even moreso than the Michael Jackson craziness.

I think there is a certain generation that grew up with Britney Spears, and to watch her become such a freakshow is to watch something in our collective psyche get kicked and corrupted and broken. In large part, I think it goes hand in hand with the Bush administration and the toxicity of American culture in general. I think the reason that Britney became so adored — and so hated — is that all her life she was micromanaged and molded into what other people wanted her to be:

"These middle-aged guys were so intense about her not being sexual that they pushed her the other way," says the friend. "They'd tell her to put on a bra or that her lip gloss was too dark. They were literally picking out her panties for her."

I would continue this rant, but I would probably start to sound like a crazy person. Someday maybe I'll write a book about how Britney Spears is the embodiment of all that is wrong with America. But in the meantime, just read the article (if you have time on your hands; it's a long one). Really it's no wonder the woman is having a breakdown:

If Britney was really who we believed her to be — a puppet, a grinning blonde without a cool thought in her head, a teasing coquette clueless to her own sexual power — none of this would have happened. She is not book-smart, granted. But she is intelligent enough to understand what the world wanted of her: that she was created as a virgin to be deflowered before us, for our amusement and titillation. She is not ashamed of her new persona — she wants us to know what we did to her.