Britney Shears, Media Jeers

You know, my young cousin really liked Britney Spears at one point. I mean, he was like three and he knew the dance moves and the songs. we all thought it was cute. He’s since moved on to Bootylicous Beyonce, like everyone else for that matter, but that’s a different story.

Today’s story is about Britney Spears. I thought about writing something about her about two weeks ago. I was just gonna pose the question, “How long will it be before Britney Poses in Playboy?” You know? I wanted to start the official countdown. It seemed as though her life after K-fed was plummeting into an abyss of drugs and alcohol. Its shameful that it has come to such a pass for Ms. Spears, who was once a media darling and as clean as Prius.

The interesting thing here is that the media is covering this like its ‘news’. Is this the insatiable America hunger for celebreality, OR is this just seedy journalism, paparazzi gone wild? I look at a guy like Barry Bonds. He never got along with the media, so when the media gets a chance to take a dig at Barry, of course they take advantage. Or you look at OJ or Michael Jackson etc etc. These are guys who the media has characterized as monsters. Not to say that it was without warrant, but the media outlets seemed insatiable in their hunts for new info. I mean, even Dave Chapelle was portrayed as a wild crazy dude who left $50 million on the table and flew to South Africa to smoke weed and drink or whatever.

But then I look at Britney; Poor little no-panties-wearing-hanging-out-with-Paris Britney. And the media has hopped all over her. Is the media supplying a need or is the media force feeding us?

It’s interesting to see the unflinching eye of the media just totally ‘cover’ a story, you know? About Britney Spears of all people. I mean I’m talking about news crawlers and news specials and breaking news briefs on E! and the style channel. You know what I mean? I question whether the media is supplying a demand. Is the average American that concerned about Britney’s hair? And more immediately, what do I tell my young cousin about Britney? How do I explain Britney’s Burnout to a child?

I think that the media is part of the ’soma’ of today. We’ve got unending news coverage of ‘nonsense’, that’s supposed to make us feel better about ourselves. We’ve got reality TV that’s supposed to entertain us. Reality TV is like an intersection of Huxley’s ‘Soma’ concept and Andy Warhol’s statement about every American having 15 minutes of fame. The media is like a drug, a mind deafening drug.

I refuse to think that this is how we define ourselves as Americans. I don’t think that we really want to watch or read about this stuff. Our television programming is just straight gutter, with the news media leading the way. It’s no wonder that I don’t watch the news. I don’t even read the New York Times. I read the Post. The post is 25 cents and its straight garbage. The Times portrays itself as this upper crusty work of editorial art; but it’s the same nonsense and propaganda, it just costs more. I don’t feel bad when I line my birdcage with the Post, ’cause that’s where it belongs. I wouldn’t feel so bad, if I could line by birdcage with Fox News and CNN and all the rest of the Pseudo TV news, ’cause that’s where it belongs.

Now, I know why Public Enemy had media Assassin Harry Allen.

Britney Bald