admits that she and Timberlake are dating. "When you're really comfortable with someone you love, the silence is the best," she says (actually, when you're with someone you love, you wouldn't care what other people think). "And that's how me and J. are. When we're in a room together, we don't have to say anything(how the hell do you communicate, then?). And when we go out to a club, it's like we're the only two people there. It's for real(why does she sound like a hippie?)." All the same, Spears's is that of a Southern girl who, despite her fairytale ascent from Kentwood, Louisiana, to megastardom, is still down home, chaste, and, above all, sincere. At this point in her career, marriage would be as unimaginable as Britney going goth(i'd pay to see that...). Spears comes from modest beginnings. She grew up borrowing fashionable clothing from friends, which her family(she has two siblings--Bryan, twenty-two, who works as a sports agent in New York, and an eight-year-old sister, Jamie) couldn't afford. To this day, both parents work--Lynne is a fifth-grade teacher, and Spears's father is a building contractor who comes home every other weekend from his job in Memphis. Spears dropped out of high schoolat fifteen to pursue her singing career(shame, shame; she didn' even finish high school), and she has yet to take her equivalency exam (i'll save her the trouble, she has the intelligence equivalent to that of a lab-rat on crack). Nevertheless, in person, Britney comes off as a bit more, shall we say, experienced (at what? being a slut?) than the guieless image she projects on the cover of Teen People. While she does pepper her speech with Southern phrases like "Oh mah lordy,"(can we say 'hick'?) and while she does say her prayers every night(my ass, she says her prayers), she also freely emloys the f-word(POTTY-MOUTH!!!!!!!) and other colorful slang. In fact, her topics of conversation can be so out-of-keeping with her Colgate smile that Spears tends to lower her voice into a confessional whisper. Take her somewhat surprising confidence that she's addicted to the show "Sex and the City," which seems like the last thing she would identify with. "Sarah Jessica Parker? I'm her," Spears says (who the fuck does she think she is even comparing herself to the scum that grows in the fungus that's planted in the dirt under Sarah Jessica Parker's shoes??? What a stupid asshole...). "And all the things that they talk about are so true. Like one show was talking about how[confessional whisper] guys can have sex without love, so women can do it too?[She raises her voice] And I have girlfriends who do that. But I [lowers voice],I just really have to be into someone(notice how she doesn't mention anything about staying a virgin until marriage, she just has to be into someone... stupid, lying slut....). [Raises voice] If not, what's the purpose?" Is Spears talking about sex? Has Eve taken a bite of the apple? Too late, her mother has just entered the room, and Spears, crafty teenager that she is, changes the subject(yeah, you have to be a real Einstein to know how to change the subject***BTW: I find it extremely retarded that she's 18 and she freely curses in front of her mom, but she thinks that she can't talk about sex; what a freakin idiot....). But we have arrived at a dichotomy: How does a pop star who is marketed as the epitome of virginal teen-hood become a woman without alienating her fans in the process?
The past, as we know, is littered with the bodies of teen idols like Tiffany, Debbie Gibson, and Leif Garrett. And before them, there was the Partridge Family. And before them, there was Bobby Sherman. For even though young girls are rabid fans, they are also fickle. They grow up to become punkers. Metal-heads. Hip-hop devotees. Indie-rock queens. Which genre they choose reflects more than what music they like; it's also an indicator of where they'd like to be placed in the cultural firmamen. But until then, they have Britney Spears. And that's no accident(i beg
to differ...). Most of Spears's marketing campaign was pure genius: Before her first album came out in early 1999, she was touring malls and opening for Nsync, which means that there were Spears fans before there was even a Spears record(that's a very disturbing thought...). This, if
you are a purist who loathes today's relentless marketing machine, is profoundly disturbing.
Spears knows that not everyone relishes her success as a cultural high point (Britney doesn't have enough common sense to know that not everyone kisses the ground she walks on). Some reviewers insist that she lip-syncs her performances("That's not true," she says)(yeah, and i suppose you naturally sound that nasual; nevermind, i don't care what the hell she does with her voice). Others snigger at her music's predictable, albeit catchy, R&B hooks(what R&B hooks??? her music is dripping with Bubblegum Pop). But, as Spears sees it, you have to consider the
source(source: a skanky, bitchy, slutty, lying, hypocritical, ego-driven, naive, ignorant little brat). "This critic came once and she gobbed at my show," she says(what the fuck does 'gobbed' mean???). "There wasn't one kind word that she wrote. And I was like, Why are you even coming at all?"(So she could put a talent-less, over-advertised, little skank like you in your place. We need more critics like that. That lady had guts, and i give her major props. The lady only wrote what she saw; Britney performing like pure shit.)
"She wrote that people were leaving her show, and nobody has ever left Britney's..." interrupts Lynne(for some reason i highly doubt that nobody has ever left a Britney concert).
Spears: "Mama, don't even go there."
Lynne:"But why would they even write that? It's so..."
Spears:"You're lowering yourself just to even talk about it." She gives
her mom a stern look."You are." (If I gave my mom a stern look, she'd slap me upside the head. And did you notice how she told her mom not to talk about the critic but she
was the one who brought up the whole subject?)
Such battle-worn, adult acceptance is unexpected from an eighteen-year-old. Spears often names Madonna's career is the one she'd most like to emulate(that's dissing Madonna). "I remember I read this harsh review about my show, and one of my friends told me that this was the exact
same stuff people said about her,"(the only difference is that Madonna became very successful, you won't) Spears says. "And it's like she didn't care. Madonna just came out and was herself. I respect that a lot." (I'm still trying to overcome the fact that she knows how to read...)