Not That Innocent

I just finished watching the Britney Spears interview on Dateline.

I've never made a secret out of the fact that I'm a Britney fan. In fact, I've written about it here. I've been fascinated, along with the rest of the world, with the rise and fall of this one time reigning pop-princess. I'm guilty of taking great pleasure in the tabloid coverage of her marriage to KFed, her pregnancies, her Oops I Did It Again mishaps with baby SPF. I love me a good trashy magazine more than the average Joe, I freely admit.

I have to say though, that from the day that BritBrit officially announced her first pregancy, I had a sad feeling. Things were not going to turn out well for America's bubblegum blonde. I felt sad that day, partially because it wasn't even her news to reveal. The mags had been all over that shit for months already with their speculations and inside scoops. I should know, I read every single word.

I know that this interview was staged, just like most of her public life, to have an affect on her audience. I'm savvy to the media machine, I really am. But you know what? It really worked this time because even though she was sitting there, boobies hanging out, mascara apparently applied in the dark, I didn't have the heart to make fun. In fact, I almost wanted to cry for her. I truly got the sense that she's fiercly protective of her baby, the same one that the stalkerazzi are trying to convince us isn't being protected at all.

She seemed very young, very unhappy and honestly lost in a world that is out to destroy her even more swiftly than it lifted her to superstardom. I got the sense that she doesn't even fully understand the extent to which she is being slammed.

I guess the reason that my heart goes out to her is because I feel conflicted by the fact that she did choose this career and to be in the public eye and has reaped great rewards as a result. But she's 24 years old and about to become a mother for the second time. She became a superstar at 17. There was no way that she could ever have had enough forsight at 17 years old to know that in only six year's time she'd be a wife and a mother. She couldn't have predicted then what it would feel like to try to protect a new life from the one that she created for herself when she was just a child.

I'm not about to put down my smut, believe me, but I think I am going to side with the Britster for a while. It's time to leave her alone and let her be a mom. Let her make mistakes (what mom hasn't dropped their baby once or twice, like seriously) without such harsh judgement and ridicule. She's not the sparkly groomed Britney of old, but we can be just as entertained by the messy baby-makin' Britney, without being so cruel, can't we?

And for God's sake, let a pregant popstar get her venti decaff cafe frappacino now and then without leaping up from behind the counter with a barista smock and a camera. Actually, I love those shots, keep doing that.