Rules Of The Game #4: Britney Shows Brain

[koganbot]

Rules Of The Game #4: Britney Shows Brain

I quote poptasticuk, I quote Britney Spears, I mention the headshave, I use the phrase "creation myth." Comment here, there, everywhere (still don't know how consistently comments will go through on the Las Vegas Weekly site).

(Contains my answer to Jessica's question "How did you end up liking teenpop? Why don't you like what you're supposed to like?")

Apparently, LVW think "fuck" is a sacred word that cannot be spelled in full without offending the gods. Also, LVW dropped my italics, at least online, but I'll try to get them to change that.

EDIT: Here are links to all but three of my other Rules Of The Game columns (LVW's search results for "Rules of the Game"). Links for the other three (which for some reason didn't get "Rules Of The Game" in their titles), are here: #4, #5, and #8.

UPDATE: I've got all the links here now:

http://koganbot.livejournal.com/179531.html

Comments

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

ok yes i think this is complicated:
no you're right in the sense that when tabs tell these stories they don't out-and-out say "this is all just commodity nonsense" -- nevertheless i think there's a kind of don't-ask-don't-tell compact between the writers (who after all know they making up up, often very hurtful) and the readers (who after all -- plenty of them -- know this at some level) and are enjoying the gossip "just as a good story".. the compact basically being "no hurt no foul" as these folks hire ppl to spin us a line all the time -- as if to say, it's all unreal, it's all a game, we're allowed, don't worry

at the same time -- at least in the uk tabs -- there's a curious kneejerk hangover of aesthetic puritanism which distinguishes the wacky wildness of men-with-guitars and and the obviously-unhinged/unfit-parent wildness of women with microphones (and fit bodies) -- which defines the wild women as either and the wild men as "business as usual wacky lad rockers"
publicity-stunt-wild or actually certifiable, and then

(and tab reviewers and commentators here routinely attack the american idolisation of pop as a step into what's "wrong with everything", with titbits of frankfurt-school-style crit of the leisure industry cocooning us with controlled blandness)

(disclaimer: given that i don't read newspapers -- except occasionally on a pub table or over somone's shoulder in the bus, or a headline on a newsstand -- i'm not sure a detailed study will back me up here: but this is general impression i get)

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

i'm not sure if para 2 ["at the same time"] confirms or undermines the point i'm making -- but para 1 and para 3 operate as a kind of pincer movement, one bigging up the irreality of actual real reality, and the other complaining about the manipulation of Reality [as the woman on the bus refeered to it, meaning eg "reality TV"]

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

haha para ii shd actually read: "at the same time -- at least in the uk tabs -- there's a curious kneejerk hangover of aesthetic puritanism which distinguishes the wacky wildness of men-with-guitars and and the obviously-unhinged/unfit-parent wildness of women with microphones (and fit bodies) -- which defines the wild women as either publicity-stunt-wild or actually certifiable, and the wild men as "business as usual wacky lad rockers"

uk tabs patrol london clubs, but london being so super-dominant, sleb just never go to a student bar in norwich, so avoidance is harder (and yes, they're nastier)

[dickmalone.livejournal.com]

Well as someone I know likes to point out, if you want to avoid the tabs, you can. They really only hang around a few restaurants in LA and clubs/bars in NY. If you don't want to be in the tabloids, go to a student bar up by Columbia, or move to San Jose or Philadelphia or something. It's pretty clearly a dance. Of course this is in the US, they're a lot more vicious in the UK, right?

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

yeah, if you look at the coverage of Victoria Beckham in the sun or the mirror, or Amy Winelodge, there's all sorts of badness about...