The Reluctant Whore

At a certain point news stories anchored in the earth shatteringly new angle that Lindsay Lohan has been acting like a total and utter fuckwit for attention isn’t news anymore. For a while you can look at her situation, examine what she symbolically represents to American culture and global pop culture, figure out why she’s popular, marvel at how entertainingly fucked up her useless white trash family is, be appalled at her enabling freeloader mother and enjoy the train wreck spectacle for what it is; just another train wreck. After a while, however, it's really just more of the same.

So, LiLo’s been charged with DUI and she had coke in her car. Ok, so there you go. It’s not surprising, it’s not even new but now it’s happened. So, just like Paris going to jail, Li Lo – our sometimes muse – is in actual trouble so she has put herself back in rehab, will probably go through a public stint with a lawyer, conjure up the old Fraulein Maria defense routine where she dresses like a pretty little nun, reads and doesn’t go out, the teenaged girls in the Midwest who idolize her with cry, distraught without irony they will clamor that this is SO UNFAIR and the carefully positioned friends of Li Lo will talk to the press about how she’s taking rehab seriously this time blah blah blah.

And the other thing is, maybe the parents are tag teaming. Dina has had her go riding the kid to free entry and free drinks and now Michael is taking the reins for a while because he’s got the whole born again angle which could help her personality overhaul in the media. Plus, the great character twist with Michael is that he’s a convicted felon so no matter he does with Li Lo now there’s always that underlying potential for self destruction that could happen at any moment which is reassuring. Plus, you know he has an axe to grind being in jail and watching his kid get rich and not being able to take advantage. It’s actually sort of like the Count of Monte Christo but in Hollywood and with white trash freeloaders.

The fact that we’re still talking about her doing the same thing is the story here but even that story is pretty tired. Why is America so obsessed with rich people behaving badly. In this instance: Oh, GOD, who cares? If you haven’t figured that out by now then JESUS, what have you been DOING? The real question that remains, which apparently no one else cares enough to ask is…who is left for us? We’ve got Avril Lavigne (sigh), P!nk (seems to be outgrowing it at the moment), The Duff sisters…ok, so there’s something interesting. The Duff sisters still lack irony and are playing it slick, clean and saccharine.

Alright, one more teenaged diva crash and that’s got to be it. All eyes on the Duff sisters until they fall off the cliff. After that, it’s back to our REAL lives. And this time, I mean it.