The Reluctant Whore

Lindsay Lohan can smell fear and it’s coming from her upper lip. Ben Widdicombe reports that she’s quietly moved out of her Sierra Towers apartment because she wants to be away from the relentless partying that goes on in that building. Oh, and this comes out in the press a week or so after it was eagerly reported that she’s decided to stay on in rehab to really ensure that she’s clean from alcohol and drugs.

So, what we seem to have here is a concerted, consistently reported upon campaign of performatively clean living. Lindsay Lohan wants to be seen as having cleaned up her act and made sweeping changes to her life…but why? Why would she all of a sudden desperately need to seem as though she were not a boozing, coke snort truck stop whore anymore? The work offers were still pouring in until the last minute.

Oh, THAT’S right. Because she has a pending court case where she’s going to potentially be sentenced for driving with a flood of alcohol and a scattering of coke coursing through her veins. With LA sentencing trends going the way they appear to be going she could potentially end up in jail even longer than Paris. But then, here are some things to consider about that.

In LA, 5 days is apparently actually 3 and 45 days is equal to 23. So, she could easily consider a potential 90 day sentence to realistically last anywhere between 90 minutes and 90 weeks.
Also, if Paris’ stock sky rocketed in value BECAUSE of her 3 weeks in jail then it’s reasonable to consider, as I always have, that jail for some people is a celebrity incubator and that’s a real plus for Lohan. You spend a couple of weeks inside and you come out with a whole list of freshly installed media viable angles installed – each of which can be revealed as your PR company sees fit.

Jail is the new rehab but it’s pretty edgy to get in jail for some press. Black rappers like 50 Cent have been doing it for years but even their stays have often been hyped to be longer than they probably were. Oh, look at that – as was the case with Vogueing and Madonna, here we have the same cultural equation; jail has been taken mainstream by a white pop culture diva.

When you’re being sentenced to jail you walk a fine line between crafting a criminal image for yourself and garnering public sympathy. The public ultimately doesn’t really support actual criminals when the crime was clearly committed and they really were guilty. Paris got away with getting jail time that wasn’t really warranted which is the goal but even she probably doesn’t know how she managed that. The trick is you have to get jail time for basically nothing, spend the time inside and the come out and cash in.

This might be more difficult for Lohan seeing as she actually had cocaine in her blood so for now perhaps, extended stays in rehab coupled with moving house quietly and letting the press know on the sly are the best things for her. [source]