ma/ch 15. 2002 1
;~ | 5
R f J & 'if lo u t
iu s tF w n r m
Up-and-coming gay icon Britney Spears:
the next Madonna or the next Tiffany .7
1
don’t know quite what it is about Britney
Spears— I just can’t take her seriously.
Madonna was cool and still is.
Tiffany was a flash in the pan— and posing
for Playboy isn’t going to bring her back. Maybe
Britney is just a “tart in the pan.”
(And poor Justin Timberlake! He is
one of the biggest teen heartthrobs ever,
and the poor boy isn’t getting laid!)
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• • •
E va H offman
Milwaukie
• •
M
aybe at the ripe old age of 34,1 finally am
starting to sound too much like my par
ents, but 1 don’t understand what is so interest
ing about Ms. Spears.
Sure, on the surface Britney and Madonna
have a few things in common. Both have made
unfortunate forays into film, both have used their
sexuality as a marketing device, and both are
associated with virginity: Madonna for calling the
loss of hers “a career move’’ and Spears for main
taining hers as if it is kind of mark of virtue.
But there is where I see the similarities end
ing. Has Spears said or done anything sociologi
cally interesting?
Has Britney challenged mainstream ideas about
sexuality, religion and hypocrisy? Has she tackled
issues of class, racism, sexism and homophobia?
Has Spears sent any kind of important mes
sage through her work? No.
In fact, Spears is little more than a hypocrite.
She is ever so proud of her virginity yet sells her
sexuality with all the subtly of a prostitute.
Madonna challenged the mainstream by
holding up a mirror to society and showing us a
woman can be articulate, literate, intelligent, sex
ually aggressive and nonvirginal and still demand
to be treated with dignity and respect. Although
I have no problem with Spears promoting sexual
restraint (which I think is actually a good thing in
this day and age of rampant sexually transmitted
diseases), she should follow that message through
with her persona and music.
Madonna is an artist who has something to
say about the issues in our world. Britney is
merely a reflection of society and how much
work there still is yet to do.
w
hen Madonna first came out she
was older and a much harder
woman because of her past than Brit
ney and her Mouseketeer years. Their
backgrounds are completely different.
Although Madonna used sex to sell herself, she
also proved to be an intelligent businesswoman.
Meanwhile, Britney just tends to be selling sex.
Also, Madonna’s style always has been able
to change with the times. Meanwhile, Britney
just has been putting out bubblegum pop.
Hopefully when she is older we can make
another comparison and say yes if she is lucky.
But Britney has been around much longer than
Tiffany was, so she has something going for her.
J ason E ngland
Portland
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B
ritney Smears is going to be the next
Tiffany. She is nowhere near as popular as
Madonna was by now.
Her “trends” all are taken from other people.
She hasn’t offered anything new for young peo
ple— except for a horrible voice, crappy
melodies and stupid commercials. She needs to
crawl back into her hole in Florida with the
other teen-age song hags.
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AJ G ilbertso n
Beaverton
• • •
iffany. She might be an industry earning
power at the moment, but her music lacks
originality and stamina.
T
' 10920 NW St. Helens Road
(503) 286-1291/Fax: (503) 286-9592
Madonna has a quarter-century of musical
firsts under her many belts. Britney still will fall
short of her maverick inventiveness in 10 years,
should she remain popular.
Is Britney capable of producing a “Like a Vir
gin” in the next year or two? Or “Like a Prayer”
in the next 10? Not likely.
Madonna’s savvy sense of controversy and
artistic daring will far outlive Britney. She will
be making original music at 50. If Britney still is
singing at 30, we all will have become even
more bored with her canned act.
Everyone might not like Madonna, but she
commands respect for license to self-invention.
Everyone likes Britney, but what we hear now is
what we’ll hear in the future.
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eliminate half an hour of network advertise
ments? It looks suspicious to me, but I hope the
scheduling decision was because of incompe
tence and not homophobia.
T homas K raemer
Corvallis
Judgmental Judge
To the E ditor :
T > resident Bush recently presented nomina-
JL tions to fill judicial vacancies. These nomi
nees, far from the moderates he promised in his
campaign, have extreme right-wing viewpoints as
evidenced by their judgments on record.
In particular, Mississippi Judge Charles Pick
ering Sr. exhibited his far-right leanings in
regard to miscegenation, abortion and even vot
ing rights for African Americans. Not only has
his record been deplorable, but he also has
attempted to hide the tmth about his judgments
from the public by refusing to make them avail
able to the Senate Judiciary Committee.
A glimpse of Pickering’s convictions:
• As a state senator and as a leader in the
Republican Party he advocated for a constitu
tional amendment to ban abortion at the state
or federal level.
• He assisted in the rewording of the Missis
sippi miscegenation law (preventing interracial
relationships) to get around challenges regard
ing its constitutionality.
• As recently as 1993, he opposed the idea of
“one person, one vote” and repeatedly rejected
measures to expand electoral opportunities for
African Americans after passage of the Voting
Rights Act in 1965.
Check exit his record for yourself. Then call
our senators immediately if his nomination is
passed to the flexir.
Ask them to filibuster this nominee and vote
against him. He clearly has demonstrated he is
neither a mcxlerate nor capable of clear, un
biased judicial decision making.
M elanie E dwards
Oregon National Organization for Women
Action Vice President
Sam support
To the E ditor :
I
Am Sam deserved more than one little piece
of popcorn (“What’s Poppin’?" Feb. lj. This is
a meaningful and uxiching movie.
While I was in college, I volunteered to teach
mentally disabled students to use calculators to
buy food. Being a demanding teacher, I got impa
tient and started to raise my voice to a student.
He was happy instead of being upset. I guess he
had learned something, but I felt guilty for raising
my voice rather than proud of my achievement.
I heard comments like, “How could Sam
(Sean Penn) raise a baby but not an 8-year-old
kid?” However, we should not forget he got help
from his neighbor. Also, a baby does not talk
back to anylxxly.
At first, I did feel the lawyer (Michelle Pfeif
fer) was flirting with Sam, but on second
thought maybe it wasn’t meant that way. She
had a busy husband who refused to help her take
care of her son. She was touched because Sam
was willing to give time and love to his daughter.
And emotioas got involved when the lawyer
was trying to help him. I could not speak for
Sam because I do not know how much a men
tally disabled person would know about flirting.
This movie was about how he fought for his
rights in taking care of his daughter. Also, it showed
how some social workers badly handled their cases.
The thing I did not like about the movie was
that I was not told how he got the homeless girl
pregnant.
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