Britney's circus

My favorite recording artist since 1999 has been Britney Spears. Until the past few years, she was just some bubblegum pop artist, dancing around with boa constrictors, kissing Madonna –  the usual. But then something happened. It appeared that Spears started to go mad.

And the world ate it up and wanted more.

This past Sunday, Spears’ documentary, “For the Record” premiered for her to set the record straight, just two days prior to the release of her new album, “Circus.”

There was something extremely sad about Spears and how we as a culture perceived her.

After she married Kevin Federline, who was seen as a talentless nobody, her image was shaken. Spears was seen as a pop princess, and the most extreme thing she’d done to this point was show off skin.

But suddenly she grew up and married someone perceived as white trash. It wasn’t the power celebrity couple we’d envisioned. Going from Justin to Kevin, it just didn’t seem like she was moving up.

Then, with the children and divorce, Spears seemed to really lose it. She lost her kids in custody battles, she had a horrible performance at the Video Music Awards that was supposed to be her comeback and she was partying and rumored to be on drugs. Then, to top it all off, she shaved her head.

It wasn’t looking good for her.

But perhaps what was the saddest part of the situation was that every day we would expect to wake up and see something else about Spears. The public couldn’t get enough of her, and it seemed as if the paparazzi was desperate for her to mess up.

The way she was followed, which is highlighted in the documentary, was unbelievable and incredibly sad. It became clear to me that I absolutely would never want to be famous because we essentially torture celebrities in our culture.

But throughout her recent troubles, I’ve remained a steadfast fan, and perhaps an even stronger one. One of my favorite parts of the documentary was when she addressed the head shaving.

She said people shave their heads all the time, and it wasn’t a big deal, that it was a symbolic action for her shedding a part of her life. I personally couldn’t understand why everyone freaked out. I thought it was just a really bold, new makeover, and I think it’s awesome she was doing what she needed to do and said that it wasn’t crazy.

I definitely recommend the documentary to everyone. It’s surprisingly touching and provides insight into a culture absolutely obsessed with celebrities, how detrimental that can be on the person and how poor of a reflection it is on society in many ways.

Although I love Spears even more for her new CD and documentary, I also have to take a moment to realize that my love for her is also a small part of the problem.