Pop Culture Junkies Anonymous

One day last week when I came home, my mother was watching the news coverage of the Jackson Family’s latest drama. After the news moved on to the next segment, my mother proclaimed “The Jackson Family have been a public circus since the 1960s.” My mother is kinda right.

Ever since the success of The Jackson 5 in 1964 the family has lived  under the celebrity microscope at their own or against their will. The attention of the family as a whole accelerated in the 1980 with Michael and Janet’s rises to super-stardom. Shortly after, stories of Joe’s alleged abusive ways and infidelity made headlines, Michael couldn’t blink an eye without the paparazzi following him while he was trying to live his life the way he wanted (Bubbles the Chimp, Neverland Ranch, the birth of his kids, etc.,)  and despite Janet’s  attempts to keep her life as private as possible, we all found out about her secret marriage to James DeBarge in 1985 and her second marriage to Rene Elizondo after they divorced in 2000.

We know that the press makes everything they do a major news story. To this day we are still seeing reports about appeals made in the FCC’s case against CBS for Janet’s “nipple-gate” at the hands of Justin Timberlake in the 2004 Super Bowl. The press can never get enough of the alleged plastic surgeries that various members of the family have gotten (they particularly came after Michael and La Toya the most, until recently when Jermaine began appearing in public with hair that looks like black paint.) Then there are those who attack the family and bring them unwanted attention. Michael was was accused twice of sexual molestation in his adult life, while La Toya was a victim of an abusive marriage and had a best-selling book based off of lies forced by then husband Jack Gordon along with a Playboy spread and video to match. But, every now and then, a member of the family manages to make a spectacle of themselves; Joe attempting to promote a new artist shortly after Michael’s death and a cologne in the family name, Jermaine appearing on the UK version of Celebrity Big Brother, and The Jacksons: A Family Dynasty  are just a few examples. Now, in the recent weeks, the Jackson family drama has been brought to the forefront by the children.

While complete details are still fuzzy, it appears that there is a rift  in the family over the late King of Pop’s estate, with Janet, Jermaine, Randy and Rebbie (the only Jackson that manages to stay out of the public eye) on one side and Michael’s kids Paris, Prince Michael I and Prince Michael II (Blanket) on the other, according to reports.  After a missing person’s report was filed and Paris took to her Twitter account to inform the WORLD that her grandmother, Katherine was “missing,” Jermaine took to Twitter as well to proclaim that Katherine was taking a much needed break in Arizona, even posting a picture of her playing UNO with friends. Paris continued to count the days that she had not heard from her grandmother on Twitter, and shortly after a week, all hell broke loose.

A surveillance video of an altercation between Janet and Paris made its way through the internet, with Janet allegedly slapping her niece, attempting to take her phone, and calling her that “b” word that means “a female dog.” Prince posted text messages from Janet on Twitter, Katherine lost custody of the kids to Tito’s son TJ, and the fight for Michael’s estate continues on, and every move of it is documented by family members and the media via Twitter.

Jackson Family, enough is enough.

Michael is rolling over in his grave not only over the fact that his family is involved in a bitter war, but the fact that he fought so hard for his kids to have a normal, private life yet they continue to make all of their personal business known on Twitter. This has gone so far that other people are throwing their two cents in, including Gladys Knight saying she would knock Paris’ teeth out, Chris Brown begging the family to stop for the sake of the kids (because we all know he is still convinced he is Michael Jackson) and Kiah, the rapper who is still bitter at Janet over the “So Excited” song, tweeting the kids offering her support  as “Auntie Kiah” ( ._.)

There have been almost 5 decades worth of the Jackson Family’s most private moments made public, so you would think the family would know when enough was enough, right? It is really time for the Jackson family to finally come together and say “Let’s keep all of our family struggles private. Let’s try to keep the press away and let’s not go act out in public while we settle this, ok?”

I know that kids will be kids, and while Paris & Prince are too young for Twitter anyway (it REALLY should be 18+, but i digress,) someone needs to step in, teach them about privacy, and explain to them what their father REALLY went through in his struggles with fame and why Tweeting every little detail about their lives is not what he would have wanted.

Jermaine, please get off Twitter.

And Janet, girl.  I know you are asserting your authority as an adult, which you should do, but you should know by now that kids are more savvy with technology than adults are. Watch what you say on the phone. And you know that house has surveillance cameras. If you are going to discipline the kids, do it AWAY from the camera!

Come on now. La Toya is the one begging for this to stop for the sake of the family’s image. La Toya!

In all, it has been 5 long decades, and the Jackson Family should know the meaning of “privacy” by now. Do it for Michael’s sake. Maybe if the Jackson’s weren’t so busy fighting, they would have seen how the first episode of the new Adult Swim show Black Dynamite ripped them all a new one (in a so wrong, yet so hilarious way.) But, I digress, again.

Do you remember how it was deemed “weird” for Michael Jackson to have  his children Paris, Prince Michael I and Prince Michael II (Blanket) wear masks and blankets over their faces whenever they stepped out in public? Or how people were “annoyed” that Halle Berry did not opt to sell the first photos of her baby girl Nahla after giving birth? Or how “odd” it is that Beyoncé  and Jay-Z to constantly cover Blue Ivy’s face whenever they brought her out of the house?

Well, it all makes sense to me now. People have taken a weird obsession with celebrity babies.

Let me say this again. PEOPLE have taken a weird OBSESSION with CELEBRITY babies.

Last week paparazzi successfully caught a photo of Beyoncé holding her daughter with her face showing, and the photo managed to find its way onto social media sites before Bey & Blue could leave the store. Naturally, the peanut gallery had comments. Her die hard fans and people who genuinely think that Blue Ivy is a cute baby had noting but nice things to say about the 6-month-old (I personally think that she is a cute lil chubby baby,) but there are those who made comments that were worthy of a Comedy Central roast, minus the element of comedy. We all know that Beyoncé has some serious haters out there in the blogosphere and they couldn’t wait until the next photo of Blue Ivy’s face surfaced to let out those obvious comments we all knew were coming; Blue has a lot of her father’s facial features, therefore making her “ugly” in their eyes. Oh, and you can’t only blame the haters on this one. Even people who never pay Beyoncé the time of day on a regular basis went out of their way to vent about Blue’s facial features.

There’s nothing wrong with seeing a cute picture of a celebrity parent with their kids every  now and then. It reminds us that celebrities are humans too. But I wonder why the media and the general public care so much about celebrity babies to the point of being a fan of a child that hasn’t done anything to show off their talent as of yet. I also wondered why celebrities cared that the public cares so much, until I realized that there is a catch 22 to it: If a celebrity doesn’t show their baby’s face, people speculate and criticize over what the couple could be hiding, but showing them off allows people to criticize their appearance. Celebrity parents really can’t win. And in the age of people finding a brand new set of cojones behind their laptops without having to show their faces,  people find their soap box to vent about it on a celebrity blog or social network (usually, these people have too much free time on their hands.)

Take the case of Suri Cruise. Shortly after she was born, Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes did not run to a tabloid for $5 million for her first public photos. They didn’t release pictures to the public through their own website. They just went on with their lives, leaving the public to speculate & demand photos of their new born baby girl, some even saying that Suri might have been an alien baby because of the misunderstandings of Scientology in the general public (which was just plain mean.) Eventually Tom & Katie gave in and did a photo shoot with Vanity Fair and the world got to see little brown haired, blue eyed Suri, and from that day on, the tabloids and the fans were obsessed. Suri, now 6-years-old, made a Best Dressed list, beating out the likes of many Hollywood starlets. A. Best. Dressed. List. People care so much about what a 6-year-old wears that they place her on a list competing with women in their 20s & 30s, praising her for her “fashion sense” knowing damn well that Tom and Katie still help her get dressed in the morning.

Angelina Jolie gave birth to her first child Shiloh in 2006 (she had already adopted Maddox and Zahara and their faces were already tabloid regulars.) Prior to Shiloh’s birth, there was a media frenzy complete with an hour long VH1 special on the unborn child and multiple computer-simulated pictures of what she was going to look like. After she was born, Angie and Brad Pitt sold her first pics to People Magazine for millions of dollars and the issue sold millions. Fast-forward to a few years later,  “fans” and spectators began criticizing Shiloh for her choice in wearing boy’s clothing, some even going as far as calling her a lesbian and a transgender. -__- Seriously. She’s a child. Many girls go through a TomBoy phase and that is most likely what she is going through too.

And speaking of exclusive photos of children for magazines, the media has unintentionally began placing a price tag on the importance of a baby. Why was it top news that Kris Jenner cannot get “top dollar” for photos of daughter Kourtney’s new born baby girl? Why are people comparing the fact that Jessica Simpson “only” received $800,000 for exclusive photos of her baby Maxwell to the $14 million Brad and Angelina received for the first public pictures of their twins? This is sick, actually. The popularity of a celebrity now plays into how much their child is worth in dollars? *shakes head* Thank goodness Brad & Angie donated that money to charity.

It is easy to see where celebrities come from when defending their kids. Yes, we know that celebrities should not care what the common folk say about their kids, but we also know that NO ONE on this earth takes it lightly when someone says ANYTHING negative about their child. Michael Jackson knew first hand how cruel people can be to famous children after being made fun of  for his appearance while going through puberty. He was not about to let the world pick on is kids for they looked. He would be livid if he were alive and heard the way people talk about Blanket’s long hair and Paris’ “lack of black facial features.” 

It is really unfair to publicly scrutinize a child. Celebrities have to sacrifice privacy for fame, but the child did not ask to be known by the public nor did they ask to be. We know that they are not going to live the normal life that we lived as kids, but that doesn’t mean that they aren’t still KIDS.  LET THEM LIVE! Let their parents be parents, and if you have kids of your own go take care of them. If a baby is cute then they’re cute, if they’re not then their not, but if you spend hours of your time online obsessing over them, then you need a new hobby. And paparazzi need to realize that stalking kids is just plain creepy. If you happen to see them out with their parents and catch a picture, cool. But if you are staking out to catch them, then you’re a creep.

It finally happened! No really, this time it did!!! After almost a month of false media reports and Twitter rumors, Beyonce and Jay-Z welcomed their first child into the world earlier today. According to multiple outlets, Beyonce delivered her baby girl via C-section at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York. There are conflicting reports on whether the couple named their new bundle of joy Ivy Blue or Blue Ivy. Ivy (IV the Roman numeral for 4) an important number in the couple’s lives and Blue which is Jay’s favorite color) is believed to be the inspiration behind her name. There has not been an official statement released by the couple, but I will be looking out for one! Congrats to the new parents Bey & Jay!!!

UPDATE: The Baby’s name is officially Blue Ivy Carter.

On Sunday night, Jessica Simpson posted the photo above on her official website with the caption “’It’s True. I’m going to be a mummy” confirming her pregnancy.

The media had been speculating about her pregnancy for months, and she remained silent when asked about it.

Congrats Jessica!!!

So, this time, FOR REAL FOR REAL, Beyonce is pregnant.

The singer announced that she and husband Jay-Z are expecting their first child on the red carpet of the Video Music Awards on Sunday night, and the Twitterverse went HAM.

According to Sky News, after Beyonce’s pregnancy was announced, Twitter received 8,868 tweets per second. 

I’m so happy! Bey if FINALLY going to be a mommy!!!

For the past few days, there have been reports about an unidentified man trespassing the property of Halle Berry and terrorizing her and her daughter Nahla.

Today it was reported that the stalker was caught and arrested.

According to the Los Angeles Times, convicted felon Richard A. Franco jumped the walls guarding Berry’s home three times in the past three days. Berry issued a restraining order against him shortly after his arrest. Police claim that Franco has a history of violence, theft and drug offences.

Glad that she and Nahla weren’t harmed. 

My FAVORITE celebrity couple finally got the baby girl they’ve dreamed of!!!

Today, Victoria Beckham gave birth to a little girl, the first daughter for her and husband David, according to the Huffington Post.

The couple already has three sons, Brooklyn 11, Romeo 8, and Cruz 5. 

David announced the birth via Twitter saying:

I am so proud and excited to announce the birth of our daughter Harper Seven Beckham.

This little girl is going to be FLY! Suri Cruz and Madonna’s daughter Lourdes have some serious competition now!