LINDSAY LOHAN:
How do totally untrue rumors spread so quickly on the internet? Well, all it takes is a little bit of scheming, Perez Hilton not sourcing his information per ushe, and a lot of traffic-mongering gossip websites: The ‘Lindsay Lohan Has HIV’ Twitter Scam That Fooled Everyone: Three days ago, a widely-reported story emerged that Michael Lohan had posted to Twitter that Lindsay was HIV-positive. Michael said it was a hacker. Lindsay said it was her dad. Nobody realized that the hack itself was a fake. (@gawker)
As you know, we’ve always given Lohan the benefit of the doubt and tried to stay away from the sleazy stuff while still providing our obligatory lesbian updates on The Ballad of Lindsay & Samantha (which coincidentally we’re also obsessed with). We spot PR meddling. We genuinely enjoy her new single. Perhaps it’s affection for a fellow ‘mo or empathy for a girl all broken up over another girl that sours us towards gossipy alleged “trainwreck” tales, or maybe it’s that reporting on somebody’s going out schedule or lip size is just really fucking boring. We don’t even read UsWeekly or tmz or x17 or whatever the sites are now, but somehow we’re consistently peripherally aware of the headlines they swill. How? I guess they just get linked to by websites we do like and then these stories just circulate & pop up everywhere. That’s gross and it pisses us off.
So we’re digging Dodai at Jezebel’s “In Defense of Lindsay Lohan” piece, written in response to Lindsay’s latest round of “Daddy Issues,” which we won’t go into as it’s more of the same; Dad talks crazy shit about Lindsay, Lindsay gets upset, etc.
In response to Michael’s recent drama and considering his criminal record and upcoming marriage to a tabloid columnist, Dodai points out:
“It seems like drama that goes on between them is always instigated by Michael, and Lindsay responds the way a daughter with a father like that would: Angry, exasperated, sad, confused.”
She argues that Lindsay “being ripped to shreds in the press mostly because she goes out at night.” Furthermore, “Like Britney before her, Lindsay has become America’s favorite person to complain about, feel sorry for, make fun of and tear down.” She concludes:
The point is: Lindsay’s living her life, working out her issues, but at this point, she can’t even try to to something right — make a documentary in India; design for Ungaro — without being eviscerated, judged, ridiculed and trashed. It seems like we expect certain things of our little girls, even when they’re not so little anymore. Maybe we’re angry that they’ve grown up, or that they’re not the things we hoped for… But our expectations should not be their concern. Lindsay should only have to be and do the things she hopes for.
[Also; major props for including quotes from one of our favorite books, Little Girl Lost by Drew Fucking Barrymore.]
However there’s still one thing we’d like to add to the “conversation” as it were — YUP THE GAY THING. On top of the crazy family and the child star pressure, we all know that Lindsay is bi (or gay), and grappling with your sexuality in the public eye is no easy feat. She’s still the first enormously famous young starlet to ever come out at the peak of her career. And if Lindsay suffers from drug & alcohol problems, as she has in the past, we should remember that LGBT people are at increased risk of drug & alcohol abuse, addiction, and suicide. (This article has a good rundown on that topic, so does this website.) Making fun of her career ups & downs, physical appearance, finances or controversial photoshoots is disrespectful and, PEREZ HILTON, is often laced with viscious misogyny.
Perhaps this factor isn’t brought up because Lindsay herself hasn’t ever brought it up when defending herself. And for a girl who shares her feelings pretty freely, it’s suprising that no “also this gay thing can be hard” feelings come out. But come on, certainly everyone reading this knows how easy it is to censor your own sexuality out of even your most intimate, vulnerable moments. It’s the world’s most popular well-kept secret, after all.
In conclusion: if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.
EX-GAY CAMP:
It looks really long, but it’s worth it. You’ll be either totally shocked or completely unsurprised to see that the tactics of conquering same-sex-attraction involve things like cuddling and beating a punching bag with a baseball bat as if it was your distant, non-loving father: What Happened When I Went Undercover at a Christian Gay-to-Straight Conversion Camp (@alternet)
THE MARBLE FAUN:
OMG THE MARBLE FAUN FROM GREY GARDENS IS GETTING HIS OWN DOCUMENTARY. Bonus? He’s totally gay!: Jerry’s story unfolds as a classic American tale. A compromising childhood, then a dash for freedom leading him indirectly to Grey Gardens, a formative event in his life. Later awakening to his sexuality in the 1970’s in New York City, going on to travel in Europe and the Middle East under unique circumstances, and sadly falling into some of the darker passions in life. Eventually pulling himself up and dusting himself off, he decides to heed a lifelong call to carve stone and discovers his love for the craft. Jerry Torre’s sculptures help free him, and he fully develops into the beloved individual he is today.
MEDS:
The Top 24 Psychiatric Prescriptions for 2009: y’all are mad stressed out, there’s some seirous Xanax going on here.
THE BOONDOCKS:
Season Three of “The Boondocks” premieres tomorrow on Adult Swim. Here’s a trailer!
The Boondocks “Black Magic” Trailer from Okayplayer on Vimeo.
BLOGGERS:
Times Online counts 40 Bloggers That Really Count. (@times online uk)
Am I crazy/tired or was this posted, removed and then posted again?
yes, that’s true, that did happen
There’s a rip in the space/time continuum. I sent a message to Seven of Nine via translink frequency and she got right on the problem. However, in the intervening milliseconds, an alien species dubbed “The Cookie Monster” by Paris and Harry escaped and devoured all the interwebs nuggets of a similar name which has kept certain Humans (such as myself) from logging onto Autostraddle properly. Seven swears that Autostraddle’s distinct lack of Former Borg Drone media and attention is merely a coincidence and in no way affected her ability to contain said space alien.
I feel like I would understand so much more about the world and the internet if only I had watched Star Trek.
There’s still time, young ‘fleeter… *nods sagely*
hahaha omg that’s perfect
Whew! Seven decided you’d been punished enough and thrust The Cookie Monster back into the rift. All’s right with the universe!
Me and my mates were just saying how we should go undercover at one of these gay conversion seminars or to one of the anti-gay catholic group meetings and video the whole thing and just piss them off as much as possible, we dont really have a plan as of yet but I do know that it will involve lots of rainbow flags. But ive a lot of respect for that guy going undercover at an American one, I mean there’s evidence to suggest that camps like that use drugs to “convert” gay into straights, have a look at this blog post-> http://www.pantibar.com/blog.aspx?contentid=5969 scroll down to see the videos, the first one has been taken down by Youtube and that was the one I wanted to show you guys, it about this young fella who was “Delivered from same sex attraction…” (what in the fuck!) but in the second one, although it’s not about gayness, the girl is acting the exact same way as the gay fella was, all twitchy and basically on something, it’s scary.
yeah we’d wanted to do it too, that was one of our big plans! but then we saw in the article how they pull it off– with serious rules about security, and probs maybe even an ability to sniff out journalists at this point. a male writer did the same thing for JANE magazine a few years back. i dunno, it sounds simplistic and everything but sometimes i wonder if the weird techniques employed at the weekend written about in the alternet piece can be at least partially explained by the fact that the program is designed by a bunch of gay people who are trying to get as much gay into their lives as possible without being gay.
Right re: as much gay as possible. So much homo-cuddling.
Yeah, I suppose the people who create those weekends are just so suppressed and they use the time at the weekend to release a little bit of gay under the guise of it being a religious thing, maybe they even do some of it subconciously, it’s hard not to act gay when your surrounded by fellow homos. The gay conversion things here seem to be different, it just involves lectures and one on one counselling and from what I can tell, just so long as your capable of lying anyone can go. I almost think it’d be more interesting to sneak into one of the fundamentalist Catholic meetings here, theres a group that’s main aim is to ensure that “the family is protected” ie: basically that gays dont get rights and they regularly have anti-gay speakers over from the states etc. It would probably be trickier to sneak in there though, they’d see us coming a mile away. I dont know, maybe you guys could go to one of the day long conversion talks or something, im sure they have those over there, it would be easier to get into and it could still make for an interesting read plus there’s less of a chance that you’ll be drugged by some insane “christians” which I wouldnt be surprised if they did do that, these can actuallly be really dangerous people. If we manage to pull it off here I will let you guys know!
eff yes. leave lindsay alone. i agree.
also, unrelated, she’s fucking beautiful.
Only if you find drug addicts that look they haven’t slept or bathed in year.
I agree. Let’s give Lindsay some peace.
Also, I’m so excited The Times listed youngfatandfabulous.com on their top blogs! Gabi is so smokin’ hot and she has killer style.
Any other Autostraddlers read her? And it won’t be too much longer until AS gets on there.
Riese, can I ask The Team for a favor. This article on Lohan is absolutely terrific. So I linked it to a couple of folks. They loved it too…until they clicked on that exploitative, misogynistic mistake of a photo session with one trick pony Tyler Shields. So instead of people wanting to discuss an awesome article, it becomes people wondering if L.L. is doing a cry for help, if she is being taken advantage of by people around her, is she trying to upset Samantha Ronson, is it a desperate move to get attention and wondering if the horrible Michael Lohan has a point about her mental well-being.
I love that you guys don’t discuss it because after all as you say “if you have anything nice to say”. I also agree that since most L.L. news is published on Autostraddle this should be too in terms of fairness and open discussion. The problem is the focus seems to keep on coming back to pictures which are the last thing persons see in the article when it should be on this amazing article which I want to link to every member of the LGBT community and straight ally I know. So can the bit about the pictures maybe be placed in another post. I understand if this request can’t be done but it seems a shame because the article is so good.
fair enough. done!
Too cool. Thanks Riese. Again awesome stuff.
The cuddling remind me of the hilarious Daily Shot piece.
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-march-19-2007/diagnosis–mystery-pt–2
“But come on, certainly everyone reading this knows how easy it is to censor your own sexuality out of even your most intimate, vulnerable moments.”
This is so true for me right now that I had to de-lurk to thank you guys!
I have to add that I find the support for a conservatorship for Lindsay, a notion tossed around by the repugnant deadbest Dad of our time Michael Lohan, to be based in misogyny. We are seeing the truly twisted way many people view women. There would never, for one moment, even be the hint of doing something like that for a man if they were in Lindsay’s position. What exactly would be the grounds for conservatorship? She likes to go clubbing. Her taste in photographers has become bad. She is head over heels in love with a woman. A conservatorship is basically saved for people that have lost all mental faculties. Doing things that people disagree with is not a sign of an overwhelming loss of mental faculties. Heck, I don’t like half of the stuff she does. Tough luck to me.
Anybody arguing for a conservatorship for Lindsay is 1) easily duped by a conman who has served 3 prison terms, been accused of brutally beating both his ex-girlfriend and his ex-wife, has sued to try to get his daughter’s money, secretly tapes phone recordings of family and friends so they can be sold, etc. and 2) someone that has apparent misogynistic feelings that cause them to want any woman who does not fit their female criteria to be controlled. Yes controlled. As for women who support this, shame on them. They are no less than a traitor to their gender.
“Doing things that people disagree with is not a sign of an overwhelming loss of mental faculties.”
exactly.
It reminded me of the Rolling Stone article about Britney Spears where it was clear that her father’s conservatorship, while enabling her health, was also completely controlling her every move as well. She wasn’t allowed to speak without him around or speak independently of a publicist or other supervisor, let alone make decisions about her life or career. She’s now in a relationship that’s more like an arranged marriage. Though it’s all fine and dandy that Britney is doing better it’s hard to understand why her father needs to completely take over management of every aspect of her life when all she actually needs managed is someone to ensure that she takes her meds at appropriate intervals. She was young and diagnosed bipolar after her first episode, and now she is on the road to managed care and health, but certainly this can’t require the level of control that her Dad now has (and of course he has the money to go along with it) It was really upsetting and now it’s like a year later and still no one has really done anything about it, let alone Britney herself. So that’s one of many things that makes me crazy about the LL sitch. She’s called trying to get the conservatorship removed and then her father threatens to take away her kids. she also did a sad interview.
What’s even more infuriating here is that Lohan has not shown any of the signs of mental instability that Spears did. Lindsay is not the mother of two kids locking herself in a bathroom babbling incoherently. She is a woman who deeply in love with another woman and struggles when they are not together which ends up with partying too much and allowing herself to be the part of poorly conceived projects. Michael Lohan has created this image of her as a loonie. I had serious problems with the Spears conservatorship drama. This is a whole other level. There was any serious discussion on this until conman Michael Lohan played the LAPD and the media like a harp. The LAPD has removed itself from the situation since it appears they know now they got duped…as evident by the last statement by the police on the matter. The media hasn’t as many still eat up this tool’s ramblings and his publicity hungry lawyer, and joke to the feminist movement, noxious raves about the tool. Luckily Salon, The Daily Beast, Jezebel and others have finally started to come out swinging as has Autostraddle.
Lindsay has problems. And as Salon and others have said they all point towards one Michael Lohan. If the LGBT community has let down Lohan repeatedly, sites like Autostraddle are showing there are exceptions to this betrayal of one of their own. Kudos to Autostraddle.
Joel Derfner talks about going to a homo conversion retreat in this book. I read it awhile ago, but I think, maybe, I might’ve cried, just like, a little bit?
I hope it was in a good way.
Living in a conservative Christian home (imagine how fun that is :P) I thoroughly despise the ex gay movement. I’ve never been forced to go to a camp or anything that extreme but listening to the constant explanations about what childhood trauma caused my own gayness or finding books about healing from homosexuality lying around the house is enough to make me have to fight very hard from feeling worthless.
The core message of the ex gay movement is this – You are broken. There is something wrong with you and you need to fix it even though you know deep down that you can’t.
It’s sick and damaging.
Being the annoying little lesbian daughter that I am I’ve gathered lots of research to do with the origins of sexuality as well as the ex gay movement and its plain to see that nothing that they do is based on research or any sort of responsible and ethical psychological framework. I think that’s pretty evident in the loopy practices shown in the article.
The church is also silent about the fact that there are gay people sat in the pews each week who don’t know what to do with the fact that they are gay. If the truth sets you free then why should it be feared and hidden? Why do more religious people not question the practices of the ex gays? Is it just denial and false hope? Grrr! Okay rant over.
i practice what i’d say to lilo if i ever met her every day in the shower
I love Lindsay. They can suck it. It’s in my night stand, they’ll be able to find it I’m sure.