An Open letter to Sony...

Many thanks to Zack Whittaker for shamelessly letting me spout my opinion on the PSN downtime over at ZD. net.

Have a peek;

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/igeneration/open-letter-to-sony-two-free-games-thanks-but-no-thanks/10083

Britney Spears’s Womanizer- Wildly Misinterpreted Music Videos

Wildly Misinterpreted Music Videos

Britney Spears’s Womanizer

So, Womanizer: what’s it about? It’s all there in the title. This song is about a woman who suspects a man is a womaniser, and tells us so insistently for several minutes. That is literally as complicated as this song gets. Any song that Britney made during her breakdown and subsequent comeback is automatically better than anything that came before it, so I’m ok with this song being exactly what it says on the tin.

The music video? Not so much. I caught this the other day and only just now realised how utterly terrifying this music video actually is. Have a look, then allow me to explain.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhCkfQ5nzaI

The video starts by establishing the relationship between the ever lovely miss Spears and the womaniser in question. She makes him breakfast and sends him off on his way to work; so we’ve got to assume that this is in fact her boyfriend. I don’t know about you; but they seem way too together to just be a one night stand, there’s no walk of shame to be seen. However, as the lyrics helpfully inform us, he is obviously a womaniser (There's a real theme to this song, don't you think?)

Here’s where things get a bit messed up. In order to prove that her boyfriend is a womaniser miss Spears begins an unbelievably elaborate scheme to expose his philandering ways: namely dressing up in a variety of different outfits and wigs and ambushing the poor guy wherever he is. She first seduces him at work, then at a café and finally in a limo, all in different masterful disguises. Clever minx, she’s revealed his true womaniser ways!

Or at least she would have if it weren’t for the fact that she is Britney Spears, consistently, every time. She is really, completely and obviously the same woman. That sexy secretary with dark hair? Britney Spears. That saucy red-haired waitress? Britney Spears. That lunatic limo driver who somehow manages to steer with her feet? Britney fucking Spears. How dare her boyfriend be so flagrantly unfaithful with his own girlfriend? The womanising bastard!

Look at this video from the perspective of the boyfriend: here’s a guy that thinks he’s hit the jackpot. His girlfriend is the beautiful, sexy Britney Spears and it only gets better- she’s so wild and adventurous that she’s willing to show up at this work and seduce him, showing off how awesome she is to all his friends. More than that, the girls into role-playing; trying out all these different personas and looks! Honestly, I think that most of this video is the story of one boyfriend having the best anniversary ever (she even made him breakfast, what a catch). This guy is one happy man with his incredible exciting girlfriend. I really don’t think you can call it cheating if it’s so obviously just your girlfriend in a wig, honestly.

Then at the end things go from bad to worse; convinced she’s proven her boyfriends philandering ways via her master plan Britney proceeds to get rid of him. Notice how all of her ‘personas’ are there at the end, rolling him up in that bed sheet before he disappears? If that isn’t visual shorthand for ‘me and my personality disorders’ and ‘murdering this guy then wrapping him up in bed sheets to dispose of the body’ I don’t know what is.

Guys, this isn’t a feminist anthem about getting one over on a womaniser. This is a song about an incredibly disturbed young woman suffering from a serious case of multiple personality disorder murdering her boyfriend.

That’s just messed up.