Where are your parents, little girl ?

This post starts with an old story.
I was umm.. Going through some "church-nun-donation sites" when I came across an angel. She was devastatingly gorgeous, as most angels are, though unlike the angels of old, she had forsaken her long flowing white robes for a skin tight gold dress. Of course, being a regular gossip maniac, this angel was not unknown to me, but that particular story and the link to Youtube opened my eyes to another aspect of her bizarre life.

The angel in question? Kim Kardashian. Who? Well, Let's see.

• I could say the daughter of the lawyer who helped O.J.Simpson escape his infamous murder trial with a 'not guilty' verdict.. 5% of you would say 'Oh. ok.'

• So I'd add she would later become Paris Hilton's best friend ( and get 10% interested ).

• Or I could say, she followed Paris's lead and made a home sex video which 'accidently' got leaked out ( and now 65% of you are listening.. You horny goats! ). Of course, like Paris , she too chose to live it up after the video, rather than shy away, attending all the famous bashes and world premieres.
  

So what was the article that caught my eye?
It was an article relating to her Playboy photoshoot last year ( Did 65% of you just open a new tab on Mozilla and click the link to Google just now.. Or will you atleast wait till I finish talking ? ). Well, the photoshoot isn't the big deal.. What was funny was an interesting tit-bit ( I couldn't resist the pun.. I really tried ) about her manager for the photo shoot. You see, it was her mom.

Her mom came along to give advice on how she could show herself off best in the Playboy shoot ! Reminding her to highlight her behind ( which, I have to admit, beats mine and J-lo's any day ) and in the end, undressing for a few 'fun pics' herself. And to think, we used to make fun of our Indian actresses for bringing their moms along for the film shoot. We're sorry, Sridevi.

But, when you look at the papers, you know this isn't an isolated scenario anymore. Even as new discoveries compete with tragic events for space, 3 women younger than me all ensure that they will get adequate space in the daily papers with their antics. They are the ' representatives' of this age, according to one of them. They are the three Goddesses.
Of course, I'm referring to Paris 'I'll try anything once' Hilton, Lindsay 'Kiss 3 strangers in a single day while on holiday after escaping drug rehab' Lohan and Britney.

Dear dear Britney. It's amazing to see how a year can change a life..Till then one of the most popular ( ?) pop stars, you suffered an unfortunate upskirt shot, followed by another, a failing marriage, post pregnancy psychosis, divorce, drugs, drugs, nipslips, a disastrous live dance in a music show in your underwear, shaving your head, the hospitalisations, the deserved loss of custody of your children.. all in 365 days. In a year in which I'm stuck with reruns of Peanuts and Calvin & Hobbes in the papers, you truly gave me a fresh tragi-comic satire.
And now, you're dating a married papparazzo who we all know is using you.
In the last week, you've bought him a Mercedes.. While dressed in your old wedding dress . Sure, it was a hot number, but was this descent into madness really necessary ? ( The fact that I'm referring to the wedding dress and not the big car for a one month lover is itself insane .)

You see, dear, I know you're an adult.. But you're only 26. And you've lost your way. We all do. I want to ask what your parents think of you like this.. But they've proven themselves to be role model parents too, this year. What with the news of your 16 year old sister's pregnancy being greeted first with shock and then a 'the boy's a good guy. We have faith in him. He's always been there for her ' ( I'll just bet he has ).

What kind of parents sit and watch their kids destroy themselves in the name of freedom ? Is it a culture thing that doesn't allow me to grasp their mentality? How can they not take charge, even at this late hour, as they watch their own flesh and blood, whom they claim to love, destroy themselves? It would perhaps be different if they were at loggerheads with her ; in her state now, I can imagine her hiding from them, but what about them - where's the active "Save our daughter from herself" gameplan and pleas ?

We never really understand how the values we've imbibed as children make a difference as we grow up. We see our parents open arms as barriers often when we've growing up, trying to stop us from having fun. We don't see them for what they really are... Our safety nets. And sometimes, by the time, we realise it, we're too late. Or as in our Goddesses case, the parents can only sit helpless and wonder 'What if?'

I'm not ashamed to say it. I will continue to follow these divas escapades with glee.. In their insane lives, I can pretend that the rapes and lawlessness of my own country don't exist. In their lives, I can still find laughter.

But when this tale comes to an end, when someday, my kids ask me who these women were, I will not talk of the drugs , the men, the upskirts or the moms promoting their daughter's nudity ...
I will, instead, tell them of the young redhead freckled girl who was cast as twins in Disney's wonderful movie The Parent Trap and showed tremendous talent in her first movie ;
I will talk of the young teen pop star who , in her first movie, sang that anthem 'I'm not a girl, not yet a woman ' to her dad..

And I will, of course, tell them of the hotel heiress ( a fellow Aquarian, no less ) who made a sex video which looked scarier than The Blair Witch Project and 4 years on and many faux pas later, still won the "Harvard University's Woman of the Year" award .. Because my kids must believe that the world they live in is a place where hope and laughter spring eternal. Where you can be at the top of the world one day and down the pits the other.. or more importantly, vice versa.

P.S. Ok. Now, you can go and Google Kim Kardashian.. Just remember, she's mine. I saw her first.