Take a look at this photo. Provocative, non? Would it make you feel any different to learn that HER FATHER took this??? And sold them to WireImage? Sorry…maybe I'm just an Asian prude but to me? That's f-cking creepy.
There is nothing profound in saying that our lives are shaped by Defining Moments, moments that dictate each and every move thereafter, experiences that form the basis of future experiences and how we react to them.
We all had At First Love, At First Heartbreak - every future relationship bears the burden. For me, of course, there was At First Gwyneth - discovering my best friend, a photo of her and Brad smoking in an SUV, an image indelibly branded into my soul.
By far one of the most important though has to be AT FIRST SHAME: that defining moment usually during childhood when we feel embarassment so acute, we endeavour forever to avoid such occasions so that we"ll never ever have to go through it again.
My First Shame occurred when I was 11 - buying my first bra with my mother. My mother who is unlike other mothers. My mother the screeching Chicken, my mother who has no secrets, who is happy to detail her pre-kidney transplant bowel movements to anyone who will listen.
At the time, my parents were divorced. My father was too mortified to take me bra shopping so I had to wait 4 months for her to come back for the summer, during which time my body ceased to be my friend. Hairs and lumps started growing in the most awkward of places, an identity crisis that would last 10 years kicked off by the arrival of two globules of flesh protruding from my chest.
We went to Eatons, now defunct, at its time the biggest department store in Canada. I didn"t want to be there, my mother was going off in Cantonese at the top of her lungs, complaining about the "COLLEY" of the merchandise…translation: quality of the merchandise. After surviving half an hour of selection, I finally headed to the dressing room with 3 options, leaving her in the aisles to look for more.
Halfway there, her Chicken Squawk exploded across the airwaves, not travelling but blistering into my ears with an announcement: YEE-LING, YEE-LING I GOT ANNUDDAH BLAH FOR YOOO!!! Translation: Elaine, Elaine I have another bra for you.
When I turned around, there was my mother halfway across the Delicates Department, waving a training bra in the air as 3 salesladies and half a dozen other customers gaped in disbelief.
THAT is My First Shame. And I have spent the rest of my life making sure it never happened again.
The problem with someone like Jessica Simpson is that she was spared such a moment. And while that may have been a blessing when she was younger, it has since turned out to be an albatross now that she"s an adult.
Simply put, she cannot help but humiliate herself. She cannot help but be drawn into situations where she is made not only to look foolish but to be worthy of ridicule, in itself leading to more shame, leading to dressing like a sausage encased in a tube, leading to photos like this. Photos where she looks horny while her father stands on the other side of the camera.
Jessica Simpson doesn"t know shame because Jessica Simpson had No First Shame.
For this reason, I shame for her. Poor Jessie, poor Jessie.
