Is it just me or do Kanye and his delusions of grandeur seem to cross previously unknown levels of pathetic? After disappointing fans and leaving them waiting 2 hours to see him prance around stage he wasn’t feeling the love from the crowd. Concert goers threw bottles of water and glow sticks at him on stage which resulted in breaking a giant television screen. The audience also chanted “Kanye sucks” over and over. After hearing about the backlash, West has let his fingers do the talking via his blog.

“I am sick of negative people who just sit around trying 2 plot my downfall… Why???? I understand if people don’t like me because I like me or if people think tight clothes look gay or people say I run my mouth to much, But this Bonnaroo thing is the worst insult I’ve ever had in my life. This is the most offended I’ve ever been… this is the maddest I ever will be. I’m typing so fucking hard I might break my fucking Mac book Air!!!!!!!! Call me any name you want…. arrogant, conceited, narcissistic, racist, metro, fag whatever you can think of…. BUT NEVER SAY I DIDN’T GIVE MY ALL! NEVER SAY I DIDN’T GIVE MY ALL! THIS SHOWS NO MATTER HOW HARD YOU TRY TO BE GOOD AT SOMETHING THERE WILL BE PEOPLE THERE TO LIE ABOUT YOU AND BRING YOU DOWN! LIKE WAYNE SAYS PLEASE DON’T SHOOT ME DOWN CAUSE I’M FLYING! I’M FUCKING HURT BY THIS ONE. ALL I CARE ABOUT ARE THE FANS. JUST SAY THIS OUT LOUD IN A ROOM FULL OF PEOPLE, “KANYE DOESN’T CARE ABOUT GIVING A GOOD PERFORMANCE.” CAN ANYONE HONESTLY SAY THAT ????????? HAS ANYONE EVEN TAKEN THE TIME TO AT LEAST DO THE MATH??? BONNAROO SHOULD HAVE RELEASED A STATEMENT IN MY DEFENSE BUT SINCE THEY HAVEN’T LET’S BREAK DOWN THE WALLS ON THIS TRUMAN SHOW AND LET YOU KNOW WHAT REALLY OCCURRED!!! FOR OVER A MONTH WE WENT BACK AND FORTH ON WETHER OR NOT WE COULD EVEN FIT MY STAGE AT THE FESTIVAL. ONE DAY THEY WOULD SAY YES… WE’D SEND THEM OUR SPECS THEN THEY THEY’D SAY OK… THEN THEY WOULD SEND SPECS BACK THAT DIDN’T FIT THE STAGE. WE WERE OBVIOUSLY DEALING WITH FUCKING IDIOTS WHO DIDN’T REALLY HAVE THE CAPACITY TO REALLY PUT ON THIS SHOW PROPERLY. THEY TRIED 2 GIVE ME A TIME SLOT WERE IT WAS STILL LIGHT OUTSIDE … I HAVE A FUCKING LIGHT SHOW DUMB ASS, IT’S NOT CALLED GLOW IN THE DARK FOR NO REASON SQUID BRAINS! MY PEOPLE WORKED OUT A COMPROMISED STAGE PLOT AND A 3AM TIME SLOT AND I AGREED. FAST FOWARD TO THE DAY OF THE SHOW. MY PRODUCTION MANAGER TRIED TO LOAD IN FOR 24 HOURS BEFORE I WENT ON STAGE BUT THE FESTIVAL WOULDN’T ALLOW US TO DO ANYTHING UNTILL PEARL JAM LEFT THE STAGE. PEARL JAM ENDED ONE HOUR
LATE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AT THAT POINT WE’RE RACING AGAINST THE SUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AT 4:20AM DON COMES BACK 2 THE BUS AND TELLS ME, ” IT WOULD TAKE 45 MORE MINUTES TO PUT ALL YOUR PYRO IN!” I SAY I HAVE TO GET OUT THERE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE . I HIT THE STAGE AND PEOPLE HAD BEEN THROWING SHIT ON THE STAGE AND HAD ACTUALLY HIT THE JANE SCREEN WITH, I GUESS BOTTLES OR SOMETHING AND HAD BROKEN MY FUCKING SCREEN. REMEMBER WHEN YOU WERE A SHORTY AND WATER WOULD HIT THE TV?????? WHEN I GOT 2 “THROUGH THE WIRE” I STEPPED ON THE FRONT PART OF MY STAGE AND THERE WAS SO MUCH LIQUID ON THE STAGE I COULDN’T MOVE WITHOUT SLIPPING. I HAD TO ADJUST MY WHOLE PERFORMANCE STYLE BECAUSE OF IT. A FEW MORE SONGS IN AND THE SONG WAS ON IT’S WAY UP.. I CUT A FEW SONGS FROM THE SET BECAUSE I WANTED PEOPLE 2 EXPERIENCE STRONGER WHILE THERE WAS STILL SOME DARKNESS TO PERFORM IT IN. I’VE STRUGGLED WITH STRONGER FROM IT’S CONCEPTION. REMEMBER LAST SUMMER WHEN I CANCELED SOME TV APPEARANCES. IT WAS BECAUSE I DIDN’T WANT TO PERFORM STRONGER IN THE DAYTIME. ANYONE WHO CAME TO THE GLOW TOUR CAN UNDERSTAND WHY I WANTED PEOPLE TO SEE IT PROPERLY. IT BROKE MY HEART THAT I COULDN’T GIVE THESE FANS STRONGER IN IT’S GREATEST FORM… BY THE TIME I GOT TO STRONGER IT WAS DAYTIME AND IT BROKE MY HEART. I’M SORRY TO EVERYONE THAT I DIDN’T HAVE THE ABILITY 2 GIVE THE PERFORMANCE I WANTED TO. I’M SORRY… SOMETIMES I GO 2, 3 DAYS W/O SLEEP WORKING ON MY PERFORMANCE… I HAVE TO ICE MY KNEES AFTER EVERY SHOW AND THEY HURT WHEN I WALK THROUGH THE AIRPORT… HAVING AN EXPENSIVE STAGE CUTS MY PAYDAY IN HALF… CALL ME WHAT YOU WANT BUT NEVER SAY I DIDN’T GIVE MY ALL!!!”

[Kanye Universecity Blog]

I too stopped reading about three sentences in. But being that I had to force myself to read it eventually, here is the basic outline of his rant. He thinks people are sitting around plotting his downfall, just because he has more costumes than Liza Minnelli and Cher put together…it doesn’t make him “gay,” the concert organizers have “squid brains” and he only performs “Stronger” in the dark because the pretty lights are the only thing that makes it worth sitting through.

His painfully long tirade of ranting was basically an apologyfor not giving fans the entire fancy light show and not for making them stand around for hours with other irate fans.

His level of douche-baggery never ceases to amaze me.

Picture Note by JayBird: Here’s Kanye performing at the annual ‘HOT 97 Summer Jam’ concert at Giants Stadium on June 1st. Images thanks to WENN.

There was an article in Time Magazine last week that had a lot of people talking. It claimed that 17 teen girls at Glouchester High School in Northeastern Massachusetts were pregnant after many of them made a pact to have babies and raise their children together. The high school in the small economically-depressed fishing town has just 1,200 students, and 17 pregnancies represents an increase of 4 times the amount of teen pregnancies the year before. The story raised all sorts of ethical issues about whether the media attention paid to Jamie Lynn Spear’s pregnancy at 16 and movies like the Oscar-winning film Juno glorified teen pregnancy and made a difficult and life-altering choice seem fun and attainable. Free day-care and a baby-friendly policy at the school also were cited as potential incentives for young girls to get pregnant.

One of the pregnant girls from Glouchester went on Good Morning America this morning with her boyfriend to talk about the pregnancy boom at her school. Five months pregnant Lindsay Oliver, 17, said that there was no “pregnancy pact,” but that a lot of the young pregnant girls did vow to raise their babies together.

Lindsay: “There was definitely no pact. There was a group of girls who decided… they were already pregnant before they decided this… that they were gonna help each other with their kids so they could finish school and raise their kids together. To do the right thing was their decision, not ‘let’s get pregnant, as a group.’” [Transcribed from video of GMA shown above]

When asked why so many teens were pregnant, Lindsay’s boyfriend Andrew Solitas said “I saw in the press conference that they can’t even confirm that there were 17 girls who were pregnant. I guess girls are just unlucky.”

Andrew, 20, is working full time and goes to community college. He said that his girlfriend Lindsay, 17, was on birth control but that she still got pregnant.

When asked if there was any reason that so many girls got pregnant, Lindsay said it “was just a coincidence.” She denied that the film Juno encouraged her. She said she didn’t understand why people thought the movie even glamorized pregnancy, because “In Juno she couldn’t even take care of the baby, she gave it up for adoption.” She also denied that Jamie Lynn’s pregnancy influenced her.

As for the way the school doesn’t distribute contraceptives, Lindsay seemed to indicate that did make a difference. She said “They won’t put any kind of contraceptive in the nurse’s office.. they should be giving them out.” She said “[kids are] obviously having it [sex] anyway” when asked about it.

Andrew and Lindsay said they will name their baby, due November 12, Chloe Jade. He said “we’re trying to do everything we can to make it right for the mistake that we made.”

Reese Witherspoon moved on with the hot and hairy Jake Gyllenhaal long ago. Now, Ryan Phillippe is coming out of the straight closet with his new lady love.

“After months of speculation about their relationship, he proudly accompanied his Stop-Loss costar Abbie Cornish to the 2008 Australian in Film Breakthrough Awards – their first major event as a couple.”

[People]

Abbie Cornish was “the other woman” that has been rumored to be at the center of the downfall of power couple Ryan and Reese. Sources saw the two kissing and sharing intimate moments at a Japanese restaurant while Philippe was still married to Witherspoon. Divorce followed and soon after denial and defense was Ryan’s strategy when it came to interviews.

Photos of the two kissing and sharing a cigarette spoke volumes to the contrary. Cornish is already rumored to be pregnant with Ryan’s love child. She failed to show up to several premieres and the only recent photo shows her sitting down in some hideous black jacket. Perhaps this is the reason for their first public outing.

Now Ryan and Abbie have made their debut. Fellow guests described them as “adorable” and stated that he had his arm around her and appeared “cozy” and “comfortable.” He also let her enjoy the bulk of the attention. While she worked the room, Ryan stood back and took his usual position as supporting actor.

Gee, it is not like we didn’t know that he was shoplifting some Cornish this entire time. No matter, I still say that it is completely unfair that Reese has gotten to nail two of the men on my “Celebs I Want to Make Sweet, Sweet Love To” list.

Controversial Australian photographer Bill Henson’s art opening in Sydney, Australia was shut down by police last Thurdday after complaints about photos featuring nude preteens and teenagers. 20 photos were seized and the police plan to interview the children and their parents. Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has called the photos “absolutely revolting.”

The dark subject matter of Henson’s photographs often include half-nude children in disturbing, sometimes suggestive poses in low light and amid sweeping landscapes. Some call his work pretentious while others find it compelling and meaningful. He’s had photographs in galleries around the world for at least 15 years featuring the same subject matter. It’s only recently that anyone has begun to draw attention to his work and accuse him of being exploitive of children.

Cate Blanchett and 42 other prominent Australians have signed a letter questioning the police raid of the gallery and wondering what implications this may have for the future of artists in the country:

Henson, 52, a renowned artist whose work is displayed in galleries around the world, has not spoken publicly since the controversy erupted.

But his supporters have rallied around him. Prominent members of the arts community, including actress Cate Blanchett, and politicians have decried the police actions as censorship.

“The potential prosecution of one of our most respected artists is no way to build a creative Australia and does untold damage to our cultural reputation,” Blanchett and 42 others said in an open letter to the prime minister released Tuesday. Other signatories included writer Peter Goldsworthy, playwright Michael Gow and filmmaker Ana Kokkinos.

“The intention of the art is not to titillate or to gratify perverse sexual desires, but rather to make the viewer consider the fragility, beauty, mystery and inviolability of the human body,” the letter said.

Henson’s work, known for its use of light and dark shading, encompasses a wide range of subjects _ landscapes, cloudscapes, suburban and rural life, young people and old people.

“They’re all vehicles for a whole set of feelings to do with what it means to be in transition,” Judy Annear, senior curator for photography at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, told the AP. “That’s why he has often photographed young people, because they are the most obvious to be in transition.”

In 2004-05, her gallery held a major retrospective of the last 30 years of Henson’s work. More than 65,000 people viewed the exhibit _ and not a single person complained.

“A debate is good but it needs to be rational,” Annear said. “There’s a lot of emotional heat in this one.”

She has seen the latest exhibit and calls it “the most still, the most classical, the most formal” of Henson’s work.

[AP report as found on The Huffington Post]

You can see the photo of the 13 year-old girl topless (NSFW and you may feel guilty about looking at it, it’s up to your perspective) on the site for Australian newspaper The Age.

The photo captures a kind of vulnerability in the subject, and when I look at it I feel guilty and protective of the girl, which is exactly what Blanchett is saying. Other photos I’ve found (NSFW - scroll to the bottom right) do seem exploitive and I feel uncomfortable looking at them, but again that’s probably the point. I wish I took an art history or appreciation class in college so I could discuss this with more background. As it is I don’t know how I feel about it. Not all of Hensen’s photographs even include children and it is only the most controversial which have sparked debate.

An Australian politician, Malcolm Turnball, is quoted at the end of the AP article as saying “I think we have a culture of great artistic freedom in this country and I don’t believe the vice squad’s role is to go into art galleries.”

Cate Blanchett is shown at a photocall for Indiana Jones 4 in Cannes on 5/18/08, thanks to WENN.

A new story in the NY Post brings up an interesting question: Are tabloid magazines racially biased? In the wake of the relatively light coverage of Beyonce and Jay-Z’s wedding last weekend, some are speculating that the disinterest from the tabloids was racially motivated. Gatecrasher’s Ben Widdicombe did some actual journalism for his column this week and found some disturbing results.

Are the celebrity media racist?

A top tabloid editor tells me that Jay-Z and Beyonce’s wedding was played down by the weeklies because “African-Americans don’t sell covers.”

Of the big five celebrity glossies out midweek, only Us Weekly gave Beyoncé the top spot on the cover. Other magazines gave her second billing to the likes of Britney Spears, Jennifer Lopez and Jennifer Aniston.

“None of the magazines landed an exclusive on wedding pictures, which would have made the story bigger,” said one tabloid insider, justifying why Beyoncé was relegated to a small cover box on his magazine.

But even wedding photos make less money for black stars, says another source. “Eva Longoria can get $1 million for wedding photos, but without the expectation of cover sales, Beyoncé might have gotten as little as $250,000 if she had sold hers,” says a top editor.

Magazine publisher and black gossip pioneer Flo Anthony responds: “That sounds to me a very racist statement. Beyoncé is one of the biggest stars in the world, much bigger than Eva Longoria.”

Anthony publishes Black Noir for women, as well as Toy Box, a black parenting magazine with a celebrity focus. She said: “It is hard for African-Americans in magazines. Only a few people, like Will Smith and Halle Berry, are mainstream. Editors really still think that only blond hair and blue eyes sell magazines.”

As another tabloid source says: “We have a saying, ‘Only Oprah.’ Oprah is the only black celebrity big enough to put on our cover.”

But Us Weekly editor in chief Janice Min tells me: “Janet Jackson has been on our cover twice, for two of our best-selling issues we’ve ever had.”

Min is also the only non-Caucasian to helm a top celebrity magazine. She acknowledges there is a perception in her industry that black stars don’t sell covers, but adds: “Typically, you will hear that discussion among a group of all-white editors.”

[From Gatecrasher]

I do agree that the tabloids tend to focus more on white celebs- especially the unholy trifecta of Spears, Lohan and Hilton. I’m not sure why- maybe there are more white celebs who are screwing up in public than black celebs? Or maybe, as the Gatecrasher article suggests, it comes down to money. However, comparing coverage of Eva Longoria’s wedding to that of Beyonce’s wedding is not a good analogy for this argument. Eva Longoria courted the press every step of the way when she got married- from the engagement to the wedding plans to the numerous ceremonies and parties. Beyonce and Jay-Z are both huge stars and if they had chosen to go the Longoria route with their wedding, they would have been on every magazine cover last week. However, the couple chose to get married under the radar- even their guests are staying mostly silent about the nuptials. The only reason US Weekly had the wedding on the cover is that Beyonce’s sister Solange went to the mag with an exclusive. Other than that, the magazines didn’t have any info on the wedding. If the couple had shopped wedding photos around, I’m sure there would have been a bidding war over them. But just like their long courtship was kept fiercely private, so was their wedding.

The latest US Weekly and People cover images from coverawards.com via Gossip Rocks.

Like Diablo Cody’s nude photos, the past of another Oscar winner is coming back to bite her in her cute ass. 32 year-old French actress Marion Cotillard, who won the Academy Award for best actress for her portrayal of tragic French singer Édith Piaf, once made statements questioning the official version of events on 9/11.

She said over a year ago in a television interview that “I think we’re lied to about a number of things… They [sic] was a tower, I believe it was in Spain, which burnt for 24 hours. It never collapsed. None of these towers collapsed. And there [in New York], in a few minutes, the whole thing collapsed.” She then went on to offer a possible motivation for an inside job destroying the towers and causing the deaths of thousands, saying “It was a money-sucker because they were finished, it seems to me, by 1973, and to re-cable all that, to bring up-to-date all the technology and everything, it was a lot more expensive, that work, than destroying them.” [As quoted in The Daily Mail]

Her quotes were taken out of context though. A French reader commented on D-Listed that Cotillard wasn’t making blanket statements, she was talking about the points that were made in specific documentaries she had seen. This would explain why she touched on such heated topics. It also was an informal interview and according to this person who has seen the show, Cotillard wasn’t set up to be interviewed ahead of time, she was caught off guard and was speaking off the cuff:

I’m french and some datas were missing here. So Marion was interviewed in a show called “Paris derniere” which is a very informal show at first. To goal of this show is to travel at night in the town, in interesting places like restaurants and museums and usually they meet randomly famous people. So Marion was interviewed and she said she was very paranoid and very influenced by documentaries. So she talked about all those events (9/11, the death of a famous french humorist,…) as an example on how her paranoid is fed by documentaries. This was not clever to talk about this in front of a camera, but it’s important to know the context.

[Comment on D-Listed by alx5962]

It’s a very controversial issue and is not something to talk to the press about if you’re famous. Still, it seems like Cotillard didn’t quite say this like it’s being portrayed and was talking about documentaries she had seen. Since this is being reported in The Daily Mail it’s not like we can expect them to get the story straight.

You can tell that Cotillard is referring to documentaries when she referred to the 1969 visit to the moon as suspicious based on the films she saw. She didn’t say she didn’t believe that it happened, just that she doesn’t trust everything she sees. It’s not clear from the way she phrases this whether she’s talking about not buying into the documentaries questioning the events or the events themselves:

She said: “Did a man really walk on the Moon? I saw plenty of documentaries on it, and I really wondered. And in any case I don’t believe all they tell me, that’s for sure.”

[As quoted in The Daily Mail]

Other celebrities who have said that there’s something suspicious about the official version of events on 9/11 include Rosie O’Donnell and Charlie Sheen. Both have recommended a popular Internet-distributed film questioning the terrorist attacks called Loose Change. O’Donnell and Sheen were widely discredited and mocked by the US press for their comments.

This strikes me as revealing a cultural difference between the US and Europe. She was expressing her doubts about 9/11, something that is acceptable mainstream conversation in Europe. I have seen documentaries questioning 9/11 on regular television in Germany, and if this type of thing is on TV people don’t think it’s a big deal to talk about it. Like Cotillard’s on-screen sex scenes, which may seem titillating to Americans, it’s commonplace and isn’t considered particularly controversial. That’s not to say that everyone believes this, just that it’s something that is not a taboo subject.

According to The Daily Mail, Cotillard will soon be in Chicago filming Public Enemies with Johnny Depp. It is a gangster film set in the 1930s, but all I need to hear is “Johnny Depp.”

Update: Cotillard’s lawyer has released a statement saying that she “never intended to contest nor question the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and regrets the way old remarks have been taken out of context.”

The U.S. version of the reality show “Big Brother” is under fire today after one of the show’s contestants, Adam Jasinski, referred to people with autism as ‘retards’ during a nationally aired episode Tuesday night.

On the show, a contestant named Adam, who said he works for an autism foundation, said he would spend his winnings on a hair salon for people with developmental disabilities “so retards can get it together and get their hair done.” The Web site for the show describes him as a 29-year-old public relations manager from Del Ray Beach, Fla.

His remark shocked his partner, Sheila, who replied, “Don’t call them that.”

Adam responded by saying, “Disabled kids. I can call them whatever I want. I work with them all day, OK?”

[From NY Daily News]

In response, John Gilmore, the director of Autism United has issued a letter to CBS executives demanding an apology for the remark and has asked that the show be canceled, or at the very least, the contestant who made the slur be removed from the show.

In episode 2, Jasinski describes his plans to open a hair styling business catering to people with autism who he refers to as “retards.”

…We believe that Jasinski’s [sic] should be terminated immediately, and that the show should be canceled. Further, we expect an apology to people with autism, developmental disabilities and their families from Jasinski, Big Brother and CBS and National Amusements. While Jasinski’s comment displayed gross ignorance, the producers of the show chose to use his comments to further the show’s storyline. This displays a conscience choice on their part to demean and hurt a large group of people to further their own commercial goals.

[From TMZ]

I think it’s safe to say that this contestant will not have a job waiting for him after this show is over. Working with disabled people doesn’t give anyone the right to call them names. I think if Don Imus got fired for his racial slur, this clown should get the boot from “Big Brother” over his equally insensitive slur. I don’t know what the show’s producers were thinking broadcasting that comment– except that maybe all this controversy will make people watch the show. I can tell you this– I don’t watch it, and if this Adam guy is a reflection of the contestants on this show, I will never watch it.

Note by Celebitchy: When I first read this article, I did some research and initially suspected that Adam was personally responsible for the controversy over his on-air slur. It seems he’s started a group called “The United Autism Foundation” to make people vote for him on Big Brother and think he’s this great guy. Mindless Mommy mentioned that the domain was just registered and that the fact that it focuses primarily on this Adam douche without much other content make it obvious that he’s behind it.

The group that is criticizing Adam, “Autism United,” does seem legitimate though. It has a similar name to Adam’s front charity, but it’s distinct with its own purpose and doesn’t seem to have any affiliation with him.

How ironic that this guy who created a fake autism charity to further his own purposes managed to sabotage himself by putting down the very group he claimed would benefit if he won “Big Brother.” He can certainly “call them whatever [he] wants” but we, in turn, can call him an asshole and a bigot.

Golf Channel anchorwoman Kelly Tilghman was suspended a mere two weeks for making an offensive comment about golf great Tiger Woods. She said on air that challengers should “lynch him in a back alley.”

When I first read this I was outraged and thought the woman should be summarily canned. That’s not a slip of the tongue, that’s a lynching reference and Tilghman should be fired, not suspended. Don Imus got canned for calling female basketball players “nappy headed hoes.” He didn’t make a reference to a barbaric practice in which people were killed for the color of their skin. A racist outburst also cost former Seinfeld actor Michael Richards his career.

When you watch the clip though, she’s addressing something someone else said, and it does seem like a dumb ass slip that she should have to live with, but that maybe shouldn’t cost her a career. I don’t know. She’s in the news field, though, she should know to watch what she says:

This makes me upset, but it does seem like a genuine mistake from some idiot. What should happen to her career now? Well she supposedly apologized to Tiger Woods and his PR person said that they didn’t take offense.

Faldo and Tilghman were discussing young players who could challenge the world’s No. 1 player toward the end of Friday’s broadcast at Kapalua when Faldo suggested that “to take Tiger on, maybe they should just gang up for a while.”

“Lynch him in a back alley,” Tilghman replied.

“While we believe that Kelly’s choice of words was inadvertent and that she did not intend them in an offensive manner, the words were hurtful and grossly inappropriate,” Golf Channel said in its statement. “Consequently, we have decided to suspend Kelly for two weeks, effective immediately.”

Woods and Tilghman have known each other 12 years. She was picked to host a club demonstration with Woods in south Florida when he talked about new products from Nike Golf.

Tilghman was helped when Mark Steinberg, Woods’ agent at IMG, said it was a non-issue and considered the matter “case closed.”

“Tiger and Kelly are friends, and Tiger has a great deal of respect for Kelly,” Steinberg said Tuesday night in a statement released by Golf Channel. “Regardless of the choice of words used, we know unequivocally that there was no ill-intent in her comments.”

Tilghman had said in a previous statement she apologized directly to Woods, and the immediate support from Woods’ camp was critical.

[From The Huffington Post]

Last night I finally watched the cartoon The Boondocks online. I know it’s a retired comic strip, but this is the adult cartoon on The Cartoon Network put out by the same creator. In case you’re not familiar with it, two young kids live with their ornery grandfather, and it deals with issues of race, family life, and politics.

It was hysterically funny, but they also use the “N” word constantly and you have to get used to it. When the word is used like that it takes the sting out of it, and it’s called “appropriation,” like when gay people use the “other” F word. There’s a lot of well-deserved debate about how words can be used by one group of people and not another, and I think the issue is intent. Like if you intend to use it to put someone down because of who they are, it shouldn’t be used that way.

This chick Kelly Tilghman didn’t intend to say that Woods should be lynched, she just kind of blurted it out and that’s not what she meant. Maybe a two week suspension is all that’s in order, but it also kind of gives you a chill to read those words and consider what they can really mean.

Shakira is one of our favorite celebrities here at Celebitchy. She’s fun, she’s cute, and she donates a lot of her money and time to charities – not to mention the good publicity she brings to them. But Shakira caused a pretty big stir in Afghanistan recently, when one of her concerts was aired on a privately owned television station. One could see how Shakira’s hip-shaking might not go over so well in more conservative country. However it seems the real problem was her upper half that was the problem – and as a result Shakira’s top was covered with computer pixels. Sexy.

A hip-shaking performance by the pop star Shakira has provoked a showdown between the Afghan government and the country’s independent media. The culture ministry has been joined by senior Muslim clerics in warning the country’s largest private television station of serious consequences following the broadcast of a concert by the Colombian singer, famous among her young fans for her onstage gyrations.

The Shakira broadcast caused consternation even though she appeared with computer pixilation covering her chest. State television broadcast interviews with clerics and MPs criticizing the concert while one pro-government newspaper attacked the “notorious” broadcast of a “naked US pop singer and dancer” claiming it provided inspiration to suicide bombers.

“We believe Shakira’s song will be shown with Tolo TV’s exclusive logo at the training camps for suicide attackers to urge our immature young people to leave a number of our mothers bereaved,” said the Weesa newspaper. But the owner of Tolo TV, Saad Mohseni, who grew up in Australia, said: “This was not that provocative and Shakira was pixilated. The government are looking for an excuse to have a go at us.

[From the Telegraph]

Afghanistan’s media isn’t as restrictive as it used to be since the Taliban government lost control in 2001, however it is still very conservative, and could become even more so. New legislation is pending (and likely will be signed into law) that will give the government expanded rights to censor broadcasts they deem offensive to the country. I’m mildly surprised that someone would broadcast a Shakira concert there in the first place. I mean she’s cute as a button, but she’s not exactly known for covering up. And the hip shaking is impressive, but certainly not subtle. You’re not left wondering what it is she’s up to.

Picture note by Jaybird: Here’s Shakira in concert during her “Oral Fixation” tour. Hmmm. Images thanks to PR Photos.

Jerry Seinfeld hasn’t exactly been ingratiating himself with the writers at Celebitchy lately. First his wife appeared to have plagiarized a lot of her new cookbook from former publisher of Eating Well magazine Missy Chase Lapine. That’s probably not Jerry’s fault, but we’re going to call him guilty by association. Then he mentioned that he spent some time studying Scientology, and talked about its good points. That’s like saying Hell isn’t really all that hot, just comfortably balmy. Finally on Monday night Seinfeld was on Letterman, where he called Lapine “a wacko.” As far as I know, Lapine hadn’t even commented publicly on the controversy at that point – and Seinfeld tried to make it sound like she was the one drumming it up. Considering how blatant the plagiarism appears to be, the Seinfelds should be apologizing right and left, and their publisher should have considered pulling the book in an attempt to avoid litigation. So Jerry Seinfeld has tried to smooth over one of the controversies – though I’m not sure it’s the one he should most apologize for. He explained his Scientology dabbling to “Access Hollywood” and wrote it off, saying he was flittering from one thing to the other at the time.

Among their topics of conversation? The stir Seinfeld recently caused when he revealed he’d dabbled in Scientology. “I did some Scientology courses about 30 years ago,” Jerry told Billy. “The only thing that bothers me about people knowing that is that it is not my complete wacko resume. It’s just one aspect! I am very interested in self help things,” Jerry continued. “When I was a young man in my 20s I would explore like meditation, and I studied Aikido and karate and yoga and I would just take little things from each of these things.”

“But everyone else takes from yoga and Aikido and all those things, but Scientology has this stigma around it. And you say it was very helpful?” Bush asked. “Yeah, well I didn’t do very much. I don’t know that much, I just did a little but I liked it,” Seinfeld said. “Why did you stop?” Bush asked. “I don’t know… I was kind of flitting from thing to thing. I was interested in exploring,” Seinfeld noted.

[From MSNBC]

I guess that actually does make some sense. Seinfeld was pretty vague about his reasons, but I think a lot of us flitter from thing to thing in our twenties. I learned about lots of religions trying to figure out which one made sense, and did read up on Scientology. Of course that’s also when I realized it was one of the craziest messes of nonsense I’d ever encountered. But their literature had to be some of the funniest stuff I’ve read in a long time. I’m telling you, Dave Barry has nothing on L. Ron Hubbard.

In other Seinfeld “Vegetable Plagiarism” news, Missy Chase Lepine and her publisher, Running Press, did respond to Seinfeld’s comments on Letterman.

“As the publisher of The Sneaky Chef we are troubled that a celebrity of Jerry Seinfeld’s stature chose to go on the Late Show with David Letterman last night and personally attack the book’s author, Missy Chase Lapine.

This controversy arose out of concerns expressed by parents on message boards who noticed that the recent book by Jessica Seinfeld is similar to The Sneaky Chef which was published 6 months earlier. Neither we nor our author have publicly accused anyone of anything.”

Statement of Missy Chase Lapine, author of The Sneaky Chef:

“It was painful to be called names on national TV when I am just a mom who wrote a cookbook to help parents get their kids to eat well.”

[From PRNewswire]

I think the Seinfelds are starting to look pretty low-class, and their timing couldn’t be worse. Promoting Jerry’s first movie and Jessica’s first book seems like a bad time to take the low road.

Picture note by Jaybird: Header image of Jerry and Jessica Seinfeld at the “Bee Movie” Los Angeles Premiere on October 28th. Image thanks to PR Photos.