Now That Britney’s Free, Will We Turn on Her?

Our culture hates successful women — unless it can see them as victims

It is happening again. Photo by Joe Seer on Shutterstock.

The end of Britney Spears’ conservatorship should be a joyful occasion. In many ways, it is; after thirteen years, the singer is finally free from her abusive father. She’s no longer forced to work or subject to horrific reproductive coercion. She can date, marry, have children, speak freely, control her own money, use the phone without asking permission.

Britney Spears deserves this; every mentally ill or disabled person who is abused and made prisoner deserves it. So why am I waiting for the other shoe to drop? Why do I have the feeling that, now we’ve freed Britney, we might not like her any more?

It is normal for the reputation of a female pop star to fluctuate; for the same woman to be portrayed in the press as either angelic or demonic, according to the temper of the times. Women are very rarely allowed the chance to be ordinary, average, or mediocre, especially not famous women, whose press narratives are always crafted for maximum impact. Women can either be perfect, or they can be hated, and our culture really, really enjoys hating women.

The tide can turn. We’ve seen it many times — we have, in fact, seen it many times this weekend. Paris Hilton was a “stupid spoiled whore” (and a racist) responsible for ruining a generation of girls in 2004; she’s a wronged entrepreneur and early revenge-porn victim with a fairytale wedding in 2021. Five years ago, when Taylor Swift released Reputation, she was a liar, a backstabber, a mean girl, a white feminist, a capitalist, a possible Trump supporter with an army of Nazi fans. This weekend, when she re-released her 2012 album Red, she was the greatest songwriter of her generation, and everyone had always loved her.

What changed? What makes us stop hating a woman once we’ve started? Easy: We start feeling sorry for her. Something sufficiently terrible happens to these women, or they lose enough status from being hated, and they become underdogs. Red had to be re-recorded and re-released because Swift lost control of her entire catalog to her enemy Scooter Braun. Paris Hilton eventually became enough of a punching bag that trading tapes of “sex” (which she herself described as rape)…