We were going to write a big, long article on why Madonna, appearing June 2 and 3 at the Arrowhead Pond, is a tired pop icon whose image flip-flops and running life commentary bug like a nasty horsefly biting your tender ass—but we thought we'd spare you. Instead, we decided to list the 21 reasons Madonna needs to retire. We picked the number 21 because that's how many years the Material Egomaniac has been subjecting us to every detail of the worst reality show ever created: her life.
1. Her name/image irony. Only a retard couldn't conceptualize the marketing ploy of being a slutty Virgin Mary. And what about all those civilian Madonnas out there, who really are Italian—and not half-French-Canadian? Think of how stigmatized they've been—just like people named “Dick” or “Whitney Houston.”
2. “Papa Don't Preach.” Her first attempt to address an issue other than feeling touched for the very first time. Clearly, she had been touched a lot, but her pro-baby mantra to the teen population was the antithesis of the feminism she seemed to advocate. The chorus should have been: “I'm aborting my baby, ooh . . . yeah . . .”
3. Her mother died when she was five and her father was cold and emotionally unavailable. BOO-FUCKING-HOO—we know already! Try visiting a foster home in Compton sometime—or an estate in Corona del Mar—where kids have their asses beat daily.
4. Asked Michael Jackson to the Academy Awards. Whether she really tried to seduce the half-woman Pedophile of Pop—okay, alleged pedophile—is better left unknown. But using Michael to get even more media attention is like, well, Michael using Lisa Marie Presley to prove he's straight and Nicolas Cage using Lisa Marie to have Elvis babies. Sick.
5. Had sex with Warren Beatty. Fingers, meet our throats.
6. Divorced Sean Penn. He hit her. Not hard enough.
7. The True Blue, Music and American Life albums: filling the used-CD bins at a record store near you.
8. The Sex book. Wow. Madonna not just nearly naked, but totally naked! Yawn. And thankfully out-of-print.
9. Her children's books. Now that she's better than us because she doesn't give blowjobs to basketball players anymore and has kids and is English and stuff, she thinks she can teach our kids valuable life lessons such as the “don't hate me because I'm beautiful—I live with my mean daddy and my mommy is dead” theme of The English Roses and the “mean words hurt” theme of Mr. Peabody's Apples. Oh, wait, these books—by a woman who has viciously ragged on everyone imaginable—aren't about teaching your kids valuable lessons; they're about Madonna being a big fucking hypocrite and feeding us her pitiful life story—again!
10. Friends with Rosie O'Donnell.
11.Tongued Britney Spears. A woman old enough to be a girl's mother sucks her tonsils out on cable television. It was so passionate, so sexy, so . . . barfingly Species.
12. Her movies and “stage” work. Just stop.
13. Truth or Dare. Contrived, stupid and completely annoying. And she gave that simp Kevin Costner free tickets to her show?
14. Plagiarism. Madonna has never created an original look or sound. Like an exploitive, sneaky, capitalist pig, she snorts around the inner-city streets, stealing fashion and moves from the black man. And the gay man. And the black gay man. Critics who like her proclaim she knows “what Americans want.” People without their heads up their asses know she didn't invent crucifixes, materialism, electronic synthesizers, Fritz Lang movies, Marilyn Monroe, riding in limos with prostitutes, cowboy hats or running people over with sports cars. She did invent that microphone headset, however, and we're still waiting for her to bail and choke on it.
15. Has said profound things like: “A lot of people are afraid to say what they want. That's why they don't get what they want”; “Better to live one year as a tiger than a hundred as a sheep”; and “I am my own experiment. I am my own work of art.” Welcome to the vomitorium.
16. That Kabbalah business. Again, she thinks we care. Pity the Jews, many of whom, no thanks to Maddy, probably converted to Scientology.
17. Thinks that people call her a bitch because she's a successful woman who knows what she wants. Correction: people call her a bitch because she tries to kick English nature hikers off the outer 100 acres of her 1,200-acre estate in the U.K. by reclassifying it as “gaming land.” Most paparazzi don't own 23 million-foot telephoto lenses, you dumb BITCH. But have fun shooting Bambi—and the occasional Scottish birder.
18. Set gay civil rights back 20 years with Justify My Love, Erotica, the Sex book and sleeping with Sandra Bernhard's girlfriend by showing the straight population that homosexuality is clearly both a choice and about S&M. Thanks.
19. None of her hit songs have stood the test of time. Would it really be worse listening to Ann Coulter talk about vaginal itching and burning than hearing “Express Yourself,” “Vogue” or “Beautiful Stranger” again? No, it would not.
20. Bazillions of websites claim this millionaire is a humanitarian, but you'd be hard-pressed to prove it. Oh, wait, she did give the American Foundation for AIDS Research FOUR TICKETS to her Drowned World Tour to be auctioned off, raising a whopping $22,000. How about donating all of even ONE of your concert proceeds to America's schools? How about not charging $300 a head for idiot fans to watch your Skeletor body skank around the stage to yet another reworked version of “Holiday”? Now that's charitable.
21. Takes herself way too seriously. Back in the '80s, she was a little guarded, but she was kinda fun! How often does the “diva” crack a smile these days? Like never. She clearly does care what we think about her, and her random, wacky image changes reek of desperation. Her gaze is filled with insecurity, and her personal comments, which she is never at a loss for, tell us she never regrets her past yet distances herself from it because she's all maternal, but she's still cool, but more reserved, but still into shock, blah, blah, blah. Look—just admit you're persnickety and that some of your stuff majorly sucked, and then parlay your current “talents” into an adult medium like popular standards. After all, you ain't no Cher—but she could give you some humility lessons.
Madonna performs at The Arrowhead Pond, 2695 E. Katella Ave., Anaheim, (714) 704-2500. Wed.-Thurs., June 2-3, 8 p.m. $45-$300. All ages.
