While some have already moved on from the revelations of Britney Spears’ June 23rd conservatorship testimony (a date that will live on in pop culture infamy), many are still reeling from the pop star giving us, at last, an indication of the true extent to which she is controlled behind the scenes. Control so invasive, in fact, that it extends all the way to her reproductive rights. As if this entire ordeal couldn’t be more symbolic of patriarchal oppression.
Spears was bold enough to share some of the more lurid details of what goes on in her day-to-day, from people watching her get undressed to having her meds abruptly shifted if she doesn’t “act right.” But she also unveiled the more long-term implication of not being “allowed” to have her IUD removed. The contraceptive method she kept referring to throughout the hearing as an “ID.” This omission of a letter in the acronym seems almost Freudian, for so much of her identity (ID) has been lost to other people. Not just her public and their many interpretations of who she is, but her own family, who has betrayed her in the most egregious of manners. But at least one identity that Spears has always held fast to is that of being a mother.
Already giving birth to her first son, Sean, when she was just twenty-three, it was only a year later that her second, Jayden, would come along. The year after, their presence in her life would beget the memorable lyric from “Piece of Me,” “I can’t see the harm in workin’ and bein’ a mama/And with a kid under my arm/I’m still an exceptional earner.” That she was—and is. Except now, her earning is to the benefit of everyone else. But she was right: what is the harm in her working and being a mother? Or, at the very least, being “permitted” to carry on with the latter. A role she has openly cherished, even if no one ever wanted to help address her bout with postpartum depression that likely helped escalate her mental health issues circa ‘07.
Never mind some of the ageists in the industry (and beyond) who might deem her “too old” to have a child (but let’s not forget Madonna gave birth to Lourdes and Rocco when she was thirty-eight and just shy of forty-two, respectively). At thirty-nine, hers would be called a “geriatric pregnancy”—just as she would also be called a geriatric millennial if she wasn’t so beloved. Jessica Simpson had one with her third child, Birdie Mae, as she described in her recent autobiography, Open Book. At the time she was just months away from her thirty-ninth birthday, the same age as Spears. Though it remains to be seen if she’ll be “granted” more freedom by the time she turns forty in December. Or, at the bare minimum, the removal of her IUD so that she can beat the unspoken race against a biological clock. Unfortunately, with the judge, Brenda Penny, still ruling against Britney’s petition to have her father, Jamie Spears, removed as her conservator, it doesn’t seem like much extra freedom is on the horizon.
And yet, as Ace of Base once said in 1992, “All that she wants is another baby.” Is that really so goddamn much to ask? Even antinatalists must have a soft spot for Spears in this instance. To add to the eerie oracular quality of it all, Britney was actually going to release a cover of “All That She Wants” in 2007, with Ace of Base participating in the re-recording of their own vocals. The song never came out officially, but maybe, more than ever, it ought to. Except that would likely just mean more profit for the Spears family. Additionally, it’s pretty undeniable that there’s something even more sinister at play, like the fact that no one in her family wants to share Spears’ fortune with anyone else, least of all another spawn or a new spouse (Sam Asghari, relegated to “partner” since 2016). Or worse still, that Jamie is into some kind of Nazi-esque sterilization shit for the sake of not wanting to spread Britney’s “mental illness” (shrouded in mystery as it is), once again, to a subsequent generation.
Whatever the true motives behind preventing Spears from partaking of something that she not only has a right to, but that would also bring her more happiness than performing or recording music would seem to, “All That She Wants” was like an early 90s prophecy of Spears’ existence and ultimate desire at a time when she was actually just starting out. Like, exactly in 1992 with her performance of, ironically (and appropriately), “I Don’t Care” on Star Search. In the meantime, Ace of Base was performing some Scandinavian witchcraft with their augury, “She leads a lonely life.” Just as Britney is forced to.
While the meaning of the song is, in typical Swede fashion, not literal (hear also: “…Baby One More Time”), it can be taken in such a fashion when applied to Spears in the present. Perhaps at the height of her 00s tabloid days, it was more akin to the original intent behind the song, which was to detail the life of a promiscuous woman who, yes, just wanted another baby a.k.a. “boyfriend”… for the night. Further examined, it could be taken to mean that the girl in question’s sexual appetite is so intense that she’s willing to risk getting pregnant again as the result of yet another night of ephemeral passion in exchange for a lifelong consequence (if no abortion is provided). But that, of course, is a less popular reading of the single.
As the vocals of Linn Berggren seem to narrate more of what goes on in Spears’ current day-to-day (whether she happens to be in Hawaii or being abruptly told her meds are changing), we’re painted the picture, “When she woke up late in the morning light/And the day had just begun/She opened up her eyes and thought, ‘Oh, what a morning.’” One thing the girl in the song and Spears could surely agree on right now is this: “It’s not a day for work/It’s a day for catching tan/Just lying on the beach and having fun.” After all, Spears is going to have to spend the rest of her life cleansing from the work experience she’s had, and few people have earned the right to enjoy the trappings of their success more. But alas, Britney is no longer the hunter in the scenario described in the song, so much as the fox (and while a cute animal, still prey if it can’t be predator).
Thus, the words, “So if you are in sight and the day is right/[Jamie’s] the hunter, [Britney’s] the fox,” take on a new definition. Once again, when applied to Spears in the present, certain lyrics come across as more macabre, like: “The gentle voice that talks to you/won’t talk forever.” Implicating something akin to the schizophrenic tendencies her family wants her to have (and that she might just have developed in terms of bisecting personalities in order to cope), the ominousness of that statement is more pure Ace of Base sorcery.
As for Spears’ well-known cryptic statements funneled into her Instagram photos and videos, she appeared to arcanely address her own long-standing infantilization by posting a photo in late May of herself at a pool with her two sons, captioning it, “I had my babies very young… at all the pools we went to on tours, all the babies flocked to me because I always brought the most toys… I really am a baby mamma.” Not only does this speak to her current relationship with Kevin Federline, but addresses several other underlying issues as well: 1) she has essentially been a mother to everyone in her life who has sucked her financial titty dry, 2) she has a continued yearning to be a mother anew (but not in the way that her conservatorship has rendered that meaning) and 3) she herself has been reduced to a childlike state for the majority of her adult life.
But when you keep someone in a trap for long enough, they’re bound to chew their own foot off—to do whatever is necessary to break free. Ergo, “Beware of what is flashing in her eyes/She’s going to get you” has nothing to do with a horny woman on the prowl in this case, so much as one determined to get her life back. “She’s gone tomorrow”—if her handlers aren’t careful—because “all that she wants is another baby.” And she’ll rip her own damned IUD out if she has to in order to get it. Hell, maybe even pull the baby out herself when it arrives, Kourtney-style.
