So I watched Katy Perry’s Part of me.  Mainly because I have these free codes for Red Box that are about to expire and at my core I am so cheap I would rather spend 2 hours watching a movie I don’t want to see than give up a free rental.  I can’t say it was a very good movie but an argument could be made that the movie promotes and artifice becomes reality if enough people believe it theme that says a lot about the current pop culture landscape.  If perception is reality and you can convince enough people that the affectations you’ve embraced are actually an expression of your core being then it becomes who you are.  Existence precedes Essence… sort of?  I am not sure, it’s late and I am likely thinking too much about it but it does bring about the interesting nature of pop stars and why they so often take up residence in our fantasies.  When Brittney Spears was the biggest Pop Star in the world I was always fascinated by her ability to be all things to all people, the innocent, godly, underage sex kitten, the Wet Hot American Virgin.  Her songs and motions sold sex and so many bought it but just as many bought the idea of a girl waiting for marriage, innocent and naive, too pure for it to even occur to her that dressing up as a catholic school girl and gyrating suggestively might be a sexual awakening for countless 13 year olds with MTV.  Pop icons are what we make of them and they are different things to different people because it’s what we want them to be.  Katy Perry, daughter of a Minister, Christian Singer and good girl; Katy Perry, whose first single celebrated faux-lesbian titillation and is a walking sex goddess.  Half the popularity of someone like this is it doesn’t matter who or what she really is, nor does it really matter how she perceives herself.  We have a movie now trying to show us an image of what she wants us to see at least but it likely won’t matter, with pop stars more than any other artist, the artist becomes art and once art is in the world it’s not longer under the artist’s control, it becomes what we make of it as we view it.  Which is why Katy is here tonight, I have my own image, my own picture of her in my mind and it’s a desirable one.  It might have nothing to do with reality, it isn’t important, reality doesn’t come to play much in our relationship with celebrities, what’s important is how we perceive them and what that says about us.  For me, right now, at the basest level it says today I want to fuck Katy Perry.