All My Role Models are Fictional.

...and dudes.

Lindsay Lohan, are you kidding me? Arrested for drunk driving and cocaine possession, an astonishing nine days after leaving rehab. At the rate this girl's going, she'll be funding her habit(s) later in life not by writing a tell-all book, but about nine seasons of "Days of Our Lives" scripts.

I was hoping the backlash against the smug, Scientologist, slapping-your-already-screwed-kid-with-a-retarded-name starlets would be a generation of smart, hip, independent young women. Instead we get to escape from our own sordid - though admittedly middle-class - lives by reading the exploits of spoiled, skanky rich girls who have made the leap from annoying to seriously fucked up without mussing their mascara. Or sleeping for the past 96 hours.

If these girls want to learn a little about sacrifice and responsibility without stressing their delicate brain cells (which I'm pegging have a half-life of about 4 years,) they should pick up the new Harry Potter book. That dude puts his lovelife on hold, shelves the Firewhisky, and goes to try and solve the nagging little problem of total evil, at the age which Lindsay was phoning in Herbie the Lovebug.

Or they could opt for retro Brit and pick up a Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (who practiced mysticism! Also a crazy religion!) tome. Sherlock Holmes also managed to hunt down and contain total evil - this time in the form of Professor Moriarty (who, like, isn't as hot as Ralph Fiennes but, you know, has a nose) - while succombing to his own nasty cocaine addiction! But you'll notice, girls, that instead of participating in car chases through the parking lots of Santa Monica with a .13 blood alcohol level, Holmes spent his wide-awake nighttime hours doing things like memorizing every single type of tobacco or playing with his chemistry set. Or faking his own death and going into hiding. Lohan, take notes on this one in particular. We'd miss you but, you know, not.

Or, man alive, what about Harry Angstrom? There's a flawed antihero for them, and a cautionary tale of what happens to young hot-shots when they grow up. Owen Meany! A metaphor for faith and sacrifice, plus he's adorable! I mean, Humbert Humbert has an affair with his 13-year-old stepdaughter and he's still more sympathetic than these trussed up Hollywood whores.

I know I should feel sorry for these women, having fame and riches thrust upon them. But it's a wide world, and there are far worse things that can and do happen to other people everyday, who all manage to continue living. There's something to be said for the role glamour plays in our lives, but it can probably fit in half a column on the back page of Cosmopolitan. There are literally hundreds of millions of words written in our collective legends. stories, and history books about heroism. And, I promise, not one of those words is "Lohan."

Femme Fatality
Boom Chicago