I know very little about American culture, because I don’t have a TV, and I stopped listening to Howard Stern in 1993. Occasionally, I find a copy of In Style magazine in the garbage, which I pore over like an English planter in Malaysia receiving the Daily Mail in 1883. In this manner, I became acquainted with Snooki.
Snooki was the most famous star of a brutally honest reality TV show, Jersey Shore. Her main claim to fame was that she loved having sexual relations with men. Eventually, she received $25,000 per personal appearance. People just wanted to see Snooki, as if she were a two-headed cow.
Recently, I was startled to see the photo of a woman identified as Snooki on the cover of People magazine, with a 6 day old baby. This woman’s hair was neatly parted, and dark brown. She looked like St. Agnes. Snooki has made the transition from maiden to matron. And suddenly one notices that she is not the female celebrity-as-victim that she was intended to be. She’s not a cokehead, a kleptomaniac, a victim of serial plastic surgery. Rather, she’s a working-class hero — and, in fact, my hero. Her one "vice" is actually a sign of mental health. That’s why it’s so rare in America. Women should enjoy sex, and so should men and cocker spaniels. But do we? No. That’s why we stare at Snooki.
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