Am I the only one who can't wait for Justin Bieber to start doing excessive amounts of cocaine?
I don't say that in a mean-spirited, schadenfreude-drenched sense; just that the hyper-celebrity entity known as Justin Bieber surely is going to make for a really terrific VH1 "Behind the Music" or equivalent self-destructive documentary where still images of his cherubic face are juxtaposed with stories of him throwing Grammys through plate-glass windows and screaming at his mom that he wishes she'd gotten an abortion.
I was up late one night worrying about the situation in Gaza, and the second-biggest news story of the day was the Celebribiebs accepting his American Music Award for best whatever. "This is for all the haters who thought I'd be around for one, two years," the now-18 year old bratted.
You can already see it: the pop star on his way to supernova, just years away from his first taste of crystal amphetabiebs, in which case the name of the self-destruct doc will practically write itself ("Breaking Biebs").
A few years ago a sportscaster was interviewing Biebs at the NBA All-Star Game and asked him to tell us the craziest thing a female fan had ever done. His answer was something along the lines of, "One time some girls ran after my limo." This anodyne, evasive answer betrayed him. When a teenage boy grows up without frailty or social challenge, his supreme adult douchiness is virtually inevitable. I'm betting the real answer to this question was something like "Fifty Shades of Grey" as re-envisioned by Caligula while wigging out on amphetabiebs.
For a kid who became one of the most famous people on Planet Earth before he had his first voice crack, the drug-fueled flameout is all too predictable: more terrible arm tattoos, public temper tantrums and an eventual arrest with an underage girl (New York Post headline: "Statutory Biebs").
An increasingly jaded fan base of true Beliebers will hold on for a while, but the cutesy romances with young pop stars will give way to tales of fist fights in strip clubs, drunken driving arrests and the inevitable comeback album featuring an embittered rap solo.
Where the world once appeared vast and all possibilities within reach for JB, the claustrophobia of unbridled fame will run head-on into the realization of his own inevitable mortalibiebs.
This will, of course, be immensely entertaining. Even though you can practically write the whole thing now, each headline will nevertheless bewilder and thrill in the same way every gruesome death in a slasher movie is both telegraphed and enjoyable. Sure, you know when the blonde uses the fire poker in the first act that this same poker will end up in her abdomen or eye socket later, but the fun is in finding out how.
The same goes for the Biebs' self-immolation. We all see it coming-juicy, weird and darkly hilarious. The cloying trap of public adoration will lead to a spiral of hypodermic needles, depraved sexual encounters, increasingly sloppy, uninspired pop hits churned out by the billion-dollar infrastructure demanding the Biebs' face accompany otherwise joyless music, until the final, ultimate indignity: a guest appearance on "The X-Factor."
Mark my words.
RedEye special contributor Stephen Markley is the author of "The Great Dysmorphia" and "Publish This Book."
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