The Tie That Bynes

First disclaimer: I love a celebrity train wreck as much as the next depraved, procrastination-inclined American. The pictures on the cover of US Weekly have the same effect on me as bright, shiny colors do on magpies and small children; they compel me more often than I’d like to admit to assume a passing interest in the private lives of people I neither know nor care about. I have watched E! True Hollywood Story, and enjoyed it immensely.

Second disclaimer: The only Amanda Bynes film I’ve ever watched is Easy A, and since that was way more an Emma Stone vehicle than an Amanda Bynes vehicle, I can’t speak at all to the latter’s relative merits as an actress or on-screen presence. She seemed to do what was required of her.

All of which is to say that I’ve been following the trail of sad little crumbs leading to Bynes’ total meltdown with the same prurient interest as anybody whose job requires passing many of their waking hours sucking down online ephemera — the reckless driving, the two hours spent locked in a dressing room, the pervy selfies, the bong thrown out of the 36th-floor apartment window, the subsequent accusations of sexual harassment against the cops who arrested her, the Twitter rants. It’s all so familiar — so LiLo, so Miley Cyrus, so Britney Spears, so Stephanie from Full House: the sweet, untainted child starlet undone by a toxic combination of maturity and privilege. She is launched into a downward spiral that can be halted only by a contrite and very public admission of wrongdoing and/or a meticulously calculated career rehabilitation, or maybe a baby. Triumph over adversity, redemption for the sinner.

We know the narrative, and yet we still can’t seem to get enough of it. Little girls lost. They hold our attention in a way that their male counterparts don’t: Shia LaBeouf went from Holes to drunk driving and bar fights and the media shrugged and rolled its eyes. Ditto Edward Furlong, the Terminator 2 kid who now drifts in and out of the TMZ orbit courtesy of substance abuse and domestic violence charges. Sordid, yes, but hardly smeared across the New York Post day after day.

There’s an undercurrent of catty glee that runs beneath the recounting of these tales of fallen women; they’re like the popular girls who were hated in school for being too pretty, too perfect, too likely to get all the boys. Their mug shots are like karmic payback, a warning not to fly too close to the sun. Men don’t usually get these warnings: Justin Timberlake, for example, managed to survive stints in both the Mickey Mouse Club and ‘N Sync without the world practically cheering for him to fail as he brought Sexy Back. Which isn’t to say there aren’t exceptions: few of us seem particularly conflicted about the sheer fun of watching Justin Bieber’s evolution from teen pop phenomenon to biggest tool in the shed, or Charlie Sheen’s efforts to impersonate a warlock.

But reactions to male displays of questionable behavior tend to fall into the “boys will be boys” camp. Whether it’s admitting to a blow job from a hooker or sampling liberally from an all-you-can-eat debauchery buffet, guys are usually free to beat up paparazzi and date escorts without the public wringing its hands with worry.

Maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise. The entertainment media has effectively turned the sphere of celebrity into eternal high school. US Weekly is less a magazine than a yearbook that exists solely to keep its readers up to date on the Best Smiles, Cutest Couples, and Girls Most Likely To. And we read it for the same reason we watch bad movies: to be distracted from things that actually matter, to criticize and laugh at total strangers because we can. The travails of troubled child starlets provide that same vicarious thrill, and allow us to feel superior to people richer, more famous, and, frequently, better-looking than we are.

It’s no different with Amanda Bynes. Except that it is. Because this isn’t really about a former Nickelodeon star who’s tweeting pictures of her tits and buying bad wigs. It’s about someone who clearly appears to suffer from mental illness, and that’s something precious few of us know how to talk about, or want to talk about. It’s easier to make fun of the weird outbursts and bad plastic surgery. Mental illness doesn’t make for good escapism; tarnished young women do.

I have a friend whose refrigerator decorations include a page from US Weekly showing Tara Reid being critiqued by the Fashion Police and another that depicts an angry Lindsay Lohan under the headline “Lindsay: Nobody Tweets Me Back!” Both of us like loitering at the intersection of camp and trash, particularly when there’s botched plastic surgery involved. But when I sent him a link to a story about Bynes’ latest legal mishap, he responded, “At first I thought it was funny. But her antics in the past few months have been incredibly sad…she needs help.”

I can’t say I lose sleep worrying about whether or not she’ll get it. But I do wonder what we really get out of watching such a pathetic public display, and why it’s so much fun to watch a train wreck in motion, right until the moment we see the body count.