How did Britney Spears end her conservatorship? (And what was the role of the media?) - YouTube

Britney Spears is known not only for her music, but also as a media sensation.

Her recent conservatorship case aroused a lot of sympathy for the singer,

while also bringing her back to the forefront of media interest.

But are we now seeing past the media sensation,

or has the singer once again fallen victim to media sensationalisation?

Such are the themes of this episode of 'Strippaus'.

Hey! I'm Matti, and in this series, I try to condense real-life stories from the modern world into comic strips.

Our viewers have requested a video on Britney Spears,

so today I'm going to be delving into the controversial conservatorship case.

I didn't follow the case very closely at the time, but in researching it now,

I couldn't help but wonder whether we have enough desire to see past the media sensation, and whether

the media attention that these kinds of cases get can really do any good.

Let's take a look, firstly, at the road which led to this conservatorship.

Chapter 1: from songbird to spectacle

At the beginning of the 90s, Disney Channel aired the newest version of its Mickey Mouse themed variety show.

In the new Mickey Mouse Club series, a group of energetic child-stars entertained its audience

through song and dance.

Many of the children got a huge boost to their future career: the series featured, for example,

Justin Timberlake, Christina Aguilera, Ryan Gosling, and a certain Britney Spears.

Mickey Mouse Club finished in '94, and Britney returned to her small hometown, Kentwood,

where she lived with her mother, Lynne Spears, her father, Jamie Spears, and her siblings.

Her musical career continued, however, and Britney didn't live the life of a normal teenager

for much longer.

At only sixteen, Jive Records had the talented singer sent to Stockholm,

to produce her first album with the help of some Swedish producers.

Britney hatched into a super star, and her first single, Baby One More Time,

was a huge hit.

The teenage pop star soon became an internationally-recognised sensation.

Of her songs, many were soon recognised as pop staples:

for example, 'Oops!...I did it again' from her second album,

her third album's 'I'm a slave 4 u', and her fourth album's iconic songs, 'Toxic' and 'Every time'

Britney's position as a new, uncontested superstar

is reflected in her unofficial nickname, 'The Princess of Pop'.

Sheer musicality, however, is not sufficient for stardom in the popular culture of today's world:

the audience wants to follow celebrities' lives as an all-round spectacle.

In Britney's case, this meant a constant invasion into her private life,

such as through the media following of her marriage to the dancer Kevin Federline,

and of her bringing up their two children.

In the 2000s, paparazzi culture was heightened,

with papers offering large sums for pictures of celebrities.

Britney was also closely observed on the streets.

The worse her divorce, child custody case, and partying appeared, the more media coverage she received.

Her private life became a media show.

In around 2007, Spears' misfortunes seemed to be piling up.

The papers described her losing control, as she became increasingly involved in night-life,

her ex-husband fought her for custody of their children, and she began to attend rehab.

The high point in Spears' personal struggles is often judged to be the night when she was

observed by paparazzi getting her head shaved at the hair dresser,

reportedly because she was "sick of people touching her".

At this point, Britney's children's primary guardianship was granted to their father, Kevin Federline.

The children visited paid visits to their mother.

After one particular visit, Britney refused to let her younger child go back home, and

Federline summoned the police to her home.

Britney is said to have suffered from a nervous breakdown,

and she was taken, against her will, to psychiatric care.

After these developments, her father, Jamie Spears, appealed to the court to declare him

his adult daughter's 'conservator'.

By the way, feel free to comment your art criticisms down below:

I always pick out the best roasts to show in the next video.

So, Britney Spears had gone from the stage, to tabloid magazines, to, ultimately, a state

where her mental health is said to have broken down.

In media studies, we often speak about ‘framing’, or the way that an event or person can be

interpreted in different ways, depending on how the media chooses to portray them,

and the context they choose to give things.

In Britney’s case, her ‘frame’ quickly became her tailspin into mental breakdown.

The long-term viewership that this media interpretation had had may have had its impacts on the fact

that Britney’s conservatorship was not much questioned.

Next, we’re going to look at what the conservatorship meant for Britney,

and how the situation began to arouse suspicion

Chapter 2: The fans’ detective agency

After her infamous mental breakdown, Britney’s father, Jamie Spears, applied to function

temporarily as his daughter’s conservator.

The papers reported that Britney might be a danger to herself, or in danger of being exploited.

The Californian court judged that the arrangement was necessary for Britney,

and placed her under conservatorship in February, 2008.

Conservatorship is a system of guardianship.

Its original purpose was to protect people who are unable to look after themselves,

by delegating responsibility for their affairs to another person.

Health-related problems such as dementia and mental health issues can lead to this order.

In the case of Britney, the conservatorship targeted both her as a person, and her property.

Conservatorship of the person meant Britney’s father made almost all decisions for his daughter.

Conservatorship of property meant that her millions of dollars' worth of financial affairs

were also under her father’s control.

After this, Britney was no longer the focus of media sensationalisation,

but she soon made her reappearance elsewhere.

Soon after the enforcement of the new arrangement, Britney returned to the stage and recording studio, and went on tour.

Spears appeared to be continuing her musical career in full force, despite her conservatorship.

The originally temporary conservatorship arrangement was altered in October 2008 to a permanent one.

The singer’s fans reacted to this with suspicion.

Could it really be that conservatorship, intended for the most extreme situations,

was the only way to help Britney, who was, meanwhile, able to carry on working?

The situation was an unusual one, as the singer's business also provided an income for her conservator

By 2009, her fans had set up a site called 'freebritney.net',

which followed the singer's life under her father's conservatorship.

From quite early on, there was speculation as to whether Britney was satisfied with the situation,

or whether it could, in fact, be causing her harm.

For her conservator could, theoretically, control her movement, relationship, and more.

The years went by, and Britney's career seemed to be on a roll.

Among other things, she performed a continuous concert series for four years in Las Vegas.

In 2019, the situation seemed to get out of control.

Within a short time, Britney's father got dangerously ill, her concerts were all cancelled,

and she was taken into psychiatric care.

At this point, Britney's fans had been following her personal Instagram closely, and began

to look for clues in her posts about what might be going on backstage.

There was speculation in the air as to how much Britney was being controlled.

In the fan-hosted 'Britney's Gram' podcast, the fans analysed her Instagram posts humorously,

but changed their tune when they received an anonymous clue,

suggesting Britney had been take to care against her will, and that she was being pressured into taking medication.

Though the information was difficult to prove, the Free Britney movement was thoroughly aroused,

and gathered lots of media attention.

Change seemed immanent, and when Britney attended a court hearing with her mother in May 2019,

the judge declared her need for conservatorship had to be reevaluated.

There are, by the way, other factors to do with the conservatorship, which I won't delve into here,

as Britney's property was controlled not only by her father, but also by her lawyers.

The Free Britney movement was sparked not only by her passionate fans,

but also by the fact that Britney does not fit our idea of a person in need of conservatorship.

She is young, and does creative, demanding work.

Still, it's important to remember that we cannot form accurate conclusions about

the state of her mental health based on media representation and fan campaigns.

Spears' father, Jamie, criticised the movement as a conspiracy theory,

but nothing could stop the public interest in Britney's situation.

Everything seemed to be moving towards a public confrontation.

Chapter 3: New frames or old frames?

By 2020, it was clear that Britney herself wanted the conservatorship to end.

Her lawyer told the court that Britney resisted her father's attempts to hide this wish.

The lawyer demanded that Jamie Spears would be removed from the role of conservator,

but the request was rejected.

In February 2021, the New York Times produced a documentary called 'Framing Britney Spears',

which showed the media's treatment of Britney, and made a critical investigation into the conservatorship case.

The film was highly praised,

and Spears' battle against conservatorship became an even larger topic of discussion.

Inevitably, the legal suit became a media spectacle in itself,

and it aroused a huge amount of attention in the papers and on social media.

Though the circumstances had changed, Britney was once again the centre of public attention over a scandal.

Lots of documentaries were made about her, and though their intention was to portray the conservatorship case,

they brought many of Britney's worst moments back to the forefront of media attention.

Though sympathetic to Britney in tone, it does seem the media was framing Britney once again.

Where previously the media had focused on her relationships and drug-use,

it now centred around her infamous conservatorship.

The frames had changed, but was Britney really now being presented humanely?

Either way, the New York Times soon released concerning information about the severity

of the conservatorship.

According to the paper, her conservators had kept very tight control over who she could meet,

what she could buy, and what work she could do.

Her private correspondence was also monitored.

At last, in June 2021, Britney spoke publicly in court.

It was clear that Britney had not, in fact, been satisfied with her 13 years' conservatorship.

Britney told the court that she felt unsafe, that she had been forced to perform and take medication,

and that she was not allowed to marry or have children.

She had had a coil implanted into her, which her conservators did not allow her to have removed.

"I am tired of feeling lonely.

I deserve the same rights as others, to have a child, a family - any of these things, and more."

In September, the court agreed to remove Jamie Spears from the role of conservator temporarily,

but Britney was still under conservatorship.

In the legal struggles which continued into the autumn, both Britney's lawyers, and her conservators' lawyers were paid from Britney's property

meaning she had to pay the expenses on both sides.

On the twelfth of November, 2021, the case came to a conclusion.

Neither party resisted the decision to release Britney from conservatorship,

and judge Brenda Perry declared: "The court has ruled that conservatorship is no longer necessary for Britney Jean Spears".

Having been in place for 13 years, the arrangement had ended, and Britney's fans were able to celebrate

Britney posted on her Instagram: "Best day ever."

Here the story ends – for now, at least. It remains to be seen, of course, whether

Britney's conservators will be judged guilty of breaking the law in their treatment of Britney.

I discussed earlier whether the way that Britney has been framed recently in the media can

be seen to hold some resemblance to the intrusive tone of the 2000s.

However, if one can see past the spectacle to a new perspective into societal issues,

positive change can result.

For example, Britney's saga resulted not only in her being able to break away from conservatorship,

but also in new US legislation, protecting those under conservatorship from being victimised by potential conflicts of interest,

such as situations where the conservator might not have the conservatee's best interests at heart.

The responsibility of ensuring the media presents events like these in a constructive way falls

to people like me: since I'm actually doing the same as all the 'Free Britney' documentaries:

in trying to condense this chain of events, I am creating a representation of the truth, even though really,

I don't know Britney's reality, or what she really needs, or how she's doing, or how she will fare in the future.

To site the first lines of Britney's song "Circus":

If you want to see behind-the-scenes footage of the creation of this series, you can follow

me on Instagram, and on Twitch, where I draw these illustrations on live streams.

Involved in the making of these episodes are also the illustrator Saara Paasikivi, and our new animator Timo Korpi.

Remember to suggest topics for future videos in the comment section below,

and come back when the next episode comes out!

See you later!