3/7/96
She's a thief of hearts, and that's why so many people hate her. She takes other people's feelings and makes them her own. She's able to do it without even thinking consciously about it. She sings a song that is obviously about herself, and in it she states what everyone who is against her wants to say but is afraid to. She is indeed a theif of hearts.
To demonstrate this effect, let's look back at her little bump-in with a fellow celebrity, Kevin Costner. He comes backstage to visit her after witnessing her performance. He obviously wants to return the gratitude she showed to him by inviting him to the show, but he is appalled by what he sees. In fact, it even makes him mildly nauseated. But he does not want to offend the poor little girl who was only trying to be kind to him, so he tells her the show was "neat". He then thanks her for the gifts, and then departs from this awkward encounter.
What does she do? She echoes his emotional response. She treats him with warmth and friendliness, despite the insulting hurt she feels at having a show she worked hard on, and which came from her heart, simply called "neat". As soon as he leaves the room, she articulates the feeling he had about the show by experiencing it herself. She signals this to her companions, and openly says "Anybody who says my show is neat has to go."
Such is the life of Madonna. She goes about, mimicking the feelings of others and making them her own, even to the point of insulting herself and her own work. One has to wonder if she has any feelings of her own. Is there a chance she may produce an original thought? Not likely. But then, almost nobody does. They almost always go through life unconsciously mimicking the emotions and thoughts of their parents. Madonna's ability to do this has been crippled, because she lost one of her parents before reaching maturity, although she has done everything she she knows how to do to model herself after the mother she remembers. Whenever she can't remember, she'll just copy whoever she happens to be in the presence of, and it certainly works better than having no one to look up to.
Many people enjoy this effect, as it makes them feel like there is someone else who knows how they feel. Others despise her, as they do not want to see what looks like their own hidden faults. She yields the impression that she knows everything about the person she is with, and in way she does. She just isn't conscious of it all the time.
Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.
Luke 23:34
This article is dedicated to a friend I hiked
with.