The strain of Madonna’s ongoing custody battle with ex-husband Guy Ritchie has become excruciatingly visible. Since December, she’s been fighting in court to get their son Rocco, 15, to come back to New York City, where he was enrolled in school and living with Madonna. But Rocco still hasn’t left London, where he’s been living with his father, stepmother, and their three young children—despite a Manhattan Supreme Court judge’s ruling that Rocco should return stateside. From an outsider’s vantage, the situation looks heartbreaking, both for Madonna—whose teenage son is cutting her off in full view of a drama-hungry audience—and for Rocco, whose wishes and best interests seem to be lost in a legal quagmire. But it bears mentioning that Madonna would barely reside with Rocco in New York, since she’s on her world tour.
And how is that world tour going? Recently, Madonna showed up three hours late to a show, and some of her audience members have said she’s looked intoxicated onstage. Madonna has firmly denied that assessment of her performance. But what else can explain her ghastly behavior on the Brisbane, Australia, stage this week, when she exposed a teenage fan’s naked breast in front of a cheering crowd? “She’s the kind of girl you just want to slap—on the ass. And pull,” said Madonna, yanking down one side of the 17-year-old girl’s tube top. “I’m sorry, sexual harassment,” she continued, giving the girl a hug. “You can do the same to me if you’d like.”
The fan has said the incident was “the best moment” of her life. “Only I get to decide if I’m humiliated or not. Why would people assume I am humiliated by my own breast, nipple or body?”
Fair enough. But, though the fan is legally an adult in Australia, if she hadn’t appreciated Madonna’s act, it would be a clear case of sexual abuse or assault.
Madonna should be held responsible for her sexually aggressive behavior. Unfortunately, Piers Morgan took that impulse a step further in an editorial for the Daily Mail, shaming Madonna for her actions not because they were just plain wrong, but because of her age, maternal status, and current custody dilemma:
This would all be bad enough if you only had the one child, the poor boy caught up in a legal fight between you and his other parent, your former spouse. But actually, you have [four] children, not one. Oh, and to make it even more excruciating, you’re 57 and old enough to be this girl’s grandparent. … It’s one thing to prance about on stage like a boozing, cursing, fishnet-stocking clad hooker if you’re a single woman in your 20s. That can be credibly put down to “artistic freedom.” It’s quite another to do it when you have five kids and one of them is being torn to pieces at the court of public humiliation.
In response to reports that she’s been drunk and high at her shows, Madonna posted a fan’s defense on Instagram. Her caption blamed the allegations on rank sexism:
Of course, people were not upset that their concert started three hours late because Madonna is a woman. Pulling down a 17-year-old’s tube top is not “thinking outside the box.” The wage gap has nothing to do with this conversation. Not all criticism of Madonna is sexist. Unfortunately for Madonna and the readers who stumbled across Morgan’s filth, his editorial is.
