How many people are willing to read Britney Spears’ new biography if they label the unborn “just a clump of cells”?
Normally, a memoir by a disturbed pop artist would be of little sociopolitical significance. There will undoubtedly be some “shocking revelations” that the denser portions of your social media friend list will be talking about for a week or two, following which the book will be relegated to the remainder bin.
However, when the pop star has been through a series of harrowing public trials — including breakdowns and a conservatorship — and still calls abortion one of the worst experiences of her life, it’s easy to understand why those who were all behind #ShoutYourAbortion might keep quiet on this one.
According to a People magazine sample, Spears claims in her upcoming memoir, “The Woman in Me,” that she became pregnant by longtime lover Justin Timberlake in 2000 but was forced to have an abortion.
“It was a surprise, but for me, it wasn’t a tragedy. I loved Justin so much,” Spears wrote in the book.
“I always expected us to have a family together one day. This would just be much earlier than I’d anticipated,” the 41-year-old singer said.
The difficulty, she added, was that the man in her life wasn’t ready to man up.
“But Justin definitely wasn’t happy about the pregnancy. He said we weren’t ready to have a baby in our lives, that we were way too young,” Spears wrote.
She wrote that “had been left up to me alone, I never would have done it. And yet Justin was so sure that he didn’t want to be a father.”
So, Spears aborted the unborn child. The two would break up in 2002.
“To this day, it’s one of the most agonizing things I have ever experienced in my life,” she wrote in the book.
Britney Spears reveals she and Justin Timberlake agreed to get an abortion after she got pregnant with his baby, due to him not “being happy” about it:
“It was a surprise, but for me, it wasn’t a tragedy. I loved Justin so much. I always expected us to have a family together one… pic.twitter.com/o63B8m1PiA
— Pop Base (@PopBase) October 17, 2023
Spears has two sons, ages 18 and 17, with her ex-husband, Kevin Federline.
According to LifeSite News, the pop singer lost custody of her children during her conservatorship and claimed she was forced to have an intrauterine device placed during that time to prevent her from becoming pregnant again.
Many social media users have speculated that Spears’ 2003 album “In the Zone” song “Everytime” is about her abortion experience.
Among the lyrics? “I guess I need you, baby; and every time I see you in my dreams I see your face: it’s haunting me,” and, “Please, forgive me; my weakness caused you pain; And this song’s my sorry.”
The video also features a woman in the delivery room:
It’s worth mentioning that Timberlake’s camp has so far refused to comment.
Sources close to Timberlake told the New York Post’s Page Six that the former *NSYNC singer was “concerned” about what Spears would expose in her biography and that it was “eating at him.”
Given the public jabs the two have traded over the years, it should.
Granted, this is only one woman’s perspective, but it’s a compelling one—and one that appears even more genuine now that the “Everytime” film has offered retrospective confirming evidence.
The abortion pressure Spears described is not uncommon.
As pro-life Live Action noted, one study found that “64% of women who have undergone an abortion did so due to pressure from parents, boyfriends, employers, and friends” and “research published by the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons reported that 73.8% of women with a history of abortion experienced ‘at least subtle forms of pressure’ to abort.”
Spears has been through the media wringer since she was a teenager, and Britney-bashing is no longer a form of entertainment for everyone, save the most vicious.
She’s been sexualized, infantilized, and demonized by a culture and society that values celebrities who are just the right amount of false and hateful. Us Weekly readers moved on to the next target when it became too unpleasant and real because Spears’ problems felt all too personal.
Despite this, Spears continues to state that having an abortion was “one of the most agonizing things I have ever experienced in my life.”
Even the most indifferent media observer is aware of Spears’ travails. If she can honestly state so, then no, it isn’t merely surgically flushing “a clump of cells.”
Leave a Comment