Late last night, I wrote Laurie Sue Brockway, author of “A Goddess is a Girl’s Best Friend,” and asked for her thoughts on the death of Anna Nicole Smith.
Here’s what Brockway wrote back:
This culture has come to know ‘goddess’ as the title bestowed on models, movie stars, and women who embody an astounding physical beauty that most of us could never emulate. I can see how people may call Anna Nicole a Goddess, yet in some ways she seemed a caricature of that.I see a modern-day goddess as someone who is spiritual and soulful, with an evolving consciousness. Anna Nicole did not strike me as being in touch with her true inner goddess. But she definitely worked the goddess “thing,” and in her public person evoked a sex goddess vibe.
Interestingly, from the perspective of goddess mythology, she lived out several archetypes.
* She was the sex goddess aspect of Venus, who loved to be admired and seen. Venus carried a mirror and loved to look at herself. As much as Anna Nicole was hounded and seemed trapped by her fame in her last months, she used TV as her high tech mirror, able to see herself and reflect her image to the masses.
* She also evoked Uzume, the shaman goddess of Japan, known for being somewhat of a clown and flashing her privates to stir controversy and get a laugh from the other gods and goddesses. Anna Nicole flashed her life–and body parts–for all to see. She didn’t seem to care what people thought of her.
* She showed aspects of Durga, the Hindu Warrior goddess with eight arms who rides a tiger. For better or for worse, Anna Nicole was a tenacious fighter and although in the end we saw the depth of her vulnerability, she survived plenty of slings, arrows and loss and always seemed to at least be able to pretend to walk proudly.
* In the end, she was Innana of ancient Babylon, the goddess of sexuality. Once the Queen of Heaven, and the goddess of Love and War, when her sacred lover/son Tamuz was killed she had to travel seven layers down to the underworld to save him, stripping her earthly possessions, clothes, jewels and egos as she traveled through each level. There she met her dark twin and had to face her before she could rise again and save her love. Just as Innana could not bear the pain of losing Tamuz, I believe Anna Nicole could not bear losing her son Daniel. Perhaps she sacrificed herself to be with him again.
Anna Nicole Smith represented archetypes people seemed to relate to. Now she, and her son, are part of celebrity mythology, leaving one child to carry on.
Well, you don’t get that kind of analysis and commentary everywhere. Eat your heart out, Larry King! For more about Laurie Sue Brockway’s goddess work and online courses (that can help any woman getting connected to her “goddesses within”), look here and here.
posted February 10, 2007 at 3:49 am
Yeah, and Mel Gibson is the modern Jesus. What a crock.
posted February 10, 2007 at 5:50 pm
Anna Nicole was a drunk, whore and acted like a disgusting slut most of the time, she was always impaired, loud and rude, shockingly rude, acting like a big spoiled baby. She made me gag!!! The constant reference to Marilyn was a joke, it was only she that felt she was Marilynesque, I bet she died from a drug overdose. Good riddens to bad rubish, Goddess? Hell NO! When will society stop puting these junkies on a pedastal?
posted February 11, 2007 at 12:23 am
I think Anna Nicole was a very beautiful woman, I think her most big mistake was got married a rich man, so older: he does not let her to enjoy her fortune after he passed away… the facts says that!
posted February 12, 2007 at 2:08 am
I hope that she is with her Son, and at peace. I am sickened by the amount of hatred some people have for a troubled soul they never even knew. The woman is dead. Have a little respect. At least reserve your judgment until such a time as you become *perfect* yourselves.
posted February 12, 2007 at 1:12 pm
Anna Nicole Smith is an Idol. But no goddess. She was a follower of the new Liberal-Progressive view of morality and life. As did her son. As do the literally millions of stories of the untold dead that embraced the licentiousness that has risen again in the garb of social-progressive ideolgy AND sadly “theology.” No matter how the story is wriiten of those that embrace the new morality of “San Francisco values,” created since the sixties, two”traditional” little phrase sums it up: “As ye sow, so shall ye reap.” “The wages of sin is death.” Let us pray that the true Idol of lascivious hedonism followed like a gender confused “Goddess” of licentiousness, so worshiped by our liberal culture, will soon end. Sparing so many people the fate of those like Smith and her son.
posted February 12, 2007 at 1:15 pm
BUT . . . I do hope so, that Anna Nicole Smith is in peace now, and is embracing her son in the kingdom ruled forever, not by an Idol, but by the Son of God, Who once was on a cross similar in shape as the one she sometimes wore around her neck. Love endures.
posted February 12, 2007 at 1:37 pm
why such hate towards a person most of us never even knew. people make choices in life different than we make for ourselves…so be it. may she rest in peace, and god bless her daughter and the rest of her ‘family’.
posted February 12, 2007 at 1:51 pm
I feel sorry for Anna Nicole Smith. She had physical beauty, but not much else, and never seemed to achieve joy in her life. She was a sex symbol. Celebrated for being a celebrity. If you want an example of a Goddess, try Mother Teresa.
posted February 12, 2007 at 3:18 pm
Let’s hear how Anna Nicole was exploited by good liberal’s like Hugh Hefner as she also attempted to exploit herself. To make her into some kind kinf of tragic “feminist as victim”is almost as silly as the deifacation of Marylyn Monroe.She made choices,albeit poor ones.Ultimatly it is her infant child who will suffer for her choices.
posted February 12, 2007 at 4:05 pm
David, You’re obviously a right-wing fundie. In other words, you are correct. Smith made choices, but for Darwin’s sake, don’t ever try to insinuate she and the people around her be held accountable for those choices.Be tolerant of diversity.
posted February 12, 2007 at 4:36 pm
What can I say? I followed the tragedy of her son’s death on E’ Tonight, caught her interviews on the Web, took every chance to read about her in the gossip “rags,” and lamented her death-too-early life. In other words, I was like so many others, attracted to this woman who made choices, some not so good, but human choices. Which one of us is going to cast the first stone? She was, avowedly, a celebrity – well, so is Paris Hilton. People are fascinated by those who live so-called “charmed” lives; who doesn’t envy someone so much in the public eye? Wihle we mere humans struggle every day to make ends meet, people like Anna Nicole struggled to be a “personality,” embued with glamour, but also with tragedy. It’s the old case of “oh, it’s so horrible, I don’t want to look; but I look.” Like examining an insect under a microscope, or watching a cougar devour an antelope on nature TV. You don’t want to look – but you do…Let Anna Nicole rest in peace with her son, who also died too young.
posted February 12, 2007 at 5:13 pm
David Bolton and Stephen Davidson, put a sock in your “I’m OK, you’re a ‘leeebrul’” buffoonery. The person who Amy Cunningham quotes with jibberish, absurd comments about Anna Nicole Smith are her own only. To quote another Bnet poster: Take your strawman down a long walk on a short pier. Anna Nicole Smith was a drunk, drug abuser and gold digger who paid the price for her reckless lifestyle, if you can call what she did “living” in any genuine sense. Wow, we agree! And it will shock you no doubt that I am a Christian but of the non-fundie variety (the kind America is in desperate need of to balance off the Jesus Camp/Dobson blowhards). By the way, be careful who you vilify…a fair number of the far right base feel similarly toward Elvis Presley as a some apparently do about Anna Nicole Smith
posted February 12, 2007 at 9:40 pm
oh, shut up! she died of a broken heart . she tried to live for her daughter, but her grief for her son was too much to bear.
posted February 12, 2007 at 10:33 pm
I think Anna Nicole Smith could have achieved a lot more out of her life. It’s not that I think fun and entertainment aren’t important, but they shouldn’t be all that you live for–especially racy, sex-driven fun. I just think it’s sad that she couldn’t have had a second chance–to turn from a supposed gold digger and sex symbol to a true entertainer (not Playboy type). She probably did die from a drug overdose, and she’d almost certainly had been using drugs and alchohol before her death, but I think we should forgive her. After all, how will that sink us from our more “respectable” lifestyles?
posted February 18, 2007 at 5:47 pm
You want TRUTH??? Can you handle the TRUTH??? Ok, here is the TRUTH .:) Anna Nicole Smith Knew Jesus & Jesus knew Anna Nicole Smith! Watch her TESTIFY Jesus Christ is her Lord and Savior and will always be . What an awesome video! http://www.youtube.com/user/RandyNein(I m sure this pisses off the devil, the religious spirit, jezebel, and the secular media)No one can say, Jesus Christ is Lord, except by the Holy Spirit . 1 Corinthians 12:4Also I say unto you, Whosoever shall confess me before men, him shall the Son of man also confess before the angels of God. Luke 12:8-9But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us . Romans 5:8
posted February 22, 2007 at 8:09 pm
best site http://www.lindsaypics.org
posted February 26, 2007 at 12:39 pm
I appreciated this article on ANS and goddess archetypes. I have another view about that, though. Anna wasn’t so much a “goddess”, but a “representative of” the goddess, in the tradition of slave girls chosen as sacrifices in Aztec and other old religious traditions with a powerful priestcraft. And as such, she was a tragedy (even if one with a sense of humor at times). I’d be interested to know what you think. Peace: http://cadeveo.wordpress.com/2007/02/16/anna-nicole-smith-human-sacrifice