#5 is here!

#4:  Laina Morris AKA Overly Attached Girlfriend

Bwuh?  Who?

Maybe THIS will jog your memory:








If you're not already familiar with the endless stream of captioned pictures associated with this wonderful young lady - in case you're just now witnessing this picture and thinking you should probably lock your doors - Laina Morris AKA the "Overly Attached Girlfriend" first hit the internet with her submission to Justin Bieber's competition to create a "Girlfriend" video to match his song "Boyfriend".

Laina Morris took it to a special place.

So right now, you might be saying "C'mon, LOIIAB (that's Look Out It Is a Blog, or loooaaaeeeaaayyb), sure that video is funny and all, but it's just an internet meme.  Does that really merit a spot on the Fabulous Five for freaking INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY?"



Well, yeah, actually, for a few reasons.

First off, the reactions to this video have varied from Bieber's enthusiastic reply to a rather trite response from the folks at Feministing.  But whether you agree with the theory that this video trivializes stalking and abusive relationships, the point is that this simple idea was enough to generate discussion about a topic that is rather heated in North America right now.  Maybe that doesn't say as much about Morris as it does about the internet, but you know what they say about art imitating life...

Second of all, it IS a simple idea.  Therein lies the charm.  Too often in comedy programs there seems to be an overabundance of...thinking.  A joke is only a joke if you don't have to explain it, and the more sheer content that is crammed into a program, the more it seems like the writers are floundering.  Family Guy, The Simpsons (the new ones), Futurama (again, the new ones) all spring to mind on this count.

But what really makes me admire Laina Morris is that she's taken her fame and created a series of charity videos.  At age 19.  Yeah.  I spent my time at 19 floundering through second year Drama and achieving a mighty C average.  And you know what?  She's STILL out there, making videos, regardless of fluctuating numbers of views and fleeting attention spans; come hell or high water, she's got her niche carved out.

Now, I know there's a lot of flak out there for so-called "celebrity syndrome charities", where public opinion is swayed only momentarily by a feel-good sense of camaraderie (like the Japan post-Tsunami series of concerts, or the Kony 2012 campaign).  Here's the thing though.  This is a NINETEEN YEAR OLD'S INTERNET MEME, NOT LADY GAGA.

Internet memes are, at the best of times, a fun diversion for a population running on coffee-induced ADD sessions of two-thousand-clicks per minute, and at the worst of times a schlocky mess of misogyny and bad grammar disguised as comedic genius.

Here's someone who saw a way to take that brief moment of fame and transform it into something...almost beautiful.  She made something out of one of the most cynical, transient aspects of modern life:  the internet.

We could stand to learn something from her example.