The Price of Mom Jeans

Once upon a time, in the golden age of pop music, there was a wholesome blonde with a great voice who serenaded us with catchy lyrics about being in love with her hunky boy band boyfriend. Then she married said boybander and had cameras follow them around in an mtv reality show, where we learned exactly how ditzy she was, but still loved her anyways. Then she decided to venture into movies, hired herself a trainer, and washed the General Lee in a tiny bikini and smokin bod. And we still loved her.

But then Jessica Simpson started making some poor career decisions. She divorced her husband; she hooked up with a string of winners that included Johnny Knoxville, John Mayer, Dane Cook, a football player, and the bald guy from Smashing Pumpkins; she came out with a line of wiglets; she joined twitter and said that a coyote took off with her maltese Daisy and that her sister Ashlee was the best actress on Melrose Place; and she wore mom jeans and a leopard belt in public (certianly not her first encounter with unflattering clothing choices, but definitely her most well-known).

You know when you leave a situation and as you’re walking away, you think of a million things that you could have said? Well, over a year later, Jess has finally come up with a clever retort, and it airs Mondays on VH1.

The Price of Beauty follows Jessica and her two BFFs, Cacee Cobb (Jess’s assistant and current girlfriend of Murray from Clueless) and Ken Paves (Jess’s hair stylist), as they travel around the world and find out about what makes women beautiful in different cultures. In this episode, they went to Thailand. I could really do without all of the scenes showing how silly Jessica is—freaking out during her Thai massage, giggling during meditation with a monk, drawing attention to her sensible high heels. And OF COURSE when the Thai model walks in, the first thing they all say is, "You're so beautiful!"…again proving models are prettier than anyone else. And also, I don’t get the point of the show. Isn’t skin bleaching in Thailand similar to the chemical peels that women in the US get? And gold neck rings are accessories that mess up your body, soooo…basically, they’re the same as stilettos or corsets, right? I think the idea of the show could work if Jessica took some non-celebrity, “non-gorgeous” people with her, and through their travels of seeing everything, they could all start to feel better about themselves. Three rich, famous, and pretty people going on a trip with cameras doesn't really prove anything to me.