On Friday, paparazzi photographed Lourdes Leon, Madonna's 15-year-old daughter, smoking a cigarette. This led to a media freakout. The Daily Mail noted, "The legal age for smoking in America is 18," while Gather News asked, "Is Mom a bad influence?"
The "Today" show even featured a whole segment on the matter, complete with an expert talking about how tobacco damages the teenage brain.
Meanwhile, elsewhere in arguably scandalous "news," let's talk about mother Madonna, who's quite openly been talking about ecstasy to promote her new album, "MDNA," (which is out today) — but is not getting any prime morning television coverage for it.
That title is a reference to MDMA, the drug ecstasy is made of. She even told Jay Leno on his show "MDNA" was indeed partially a reference to the drug, which she said creates "euphoric feelings of love." (It is also, perhaps more obviously, a reference to DNA.)
And then over the weekend she made a surprise appearance at Ultra Music Festival in Miami, the electronic dance music extravaganza that is pretty closely associated with party drugs, ecstasy in particular. When Madonna came on stage to introduce headliner Avicii, she was even more direct in her discussion of the drug, shouting, "HOW MANY PEOPLE IN THIS CROWD HAVE SEEN MOLLY?" (For the naïve among you, "Molly" is another nickname for MDMA/ecstasy.) She then proceeded to not perform, but just bop around next to Avicii in his DJ booth.
The diva is surely trying to appeal to a younger, dance music-obsessed crowd – both with her EDM-inflected new music and taste for controversy. And she seems to think that showing she's cool with party drugs will allow her to win over Avicii fans, which might very well be the case. As a friend who saw her at Ultra put it, "It was like she was trying to convince everyone that she had a reason to be there."
But when you're Madonna, do you even need one?
