Chris Brown: Friggin Idiot

Seeing the tease for the now legendary Chris Brown interview this morning on "Good Morning America" I thought to myself, "Why?"

Sure, he has an album coming out this week. So does Jennifer Hudson (who was on GMA yesterday). So does Panic! At the Disco and The Strokes. So that's not the criteria for booking him.

The song he performed on GMA today was released LAST October and peaked on the US charts at No. 15. So, having a big hit song wasn't the criteria for his appearance.

I would have to contend that the producers on GMA know that for most of their viewing audience, Chris Brown is known as "that singer who beat up Rihanna". Booking him instead of other acts with albums coming out, or acts with big hit songs indicates that though that tale might be two years old, it still resonates with GMA's audience.

Anyone who has seen the photos of a swollen, bruised, bitten Rihanna will not forget them nor will they likely take lightly the amount of pure animal rage that must have transpired that night.

Chris Brown is a man made front-page famous not by his musical talent or acting chops but by his very public meltdowns. Beating up Rihanna right before the Grammys, weeping on his knees at the Michael Jackson tribute during which he vowed "I let y'all down before, but I won't do it again...I promise" and now this violent tantrum.

Following the altercation with Rihanna, he famously stated that the scope of his actions left him "...in shock, because, first of all, that's not who I am as a person, and that's not who I promise I want to be."

Perhaps he is forgetting that who he is as a person is less about who he wants to be, or wants to be perceived to be, and can rather be almost totally summed up by the actions he takes, the words he speaks...in short who you are is what you do.

During the interview this morning with Robin Roberts, who pushed him for comment on Rihanna and his continuing legal issues (Brown is still on probation for the incident) Brown said "It's not really a big deal to me now, as far as that situation. I think I'm past that in my life."

Fair enough, however it is ENDLESSLY ironic that he then proceeded to reportedly scream, tear apart a dressing room, throw an object through a window and get into a verbal altercation with a GMA producer then rip off his shirt and storm out of the building.

Yeah, he's past it.

As far as his pleas that "this album is what I want (people) to talk about and not stuff that happened two years ago" his outburst not only revived chatter about his bad temper and resurrected questions about his mental state but also arguably completely erased any goodwill he had built up with the general public. He walked onto the GMA set as Chris Brown, looking for a comeback, come on and give the kid a chance and walked off a shirtless, livid, screaming, window smashing angry young man. So much for that second chance.

For someone who claims to have worked so hard to put the past behind him, mature and learn from his mistakes, Brown seems to have fallen back into his "old ways" very swiftly.

It is more likely that he would like to rehabilitate his public image without actually rehabilitating the character defects which earned him his current reputation as a dangerous, violent, loose cannon.

He speaks like the Wizard of Oz to Dorothy after the curtain has been pulled back, revealing the true nature of the Great and Powerful Oz

"Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!"

Brown would prefer to leave those curtains drawn, shelter the truth about himself from the public and possibly even from himself. Then he could go on with the pretense of being a changed man despite the very public announcement he made this morning that he's not so different after all from the boy who beat and bit a woman he claimed to have loved.

Perhaps now that his true nature has been revealed his family, friends and handlers will step in and ensure that he does get the assistance he needs instead of allowing him to go through the motions.