So by now I’m sure many of you have seen or at least heard about Joe Jonas’ article in New York magazine about what it was like growing up working on Disney channel and all the issues that came along with it. If you haven’t seen it, he talks about how closely their actions were monitored by Disney executives and the pressures they felt to be perfect. He talks about always worrying about his relationships with girls because he was afraid of getting kicked off Disney if they found out what he was up to. He also talks about how the Jonas Brothers break-up was a long-time coming: which made me wonder why they scheduled that tour in the first place..if they knew a tour was not going to work. Maybe it was a last-stitch effort to save the band?
Anyway, overall I thought the article was really interesting. One of things that stood out to me was the part where he talks about staying in a “relationship” with Demi Lovato because of the many addictions and battles she was facing that not many people knew about. He talks about wanting to break up but also not wanting to leave her alone because he felt responsible for her in a small way. I think he raised some good points about all the repercussions that come with addiction. It doesn’t just affect the person battling the abuse, it affects those close to them as well. I think this too often gets left out of the conversation when society talks about things like mental health and substance abuse. I think the conversation needs to address all sides of the story, not just some.
On a little lighter note… a lot of other Disney stars were reacting to the article, like one of the twins who played either Zack or Cody on “The suite life”: I can’t remember his name.. or which one he played but if you ask me that makes his reaction seem all the more like he’s bitter his fame didn’t last longer. He basically said that the Jonas Brothers were stupid for letting themselves be “manipulated” by Disney and he would never allow that to happen to him. I thought this was obnoxious, first because he and his brother started on Disney as little kids so there were adults helping them with everything anyways. They were too young to have to worry about being “too sexual” like Joe talks about the Jonas Brothers having to deal with. So he just sounds like he’s placing himself on a pedestal and claiming he’s so much smarter than Joe is. That annoyed me. He’s not smarter than anyone and he just sounds immature trying to bash them.
So the moral of the story? Go read Joe’s article if you haven’t because it’s interesting and form your own opinion of him, the Jonas Brothers, and what it’s like on Disney channel. I’ll say this: I definitely don’t think I could handle all that and come out as unscathed as they did.
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