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'I Feel Your Hearts': Britney Spears Thanks The #FreeBritney Movement For ‘Freeing’ Her
Britney Spears, whose father was removed as overseer of her finances, gave thanks for her squad of online supporters.
Pop icon Britney Spears is thanking the #FreeBritney movement for helping her in her fight to break free of her conservatorship.
“#FreeBritney movement … I have no words … because of you guys and your constant resilience in freeing me from my conservatorship … my life is now in that direction !!!!!” Spears, 39, posted on Instagram on Monday. "I cried last night for two hours cause my fans are the best and I know it … I feel your hearts and you feel mine … that much I know is true !!!!!”
Last week marked one of the most significant changes in the “Overprotected” singer’s battle to end her conservatorship. Los Angeles Judge Brenda Penny suspended Spears’ dad Jamie Spears, 69, as conservator of his daughter’s estate on Wednesday. This is the first time since 2008 that he will not have control over major parts of his daughter's life and career.
The ruling came after Britney Spears' lawyer Mathew Rosengart told Penny that Jamie Spears was “a cruel, toxic, abusive man” and that Britney needed to be released from him immediately. The ruling is not subject to appeal.
Since 2009, a cluster of Britney’s fans began vocally opposing her conservatorship, fearing that she was being exploited and controlled. The group was often portrayed as conspiracy theorists, fixating on social media posts from Spears' accounts they thought were coded attempts to communicate her desire to get out from under the conservatorship arrangement, as US Magazine reported earlier this year. Whether Spears was writing coded messages or not, it soon became clear that she was unhappy with living under the yoke of the conservatorship. Court documents obtained by the New York Times showed that Britney had been having issues about the arrangement, and her father's fitness to oversee it, for years.
In June, Britney spoke out publicly, accusing her father of conservatorship abuse in a public hearing. She told the court that at one point during the 13 years since the conservatorship had been established, she had been placed in a psychiatric hold against her will while her family did nothing. She also alleged that she was forced to perform live against her will, take lithium, and was told she could not get her IUD removed. Since that hearing, the pressure for her father to resign began to mount both on social media and in the courtroom. After Britney Spears was permitted in July to finally hire her own attorney, she quickly filed for her father's removal, which was approved by Judge Penny last week.
“Britney is free,” Erin Lee Carr, director of “Britney vs Spears,” one of several recent documentaries about the conservatorship, tweeted as a response to the ruling.
Rosengart, Spears' attorney, said in court last week that he will be investigating Jamie’s actions for the next 30 to 45 days while a temporary conservator replaces him as conservator of the estate. Following that, a court review of the conservatorship, and possible termination, is expected. The hearing for the possible dissolution of the conservatorship is expected to occur by Nov. 12.
