Pamela Anderson: "I Wanted Off This Earth"

"I wanted off this earth,"

declared Pamela Anderson as she detailed a childhood of escalating sexual abuse.

*molested at age 6 by a female babysitter
*raped by a friend's boyfriend (25 y/o) at age 12
*gang-raped by 7 high school teenagers

Well, this "may" account for the promiscuity and the less-than-prudent choices she has made. And while I'm not sure this conveniently absolves her from a lifetime of questionable decisions -- nor should she care what I think -- if there's one takeaway from this, it's this:

YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT SHIT PEOPLE HAVE GONE THROUGH. 

It's ridiculously easy for people to jump in and poke fun at other people's mistakes without knowing the least bit of context. Is it really inherently human to be on the edge of your seat, eagerly awaiting a fellow human being's failure? Are our existences simply devoid of meaning that we depend on other people's downfalls to uplift our own lives? Er, maybe that's taking it too far. 

But look where she is now. She is a spokesperson for the MAC AIDS Fund and the American Liver Foundation and is an active member of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).

She just unveiled the Pamela Anderson Foundation, which will center on environmental protection and animal rights. (Launched in Cannes, in the very event in which she revealed above-mentioned sexual trauma.)

May I be struck by Zeus' thunderbolt if I were lying, but I genuinely believe she's a more beautiful person today than when she was on Baywatch and Playboy. And as Pamela Anderson-slow-motion-beach-running constitutes an integral part of my childhood, that's not something I say lightly.