The Hannah Montana Ticket Crisis: Let’s Blame The Internet!

jharv | September 18, 2007 10:00 am
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So apparently that scalper/broker-fueled Hannah Montana concert sell-out in Florida was not an isolated incident. The Houston Chronicle reports that tickets are disappearing within seconds across the country thanks to…unscrupulous Internet types! (We’re just no good, people.) With the draconian touring schedule that Disney has imposed upon thankfully-just-over-the-Child-Labor-Law-cutoff Miley Cyrus, repeat gigs in the same town are apparently impossible, and adults have been forced to make potentially life-changing decisions in order to keep their spoiled spawn happy. One of many (literally) sad tales from America’s parents is after the jump:

Among parents dismayed by the fast Houston sellout and subsequent price gouging is Sandra Isget of Groveton. Having promised her 8-year-old son she’d get tickets, she wound up paying $629 for two seats to a Bossier City, La., show via Ticket Exchange, a service of Ticket Master, which allows fans to sell or buy among each other.

“I didn’t trust eBay, because you don’t know who those people are,” Isget said.

Now she’s having buyer’s remorse.

“It was supposed to be something light-hearted and fun, and it’s turned into something more expensive than our monthly mortgage,” Isget said. “My son has no knowledge of us going into credit-card debt to get the tickets. I thought it would be worth it — that it would compensate for my own mental anguish — but it leaves me with such a bad feeling. I’d promised him. How far am I willing to go to keep that promise. If I refused, that only hurts him.”

Uhhh…he’s eight years old. If he even remembers this concert by the time he’s a pube-‘stached 13–having rotted his brains out from too much huffed glue/stolen domestic beer after he’s manned up and switched from Disney teenpop starlets to rap and/or metal–I will personally refund this woman her $629 adjusted for inflation. (Provided I can find her since I imagine she and her family will be living on the streets of Louisiana thanks to buying little Billy a pet alpaca rather than paying their mortgage.) Maura thinks that this Montana ticket debacle spells “the last gasp of My Super Sweet 16 culture.” Me? I’m just remembering my broke-ass parents reverting to some sort of primal/feral state while trying to claw a stray Cabbage Patch Kid during the Christmas rush and thinking that our culture could use a stern matron to tell it to clam up and be happy with whatever leisure culture it can actually afford.

How Much Would You Pay For Hannah Montana Tickets? [Houston Chronicle]