What Miley Cyrus Says About Us

Here we are, a month removed from the VMA performance that shook a nation. Before Miley Cyrus did her infamous phallic-foam-finger dance, we had a federal government; clearly, times have changed. Like the pop-culture addict I am, I’ve been following the saga of Miley Cyrus’s artistic development with bated breath (and hoping against hope that if she grows her hair out again, the Tea Party will agree to a budget and we can reopen the national parks). After thinking about it for longer than any person should ever think about the star of a Disney Channel Original Series, I’ve come to the conclusion that Miley is a total mystery. But our reaction to Miley, that’s another story. Here’s what we can learn from the way we think about Miley Cyrus:

One: We’re so confused about sexuality.

If the media puts the word “sex” in front of something, we’ll respond accordingly, without thinking much about what exactly we’re reacting to.Although she was dressed provocatively, it only occurred to me recently that most of what Miley Cyrus has been doing lately isn’t actually sexy at all. “If I was trying to be sexy, I could have been sexy,” she said of her VMA performance in a recent Rolling Stone profile. As far as she’s concerned, running around dressed up like a teddy bear and licking things not, in fact, the pinnacle of sex appeal. Her VMA routine was more of a grotesque parody of sexuality than the pornographic nightmare everyone was talking about the next day (although it’s not clear how much of that parody was intentional).

Nonetheless, the nation responded as though we’d all watched that one scene in Black Swan together. We literally have no idea what’s actually attractive to us. If the media puts the word “sex” in front of something, we’ll respond accordingly, without thinking much about what exactly we’re reacting to.

Of course, the foam finger thing didn’t help.

Two: Men tend to get a free pass.

Miley Cyrus’s VMA performance elicited over 150 FCC complaints, which generally refer to the sexually explicit elements of the show (“She made multiple very indecent sexual poses and gestures, from grabbing her crouch, using a foam finger like a dildo, and licking the butt of a stuff bear,” reads one). It should be surprising that so few of these complaints mention Robin Thicke, the man on whom Miley was grinding, a man whose biggest hit refers to the “blurred lines” of consent. The ones that do refer to him generally only mention his participation in passing, making a point to condemn Cyrus’s “lewd and lascivious shenanigans” outright.

More recently, Miley Cyrus had a photo shoot with notable creep Terry Richardson. If you look at the whole series, you’ll see both of Miley’s nipples. Once again, news outlets are more concerned with Miley’s wrongdoing than the frankly creepy fact that these photos were taken by a 48 year old man in fake hipster glasses. “Cover your shame, girl!” says Perez Hilton about a photo where Miley’s labia are very nearly visible (I guess “shame” is another word for “vagina” these days), but few people give Terry Richardson more than an eye roll.

I’m sensing a double standard.

Three: We feel weird about cultural appropriation, but we don’t quite know how to talk about it yet.

A lot of very intelligent people have said a lot of very intelligent things about Miley Cyrus, her obsession with being “ratchet,” her use of black people as props, and cultural appropriation. I don’t have a lot to add to that conversation, except that it’s interesting to me how difficult it is to nail down what exactly constitutes appropriation.

Can someone provide me with a working definition of cultural appropriation, hopefully before Halloween? That would be incredibly useful.

Four: We can’t wait to see this blow up.

People are already googling “miley cyrus crazy” with more frequency than ever.

By defying so many of our cultural norms, Miley’s really just begging for a breakdown. We demand blood.

Even other musicians are foretelling her downward spiral. A few days ago, Sinead O’Connor wrote an open letter to Miley Cyrus that was part pep talk, part doomsday prophecy. “When you end up in rehab as a result of being prostituted, ‘they’ will be sunning themselves on their yachts in Antigua, which they bought by selling your body and you will find yourself very alone,” she wrote.

The story of the child-star gone crazy has been told so many times that we think we know how it ends. Hopefully, for her own sake, Miley Cyrus proves us wrong.