A Semi Nude Cyrus Pose
A furore has errupted over a photo of 15-year-old singer and actress Miley Cyrus (daughter of Billy Ray) posing seductively with only a sheet draped on her naked body, taken by renowned photographer Annie Leibowitz for Vanity Fair magazine. When the images surfaced many were outraged, while others, including celebrities Tyra Banks and Rosie O’Donnell, defended the starlet.
I don’t think the photo is particularly raunchy, in fact it’s quite tasteful…for an 18-plus-year-old, that is.
But even if Cyrus was not still a child, what does nudity (or the allusion to it) have to do with music?
If anything, the incident highlights the differences between the commercial music industry and the alternative one.
I doubt the girls from alternative pop outfits Operator Please or Bridezilla would do the Cyrus pose, and they’re at least a couple of years older.
Unfortunately for Cyrus, her path seems to be imitating that of fallen pop icon Britney Spears, who very early in her career had to juggle a squeaky clean image with an overly-sexualised appearance.
People are quick to criticise Spears’ every blunder, but perhaps her trainwreck image could have been avoided if she didn’t live in a society where sex sells records.
The first song she released at age 17, with the sexually-suggestive title (Hit me) Baby One More Time, went multi-platinum and won a Teen Choice Award for best single.
Young girls need role models who are willing to contest the music industry’s expectation to be sexy. They need idols who are age-appropriate, clever, and of course loads of fun.
At the time of writing this blog, Britney Spears’ locked Wikipedia page had been hacked and vandalised. It was empty but for two words “crazy whore”. Let’s hope Miley doesn’t encounter the same fate.
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
Comments
No comments yet.
Leave a comment