By now you have probably seen the Vanity Fair photo of Miley Cyrus taken by famed photographer Annie Leibovitz. The Hannah Montana star is lying in bed, hair tousled, a thin bed sheet covering her breasts. The big question: Is this wrong?
The answer my dear readers is yes. It is appalling. Miley is 15 years old and clearly being sexualized and exploited to sell magazines, much in the way that a 15 year old Brooke Shields was used to sell Calvin Klein jeans. It's the most alluring of all taboos: Innocence corrupted, the virgin whore dichotomy.
But the difference between Miley and Brooke is that while Brooke was famous for her looks and marketed towards adults to build her career, Miley's celebrity is based on her musical ability and catered specifically to children. She is a role model for young girls and her posing like this is not only confusing, but lends the message that this is okay.
Miley has issued an apology to her fans, but her family and handlers were all present at the shoot and allowed this to happen. Miley is even quoted as saying, "Annie took, like, a beautiful shot, and I thought it was really cool..I think it’s really artsy. It wasn’t in a skanky way.”
Lets overlook the fact that it's completely false that beauty=art and art=beauty and view this from that perspective. You still get the same gut reaction: A young girl half naked, vulnerable, exposed and sexualized. She is being fed on.
Disney spokeswoman, Patti McTeague, has come forward and said "a situation was created to deliberately manipulate a 15-year-old in order to sell magazines." And she is right. But considering that Miley Cyrus sells big with the teen market, which is not included in Vanity Fair's target demographic, it's just grossly taking advantage of someone.
Look at what happened to Britney Spears, whose talent at 16 was dressed up in a catholic schoolgirl outfit. Will Miley have the same fate?
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