Letters to the Editor
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Agreed: I'm not seeing the big deal
Maybe I'm missing something (only seeing the wrong photo or what not), but that "topless" photo of Miley Cyrus seems more "girl with the pearl earring" than "scandalous sex kitten." Ah well, I'm out of touch with the Hannah Montana phenomenon, so who am I to judge.
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Spring and All
The pure products of America
go crazy --
And they follow the same trajectory: think Britney, Cristina, Scarlett. First the covertly sexualized icon of innocence, then the protestations of continuing innocence amid the mounting evidence to contrary, then the sexual object tout court. Let's just call it the market.
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The pose with daddy is a little weird
All in all, they are stupid to think nothing would come of this photo shoot, working for Disney.
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Leibovitz
I love Annie Leibovitz's work... she does incredible portraits that are sometimes a little shocking (her trademark I believe)but are undeniably beautiful. Miley should be proud that she was photographed by Leibovitz who will still be regonized as one of america's great artists long after Miley is a hasbeen with a couple ex husbands and a string of unsuccessful comebacks behind her.
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Art?
The Annie Leibovitz picture is indeed artistic and classy, if simply so. However, there's a kind of post-coital exhaustion that is meant to be represented in that shot (the tussled hair, the satin sheet over the naked body, the firetruck-red lipstick) that had a man taken Ms. Hepola would have been crying child rape.
As to her other photos, they certainly don't look like they were taken with a cellphone, however they look like every other teenage girl's photos of her and her boyfriend. certainly there is a staid immaturity to them that makes them easily dismissable as any other LOL! OMG!!! photos taken by any other teenage girl in America.
But with Leibovitz's shot there is an intent at representing the subject in a salacious light, almost as a 19th century Parisian prostitute not entirely outside of an Edouard Manet painting. That the parent of a young girl would feel uncomfortable by it is not so easily dismissed.
FYI I am not the parent of a young girl, so am not so outraged by it, but I could see where they're coming from.
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I wish people would back off
I've been seeing headlines for a week about Miley "showing her bra" and "laying back across a boy's lap with her top pulled up."
The fact is, if any other teenager took pictures like that, it would be perfectly ordinary. So she has a decorative bra that's meant to be seen outside her clothes - big fucking deal. So she has a boyfriend and she lounges around on him and her shirt rides up a little. That's normal behavior. It's not even PG rated. Why are people treating this gal like she did a full beaver spread in Penthouse?
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Hannah Montana
The photo was not bad, but the Hannah Montana show is stupid. It teaches girsl be mindless and do stupid tings. My 6 year old grand daughter watches. I have banned it at my house.
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Parental discussion will have greater impact than the incident itself
Teenage girls who look up to Hannah Montana will have to come to terms with sexuality, sexism, feminism, and all the other controversies related to womanhood, someday. Who better than Miley Cyrus to bring up these discussions?
Perhaps this was not the best way to bring up these subjects, but I suspect the parents that are most outraged are the ones who are least likely to present these important discussions on their own.
The way parents discuss the Miley Cyrus controversy with their daughters will have a greater effect on their development (for better or for worse) than the controversy itself.
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We have to sexualize then humiliate her to death so we can have a good corn crop next year.
Don't you people watch South Park? Geez.
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Right on, Sarah
I agree with everything you said, about Miley, about Liebovitz.
But Miley doesn't seem to be "stupid" to me. She's just a normal 15-year-old, as normal as can be considering she's famous.
Her show isn't bad either (which I watch with my 10-year-old daughter). And it's nice to see a southern white kid being embraced by kids as cool, instead of as stereotypically stupid, uneducated and racist.
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outrage
the uproar is over the photo of her back and shoulders? gosh so many things to say i don't know where to begin.
talk about a confusing cultural landscape when it comes to sexualized teenaged girls. putting on a short skirt and midriff baring top and jumping up and down with pom poms is all-american and ok. going to the beach and presumably showing far more than the shoulders and back? also ok. ads depicting women under eighteen modeling clothing made for adults, and showing more than miley cyrus: ok.
but if you're a "wholesome" role model for tweens, showing your back in a photograph taken by arguably one of the most important photographers of the twentieth and twenty first centuries, however...not ok.
the uproar, if indeed there really is any, is misplaced. instead of blaming miley cyrus and her back, perhaps we should blame ourselves for having dirty thoughts about about fifteen year old girl. after all, is it her fault if she is sexualized by the viewer by showing her BACK?
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No one talks about the "other" other photo
I think the photo causing all the uproar is beautiful and I hope Miley is proud of it in 15 years. The bra photos - well, everyone does stupid things at 15 and I am sooooo glad I was a teenager before camera phones. But no one is commenting on the photo of Miley and her dad that is part of the VF spread. I found that photo to be a bit, well, odd. Why on earth would you photograph a father/daughter with sort of sexualized pouts? I just am not sure what message is supposed to come across from that picture. Has anyone seen any comment about that one from anyone invovled in the shoot or the magazine?
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Have to agree
I don't see what all the fuss is about. She's 15, not 8. And she comes from a Hollywood family and has been on a stage for many years -- she's no dummy, and she's no angel. Good for her for having sexy photos, honestly. Everyone acts like 15 is some sort of prelapsarian age... it's not for most people.