A friend sent me the link for an interesting article in Stuff.co.nz today:
The author asked directly a group of young girls about what they thought of Miley Cyrus’s MTV performance. I think is very interesting to hear their point of view on this and what I can read in this article is not much different from the comments I am reading in my participants’ Facebook wall (all girls 10-13 years old)
Their reaction is very well expressed through an old video of Hanna Montana spotted on my FB wall and apparently gone viral among youngsters these days: don’t forget to read the comments, it’s quite illuminating…
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=535714613149558&set=vb.431851636869190&type=2&theatre
My personal impression from talking to young girls directly but also from researching, reading their comments of different forums, social networks and Facebook pages is that most of them are incredibly grounded and maintain a level-head attitude regarding the constant bombardment of sexualised material: it ‘s becoming so normal that I am wondering if all this emphasis the media and celebrity culture put on sex would one day reach the point of having the opposite effect on our children: maybe they’ll get bored out of their heads to see it – completely desensitised – and nothing will really shock them any more, however sexually explicit it might be!
The article made me realise that often adults have their pre-conceptions regarding how young girls (or children more in general) would be influenced or react to certain material, so in many instances talking to them is not enough…we should really learn to LISTEN more 😉
I think the behavior of MIley Cyrus is completely disgusting. Did anyone ask her to be a role model any more? NO! Should she still pretend to be today’s top news? NO, again. The only reason we keep seeing this kind of stuff glamorized is because we watch it over and over again. From Miley Cyrus and her lewd behavior to MTV glamorizing teen pregnancy, it all needs to stop or the world will go farther into the sewer.
What children were allowed to see this debacle in the first place? Parenting should start in the home and the parents should know what their children are watching and what MTV and these other channels teach their kids. As far as Miley, she’s an absolute train wreck and I don’t know who is worse, her or her fan base that worships this mess. They will have a daughter one day and they will realize just how awful these kind of actions really are and how hurtful they can be to a young child’s psyche.
Parenting as a whole needs to be taken a lot more seriously. Both the parents and kids need ongoing education and do their own research on topics like this but unfortunately many of the parents were never ready. They end up in no better a position to comment on the problems than the kids. However, it is true that often these kids are smarter than we give them credit and they do make their own decisions more often than not. Why take risks though?
I happened to see Miley Cyrus on the Barbara Walters “most intriguing people” special last night, and it was hard to watch. She doesn’t sound intelligent or thoughtful in the least. It would be nice if the news media could find young women “intriguing” who are doing interesting writing, visual art, etc. I feel like the popularity of a lot of young female artists is based on their ability to be provocative in a sexualized way (I think this was behind Katy Perry’s rise to fame, too, for example).