Cirque du Inconduite
An admitted dolt in the realm of pop culture, I am not one to devote two hours of my innately fickle attention to a show that awards celebrities for their societal merit, and MTV’s Video Music Awards are definitely no exception. But when the chaos of the proceedings catch the attention of my boyfriend, the diners seated next to us at Phở Show, and the old lady who rings a loud bell as she pushes her cart of purchasable goods down our street every day, I figure there’s no use fighting the tide of insignificant viral knowledge and succumbing to a few recaps. Specifically, the award ceremony’s shocking crème de la crème in the form of Miley Cyrus.
In keeping with the pop culture ignorance that replaced the actor idolatry of my youth, I don’t really know anything about Miley Cyrus beyond the fact that she used to wear a wig on TV and mesmerize kids with a proclivity for hero worship; those of us wrought with country music ineptitude consider her father an achy-breaky one hit wonder; she starred in some movie filmed on Tybee Island while I attended class completely unawares only 18 miles away; she may or may not have married the arguably less attractive Hemsworth brother; and her sexually suggestive shenanigans have been curdling PTA member’s breakfast milk for the past several years of her waning adolescence. On top of all that, I know that she’s the same age as my younger sister–born only a few days prior–and having been around both my sister’s crew and whole troops of them back in my college days, I know how 20 year olds act, and can only imagine how the constant accompaniment of a blinding limelight would amplify said behavior.
Thus, I find it hilarious that a celebrity like Miley Cyrus can get so much opprobrium for parading around in feigned nudity and conducting lewd, embarrassingly uncoordinated dance moves during her VMA performance, but the backup dancers who successively march out to the beat of a sex-driven drum in cliché, skin-tight spandex can go virtually unnoticed. Yeah, yeah, Miley Cyrus was a child role model–I remember how excited my young cousins were to unwrap Hannah Montana paraphernalia at Christmas. But we sure are quick to forget that Britney Spears was a Mickey Mouse Club member (along with Justin Timblerlake and his jheri curls) whose first album beguiled the nation’s youngins, and look where she ended up–a fact that Trey Parker and Matt Stone already equated to Miley Cyrus long before this public debacle. Is this recurrent trend not a blatant sign that we as a society keen on the scandals splayed across People Magazine are culpable for the shocking behaviors of our young icons? If we weren’t a species akin to the Ashleys of Recess fame (crying, “Scaaaandalous!” at the slightest inkling of amorality), then those young superstars we love to distract our kids with might keep their pants on for a change.
As it is, pop culture has always been a game of one-upping the last controversy to obtain some free publicity. You need to be brash to sell tickets to a society that claims to have seen it all, and if standing out means upsetting the mothers who once called you adorable, then by God, the increased attention is worth a clumsy attempt at half-nude twerking. Especially when your competition operates under the moniker “Gaga,” serves as a gay bar icon second only to Cher, and constructs her public persona from Madonna hand-me-downs, Harajuku fashion, and what must have been the deranged visions of an acid trip.
Ironically, the polls say young Miss Cyrus and her unremitting penis innuendos trumped Lady Gaga’s bug-eyed, postmodern nun, Bauhaus-ish choreography, and tacky shell bikini, a feat that even Madonna herself couldn’t pull off when she abandoned the hippie phase that produced Ray of Light, filled in her gap, donned a faux British accent, and attempted to regain popularity by enlisting the aid of M.I.A., Nicki Minaj, and some pompoms. Misinformation or not, however, according to The Slatest, Lady Gaga still managed to perturb Will Smith’s family with the nutty schtick the masses are beginning to deem passé, so perhaps there’s hope for her next public stunt yet.
Overall, the whole Video Music Awards ordeal is a silly affair sprung from a Victorian era affinity for scandal. We the people of the United States of Rabble-Rousing fuel the raunchy flames of fame crazed twenty-somethings by making a big fuss over behaviors that attention-seeking young adults conduct for small beer pong audiences on a weekly basis. The controversy we engender is the coal that keeps this monkey train rolling. Lose the voracious appetite for muckraking, and maybe we won’t have to watch girls the same age as our little sisters defile the innocence of teddy bears and #1 foam fingers with their bad dance moves and flesh-tinted ensembles.
EMILY MOON 