Poor Little Hannah Montana

By sovknight | April 28, 2008

This post started out innocently as nothing more than a comment on a fellow blogger’s post, but the subject enrages me so that I just had to create my own blog about it.

Here’s what I wrote in the comment:

I have to comment on this, because it’s been rattling around in my brain today and I need an outlet. First of all, I respect Annie Liebowitz like no other. She’s as good as it gets when it comes to what she does, and I’m quite certain… even without seeing them, that that pictures she took of little Hannah Montana are artistic and beautiful. Second, there are a lot of haters out there bashing Annie and the magazine about this. Let me remind them:

1. Miley is 15, so her parents/guardian (in this case, Billy Ray) HAD to be present AND APPROVE any poses or wardrobe used.
2. Said pictures HAD to have been not only viewed, but signed off on by Miley and Billy Ray (as her guardian) before they could be published.
3. Miley, Billy Ray, and Annie all knew EXACTLY what they were doing.

This whole thing smacks of nothing more than propaganda designed solely to increase readership. It wouldn’t surprise me if this was all set up in advance.

Since writing that post, I looked up this picture (it was in the very first Google hit on the page) and checked it out. People, come one. You have to be kidding me.

Now, I’m not a big perv. I don’t look a child porn and I think it’s rather odd that someone would be in any way aroused by sexual pictures of little kids. I find it distasteful. However, the picture in question of little Miss Cyrus is NOT EVEN REMOTELY erotic, scandalous, or even particularly all that noteworthy. It just shows her wrapped in a sheet glancing over her shoulder at the camera. You can see her bare back, but that’s it. She’s not topless (she’s covered by a sheet), and nothing about the picture suggests anything sexual at all. Actually, if I have to describe it, she looks more like she just woke up and someone caught her with a camera sitting up in bed.

The real problem here is not Miley or Billy Ray or Annie Liebowitz. The problem is people’s misunderstanding of what is dirty or shameful. People label this as child porn without having any idea what pornography really is. Just for the record, naked women or men is not pornography. Porn involved acts of a sexual or erotic nature that may or even may not involve nudity. These pictures have NONE of those qualities. I’ll tell you though, you know what’s offensive to me? How many pictures of naked babies do you see? Lots, I’d be willing to bet. You might argue, “Naked babies aren’t erotic or provocative. They aren’t being used to sell things.” Bullshit. True, naked babies aren’t erotic or provocative, but then neither is that picture of Miley Cyrus. And I see naked babies in advertising all the time. Don’t tell me they’re not used for selling things. You aren’t offended by seeing a 1 year-old bare-assed in a diaper ad, but a pretty 16 year-old who is fully covered bothers you?  Just so you know, naked babies are not cute.  At all.

I’ll go back a little bit on what I’m saying. Miley Cyrus is a phenomenon and the most popular thing going right now in the pop music biz. Doing a photo shoot for Vanity Fair is a way to bolster that popularity, and showing a somewhat risque-ish shot guarantees publicity. I’ll reiterate what I said in the above comment though. The whole lot of them knew exactly what they were doing when they did this. They knew exactly the kind of controversy this would stir up and I’d be willing to bet they planned it all along. Take picture, publish article, stir up debate, have subject apologize saying she’s all “embarrassed”, even though she knew full well what the picture looked like and what people would think, and then sit back and rake in the cash.

It was planned I tell you. Oh, and as far as Miley being “embarrassed” by the picture? Yeah… whatever. Miley and Billy Ray are laughing and probably looking forward to the mountains of money on top of the mountains they already have.

Oh, and here’s something to chew on. What you see in this picture depends completely on your own mindset. If you see some pedophilia-inducing trash, then you might want to stop and think about your perception of the world and exactly what it means to have even thought that, you perv. Personally, I see a tasteful picture of a girl.