Miley and the Counter-Revolution

High Culture

There were seven of us sitting around a fire at the lake, late August. Three couples, and one dear friend, recently single. Talking relationships. Two of us joked—but seriously, folks—that our wives were the men in our relationships, that we are the emotional and evolved modern men wanting to talk about our feelings and needing affection. It’s a constant joke-not-joke for many of us, men raised in the “I feel” era, men raised by women who were liberated. Men raised to respect women as our equals, but not on our terms. Vive and all that. We are the sons of a revolution, but is it a failed revolution? Is the cause lost? Have equality and liberty for women and enlightenment for men failed to take?

There is a counter-revolution going on beneath us, in the younger masses. Too many of the men/boys are embracing a mentality more befitting our great-grandfathers towards women, only minus the blind faith and work ethic, instead adding utter narcissism and access to reams of pornography. And as for these liberated women/girls, too many of them seem to feel they must pander to this objectification rather than fight the good fight of their grandmothers against it.

                For a week the entire social media and regular media world has been abuzz with the performatory pornography antics of Miley Cyrus at this year’s MTV Awards. Women’s Lib has worked hard for a half-century to create equality. Yet, here is a female entertainer who intends to show her maturity (her break from Disney, is it?) by debasing herself before the slathering masses, by showing that the only creative re-imagining she and her handlers have of her is as a tramp. It even works to endorse Robin Thicke’s much-debated misogyny, as her grinding and twerking (sigh) up against him are apparently the modern musical endorsement.

“I’d like to show my support for this artist with a good old-fashioned dry hump.”

Lady Gaga chooses to perform in a thong and the defence from many women is “I would too if I had that ass.”

That would show your creativity, would it? Your maturity as an artist, your growth as a performer? Turning yourself into just another chunk of meat to satisfy our sex-mad entertainment industry? Sad.

I’ve written before about the male side of this counter-revolution, of the Robin Thickes, the Kid Rocks, the Chris Browns. Of men who, amidst all this feeling-talk and female empowerment, choose to respond by taking two full backwards steps on the evolutionary road. They slap asses, soup up hot rods, buy guns. And where I live, they’re becoming the norm in the younger generation. Men who are not secure enough to see women as people, because they're so confused by what they're shown conflicting with what they're told.

It’s the fault of too many to isolate with a pointed finger. Men, women, young, old, you, me—we’re all to blame for this culture where an artist feels she must compete with pornography and video games on their own terms. Surely we’re better than this. And, yes, it is a far stretch to refer to Miley Cyrus as an artist, but at twenty she still stands the chance to amount to something greater than another pathetic self-degrading boy-toy. 
In writing this I know that I'm showing that the stunt worked, that the publicists who created that farce where a barely-legal in her underwear lap-danced on a man in a full (if awful) suit. I didn't see the show live, but here I am talking about it. Yep, good on ya. The shock shocked.
Fellas, young fellas, are you that stupid? Have you fallen for it, the characterization of women given by this vaudeville? C'mon boys, look at your mothers and sisters, your grandmothers. If that makes you squirm, then you need to take a good long consideration of what your idea of a woman is. Because if the image above arouses anything but bile in you, you sure as hell better need to ask what you're contributing to our forward progress.