The Stupidity of Youth

Recently, Miley Cyrus has come under fire for the way she has been dressing and behaving and looking and singing and dancing and breathing and existing.  People say she's "too sexy" for her age, that she is trying to "be sexy" instead of just being natural and age appropriate.  Which, right away, tells me that no one in the media thinks that Miley Cyrus is really attractive, because if she puts on eyeliner, the headlines scream about how hard she's trying.

That being said, I watched her new video, "Can't Be Tamed, But Can Shriek," and immediately called animal control to return her to the wild.  If you missed it, here it is:



The most recent kerfuffle has to do with this outfit, which she wore to perform:

(Just for perspective, here's a picture of Britney Spears at the same age:

)

Miley's outfit?  For a 17-year-old?  I don't see the problem, frankly.  I think the video is awful, but the sick green leotard is just a leotard.  I don't see the problem.  (And, for the record, most of my objection to the video is that it is terrible music accompanied by a terrible video from someone with very little talent who has been mass marketed to the point that children are being conditioned to like her regardless of what she produces.  Not that I have a strong opinion about that.)  Okay, so Miley "defended" herself via this statement:

"I always tell people, everyone goes through a bad point in their life and makes bad choices. But they just haven't been published and it hasn't been documented and (published) on the Internet.


You can see how that would drive people crazy. I would like to see you at 21 and video that and put
that out there for people to comment on,"

So, apparently, Miley's current media strategy is to do stupid things, and then say that she should be allowed to be stupid because young people are stupid, so stop paying attention to all of these things I'm doing to get attention!  Because everyone does stupid things intentionally!  Seriously, Miley is trying to say that the deliberate, business-driven choices she is making with a committee of handlers is the same as a 20-year-old getting wasted at a frat party and waking up with a headache the next day.  Guess what, Miley: most people who make stupid choices in their teens and twenties don't know they are being stupid!  They make those choices because they are stupid, not because they think they are entitled to be.

So compare Miley, who is defending her right to be stupid with calculated, attention-getting stupidity, with this painfully stupid young superstar:

Her name, my friends, is Ke$ha.  Yes, her name has a dollar sign in it, which is classy with a capital K.  This Autotune diva recently made an appearance on Saturday Night Live in which it became painfully obvious that she is utterly without any irony to temper the complete ridiculousness of her "talent."  I once entertained the possibility that she was, perhaps, being awful with a little wink, that it was a Lady Gaga-like commentary on the trashiness of celebrity.  No, as it turns out, Ke$ha is completely earnest.  Look at her two performances from Saturday Night Live, each of which are brimming with avant-garde-like flourishes coupled with the most inane pop music since Tiffany:





(The fan-made tags on Hulu, by the way, include phrases like "would rather be blinded by battery acid; talenteless, worst thing ever," and some that could be considered hurtful.)

It's one thing to be young and stupid.  It's another thing to be young and stupid enough to believe that the adults around you telling you to be stupid have your best interests at heart.  Poor Miley.  Poor Ke$ha.  Poor all of us.