Thursday, August 29, 2013

Is the USA Twerking its future away?


Like many others who have commented on Miley Cyrus’ VMA performance this past weekend I too have some deep concerns; however, those concerns do not run in the same vein as the supposed news mavens, YouTube gurus and etiquette pundits. What currently passes for “expert” opinion on Ms. Cyrus’ performance is devoted to the “how could such a good girl go so wrong?” school of criticism technique.  After all, she was a “Disney product”, pure as “Ivory soap”.  Did you see those hip movements?  They were so sexually suggestive! The dancing; wait a minute!, what dancing? That was exhibitionism!  Miley found a way to out Madonna Madonna! Who does she think she is, prancing around in her underwear?  And the people in the audience, did you see them, with mouths gapping wide.... a true OMG moment! Did your kids see this?  What are we to tell them now? Fourteen and fifteen year olds grew up wanting to be just like Hannah Montana.   Oh, woe are we!

I have a few choice questions and comments for those who have offered their surface criticism of Miley Cyrus over the past week: Where the heck have you people been for the last 20 years?  What rock have you been sleeping under that you could not see the potential of such a performance as was given by Miley on the MTV, VMA Awards show? Have you not heard of popular music stars such as Nicki Minaj, Snoop Dogg, Dr. Dre, Britney Spears, Lady Gaga, Beyonce, etc.?  Relative to modern day video music selections of the same hip hop genre, what in Ms Cyrus' performance or the performances of those who danced and sang with her surprised you?  Have you no awareness of the depths to which American music, culture and character has sunk?  How many of you have gone to a dance featuring songs with far worse lyrics and grinded the night away?  If we are all so oblivious to the world around us how could a “hit song” by Lady Gaga called “Pokerface” get over 162 million hits on YouTube? What a bunch of hypocrites we are becoming! If we were to hold a mirror up in the face of our society would we see the strong faces that made this nation? Or the loving ones who helped to raise us and thought we held such promise?  Or even the person we once were who dreamed great things, held inside hoping for that one break or wonderful moment when we could let our light shine?

On August the 27th, the day after the real firestorm surrounding the Miley Cyrus VMA performance hit, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) published an Op-Ed piece by journalist Juan Williams at the bottom of page A15.  The article was entitled: “Songs of the Summer of 1963 …and 2013”

( http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324619504579028691595414868.html) The article juxtaposed the aura of those folk songs so filled with hope, longing for justice and faith in the future, surrounding and accompanying Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech held on August 28, 1963 with the current genre of hip-hop selections that are filled with sex, violence, bigotry and greed. For examples of the lyrics of the time in 1963, Mr. Williams refers to the songs of Bob dylan, Joan Baez, Woody Guthrie, Johnny Cash, Sam Cooke, Curtis Mayfield and the vocal group Peter, Paul and Mary.  The WSJ  Op-Ed article is well worth reading if you have not already done so.  And, it goes a long way to explaining how far we have come from that day in 1963 to this past weekend when Miley Cyrus was led into a production for the VMAs that was at once both an affront to common decency and the epitome of the “the best” that our egocentric,  jaded,  entertainment-driven culture is capable of producing.   We have become a nation of schizophrenics fully aware of the damage we do through our base treatments of others yet craving all the more excess and hyperbole.   That is why the same pundits that castigate Miley Cyrus for her actions at the VMA show this year will probably find themselves at some nightspot this weekend grinding the night away to the sound of Lil Wayne as he croons about “hoes” and bitches”.  That is also why we all need to seriously rethink the direction of our culture and our society. 

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