What Are We Teaching Our Daughters? Take Miley Cyrus, for Example

I am quite sure that most people are over & done with hearing about Miley Cyrus' recent VMA performance. I know that I am! So I only reference it here to make a point about what we are teaching our daughters today. When my teenage daughter was a young girl, she was a huge Miley Cyrus fan. By huge, I mean that she had the backpack, bedspread & sheets, posters, CDs, clothes.....you name it, she had it. She was Miley Cyrus obsessed.

When Miley Cyrus came to San Diego to perform a few years back, it was during the time that we were having a horrible wildfire season, & practically all of Southern California was on fire to some degree, including much of San Diego & Los Angeles. There were evacuation centers set up all over the county, with San Diego's Qualcomm Stadium set up to hold thousands of people who were forced to evacuate their homes. Miley sang her heart out & interacted with the audience in such a way that everyone enjoyed themselves. It was a nice escape & happy diversion from the stress going on around us. The Jonas Brothers also came out & sang, which of course left this mother practically deaf, with a few thousand tween & teen girls screaming in her ears. Towards the end of the concert, Miley addressed the audience & said that she knew that San Diego was going through a lot with all the wildfires. She dedicated the song to our city. Her caring & concern touched everyone there, & brought a lot of tears to people's eyes, mostly to those of us deaf parents in the audience.

Miley left a positive impression on me, & I remember thinking to myself "this girl may be a celebrity, but she has a lot of maturity for her age, & she has her head on straight". Little did I know that I would have a different impression a few short years down the road. My daughter adored her then, but began to lose interest, about the time that Miley posed for the cover of Vanity Fair magazine, wearing only a sheet covering her front side & exposing her back. Miley was only fifteen at the time....the same age that my daughter is now. Somehow, even young girls can see something like this, & without a parent's disapproval toward what they are looking at, can still see it as inappropriate. 

When Miley's VMA performance became the talk of so many, from social networking sites, to blogs, to news networks & so on, people were Googling video clips to see for themselves what all the brouhaha was about. That's what I did, since I don't normally watch the VMA awards. What I saw when I watched that video, not only shocked & disgusted me, but it left me feeling sad for Miley Cyrus. My daughter had not seen the performance & told me she wasn't interested in seeing it. But when the topic came up in conversation with her friends, I heard her say that she didn't care about what Miley did or did not do, because it was frankly nobody else's business except hers & her parents'. She said that the only people who should care are Miley's parents & family, & if they don't care, then nobody else should either. 

It struck me that although the performance was disturbing to many, what my daughter said was true. The ones whose opinions actually matter, truly matter, are Miley's parents & family. But that's the part that made me sad. Her parents not only didn't seem to mind her performance, they appeared to be proud of it. Heck if my daughter were to behave like a girl auditioning to become an exotic/lap dancer, I would surely not be proud of her for that. I would send her to a convent.....& I am a Protestant, not a Catholic. I would be trying to help my daughter figure out why she would feel the need to do something so demeaning & disrespectful toward her own body, in front of millions, all for attention or publicity. Miley's behavior at the VMA awards was in stark contrast to the Vanity Fair cover photo of her wearing a sheet when she was fifteen, to which she apologized to her fans, saying that her intention was for her photo to be artistic, not inappropriate. Miley is not apologizing this time. She is not embarrassed or ashamed. She is proud of what she did, despite the vast majority of viewers being shocked & disgusted. Her parents are proud of her as well.

Say what you will, & call me a prude, but I just don't think it's healthy to see a woman, young or not, parading her body around in that manner, & putting herself in the position as being seen not as the bright, caring & head-on-straight individual I saw at her concert here in San Diego back in 2007, but rather as the girl who hasn't quite figured out who she is, & who doesn't seem to mind that others are looking at her for her body & not for her mind & personality. I wish that she could understand that there are countless men, including men old enough to be her father, who may have been shocked by what they saw, but who are now wishing she could stop by their home & give a personal performance. It's sad that her father not only has not tried to help her to see things from a man's perspective, but he basically told her that he'd have done the same thing in her shoes. She has evolved from the Disney Channel TV sensation who had the admiration of millions of tweens & teens, & whose vocal & acting abilities helped her to achieve fame, to the young woman that many men & teen boys are having sexual thoughts about. Is THIS what she wants to be known for? For twerking in front of millions & parading around like an exotic dancer (for those who don't know, the term "twerking" generally refers to the shaking of the hips in a sexually suggestive manner) & sticking her tongue out so far that it looked like she was trying to clean her ears with it? 

I'm not saying these things to be mean to Miley. I'm saying them to point out that I feel bad for her, & for anyone who follows her example, because somewhere along the road, this young woman has lost sight of what it is to respect herself enough to not engage in behavior which causes so many people to disrespect her. It's one thing to have fun (which pals of Miley say she was only "being Miley" & having fun), & to not worry about what others think. Not caring  if someone likes how you look or agrees with your personality is one thing. It means you have the self-confidence to recognize that not everyone will like you, not everyone will approve of you, & not everyone will agree with you, & that's okay. My daughter has been teaching me that it doesn't matter what others think of one's appearance. But not caring if the vast majority of people think that you are a train wreck waiting to happen & that your behavior has crossed several lines of decency to where even liberally-minded folks are shocked & disturbed......well, that just doesn't seem very healthy. It makes me sad. As a mother, I would never have allowed my daughter to pose for that Vanity Fair magazine cover. As a mother, I would have taught my daughter to respect herself enough to not put herself in a position of being made fun of & disrespected by millions of people. That's the part that makes me sad. 

One could say that Miley is an adult & she makes her own choices, & that her parents are not to blame for how she acts, but when both parents show how proud they are of her performance, even while an average of 3/4 of those in opinion polls strongly disliked it, then that shows that they are responsible for shaping her value system that says this type of disrespect for herself is acceptable & okay. Heartbreaking. She is young, she has a lot going for her, & none of that matters to anyone except for the sexual images she left with people. People won't be thinking of her talent or her good heart - the same good heart I as a parent, witnessed at her concert, a few short years ago. People won't be thinking of her compassion, or her energy & her can-do attitude. They will be thinking of gyrating hips & a lot of tongue. Have I said this is sad? Well in case you missed it, this is sad.

I don't want to only pick on Miley Cyrus though. I guess the reason why she is the one my focus is aimed at, is because so many young girls used to look up to her & aspire to be like her. On the one hand, she has let a lot of those girls down. On the other hand, there will undoubtedly be an increase in tongue photo shots with tweens/teens. It's bad enough seeing all the "duck face" photos that young girls seem to be taking these days, but I can just see it now: photo after photo, displayed on various social networking sites, with girl after girl sticking out her tongue, thinking it is sexy or fun, when in reality, it just looks ridiculous - just as the duck face photos do too ("duck face" comes from the way the lips look like a duck's bill, when pressed together in an exaggerated pouty expression). I can just see little 6-year-old girls "twerking" about, not fully knowing exactly what they are doing, but knowing that it is a popular thing to do & that they receive attention unlike any they have ever received before.

As parents, I would hope that we are teaching our daughters not to look up to the ever-so-fine examples of the Kardashian women, Lady Gaga (who is tame by comparison to Miley's recent performance), the Jersey Shore girls, & other celebrities who so many girls are drawn to. Even Taylor Swift, with her pure, girl-next-door image, is not someone I would want my daughter to aspire to be like. I do NOT want to teach my daughter that when she is no longer dating a boy, that it's okay to publicly blast him with her words. We as parents, should instead, BE the example we hope our daughters will learn from. We don't have to find some famous woman who has done many good things, for our daughters to look up to & aspire to be like. We ourselves, can model the behaviors & values we hope to see in our child. 

My mother had her faults, thankfully. I say that because I have my faults, & I am comforted in knowing that it's okay to be an imperfect parent, because a child will still turn out okay. After all, my parents weren't perfect, & I'm all right, & so are my siblings. My mother set the example to be unconditionally loving & giving, & to be devoted to her family, often in sacrificial ways. She taught me to not take life too seriously, but to be able to have fun. Her motto, which I heard quite often, was "I'm rough & tough & hard to bluff. I chew nails & spit rust". She also used to say, "it'll all work out" & "it'll all do". My mother didn't have to do a lot or say a lot (although saying a lot was a given, where my mother was concerned.....where do you think I got it from?).  She just had to live her life. Her children learned from her example. Same goes for my father. 

So what I would like to encourage all of us who have daughters, or who have an impact on a young girl's or young woman's life, is to teach by example. Our daughters are constantly faced with an onslaught of images, examples, & teachings that go against the direction that we are trying to lead them in. We can't always stop them from being exposed to such things. We can however, give them examples to balance out the negative images they are being exposed to on a daily basis. 

My daughter is fifteen. It's still a bit too early for me to know how she will "turn out". She's still at that adolescent stage of figuring out who she is & what's important to her. She's like every other teenager out there in that regard. My adult son on the other hand, has given me feedback on my parenting, in the sense of how I have influenced him in certain areas. He is certainly his own person. He is most definitely not a clone of either of his parents, that's for sure. But the best parts of who I am (thankfully not the worst ones), are definitely evident in some of the things my son does, in some of the values he possesses, & in how he lives his life. I feel good about that. So however my daughter chooses to live her life when she is all grown up, will be up to her.....but hopefully, she will carry with her, the values & character traits I have tried to instill in her, not by my words, but by my example. 

One of the best things that we can teach our daughters, is not to buy into the notion set by celebrities, that we have to have that perfect body, that we have to have the best of everything, that we have to be wealthy to be happy, & that just like many reality TV stars, we have to manipulate, lie, & use others to get what we want. It's important to teach our daughters to respect themselves & others, & to expect others to do the same. We ought to model that respect.  The best way that we can teach our daughters anything, is not by our words, but by our example. 

We don't have to diminish the entertainment value of celebrities, but we ought to show our daughters that what matters most in this world, cannot be learned by watching how celebrities & famous people live their lives, but rather by watching how we as parents & loved ones do. One of the greatest gifts we can give our daughters, is to learn how to respect themselves as well as to follow their own path, & not the path forged by those who still haven't figured out where they are going. So, as we are trying to lead by example, let's start by making sure that the example we set is the one we want to see followed.