We Still Get All Hot and Bothered Even Though We Know Better

Do we ever get tired of these scandals?

Last week a golden girl finally got her "due"--hey, it was time, it wasn't like South Park didn't warn us--and a universally acknowledged douchebag were further indicted in lowbrow and highbrow print alike.

As for Miley--yes, it's someone's fault, yes, those pictures are disturbing. As the teen starlets get younger and younger, the point is obviously to create a ruckus. C'mon--very few of Miley's fans read Vanity Fair; she's trying to look mature to an older audience. They're still not going to listen to her music, read her autobiography or watch her TV show. But despite this, assuming that Vanity Fair contacted her with a story in mind (hidden between a story about a man who was assassinated 40 years ago), why wouldn't Miley take them up on their offer? If I had the opportunity to dress in couture for a photo shoot when I was 15, I sure as hell would have done it--ignoring the fact that I would have been scared out of my wits and incredibly awkward. It sounds so glamorous, grownup, and sexy. The MySpace pictures of her showing off her green bra are so disturbing because she looks so young, yet she's just parroting what she's seen. Of course she knows this; any girl, even in private, who has mugged some sexy poses knows what she's doing. Compare this with Britney Spears, who, nine years ago (!) posed sexily as a schoolgirl for Rolling Stone and the uproar that caused. She'd barely been out for more than three or four months at that point; she didn't yet have a huge virginal reputation to discard like a pair of low rise jeans during a heavy makeout session. Don't those pictures seem tame now? At 16 Britney then already looked years older--and in a completely different world than Miley. Britney was only just beginning.

I caught a glimpse of Miley performing the other week, a random change of a channel. She was on her knees, her legs split. It's a fantastic rock star move, but one not suited for a girl who is (and looks) as young as she is. It's a move done countless times by performers and Madonna; it's also the type of move that should stay in the living room when the performed by a teenager.

It's not just her age that's a factor here, not even that she's practically the face of Disney or that an alarming number of kids under 16 look up to her. It's the fact that she looked so young, that her character stood for the everygirl and made a name for herself by living out many child's fantasies. She had the best of both worlds, the fun and perks of fame without the real, adult drawbacks. She still looks like a child, no matter what the green bra says.