Perez, Miley and Slut Shaming

Last Sunday, gossip blogger Perez Hilton made the controversial decision to post a photo of Miley Cyrus exiting a car on his twitter, implying that she was not wearing underwear. Now, the internet is firing back, with claims that Perez could go to jail under child pornography charges.

Initially, when I heard about this story, I was pretty disgusted. What an idiot Perez Hilton must be, I thought to myself, so obsessed with attacking people that he doesn't know where to draw the line. I'm not a fan of Perez or Miley - they both annoy me in general - but seriously? Posting a photo of anybody in a sexual way without their permission is just wrong. But as commenters on the blogosphere, and even Perez himself, started firing back, another problem (you know, aside from possible child pornography and borderline sexual abuse) began to arise.

Yes, Perez, and a slew of blogosphere commenters, decided to turn the issue of a grown man exploiting an underage girl into a big Miley slut-shaming fest.

Perez's defense for his actions? Implying that Miley has no class, and therefore posting the picture was meant to teach her some. "I thought she was exiting this car in a very un-ladylike fashion," Perez commented, defending his decision to post the picture. So, therefore, he thought it was his place to teach her a lesson about being a slut (his pet name for Miley after all is "Slutty Cyrus") by publicly embarrassing her for what was almost definitely an accident. Because, as we all know, sluts deserve punishment - no matter how much our society pressures teen pop-stars (and teens in general) to be sexually provocative, even if their career depends on it, they MUST RESIST and if they don't, we need to teach them a lesson.

Now, I'm not saying that since girls are pressured to be sluts it's understandable that they give into it or that it's inevitable. It would actually be great if we could find a happy medium between our teen stars dancing on a stripper pole and saving themselves for marriage, complete with a purity ring. Why can't our culture accept that teens can be healthy about their sexuality without being "sluts"?

But, because she is no longer Hannah Montana - read, not an innocent child - well, then she must be a slut. Because there is just no other option in the music industry, or in our society in general. And because she chose slut over child, she deserved to be exploited by Perez Hilton. As one awesome commentor on Popcrunch.com wrote, "It's ok for the little skank to act like a sexual horny adult but as soon as she's treated like one it's child porn? Get real." Another added, "Miley brought this on herself!"

Bottom line? Perez Hilton is a creep who needs to stop exploiting people - especially underage people. People need to stop blaming Miley for this and realize in general that this virgin-whore dichotomy needs to end (although would it kill Miley to wear some jeans to a performance and maybe not crouch and spread her legs? Especially at a charity concert? Maybe?)

Really, everybody should just go read a book instead of gossip blogs. Like maybe this one.