Miley Cyrus courts controversy for a living. Well, she sings for her lavish suppers too — “Nothing Breaks Like A Heart” has been viewed 130 million times. But almost nobody — even in a world that never stops trying — can beat Miley for taking a wrecking ball to societal norms, or the perception of them.
Now the artist and activist is performing an Instagram takeover on her feed, flooding it with red — most notably Cyrus in skin-tight red latex catsuit that commands attention. She’s selective and terse with her words, but she issues a challenge that has fans and followers hot and bothered. “Virginity is a social construct,” Cyrus writes. Is it?
There is some very coherent debate alongside the predictable blowback. Scolds are saying things like: “Miley you are too smart for putting out something as dumb. You have a responsibility towards the youth of today for Gods sake.”
But longer considerations, no doubt what Cyrus means to provoke, also filled the comments. An example is below
“Virginity was an important aspect of many pagan religions. Although it was not seen as a negative to not be a virgin. Virgins were seen as particularly pure and were important for certain rituals. Women who had birthed/were not virgins were seen as close to godliness because creating a life is as close to godliness as one can get. Both were worshipped. Both were important. It was organized religion that took this and twisted it into something terrible in order to control female bodies. We should be appreciating the aspects of both virginity and non-virginity! “
And this: “What? That’s like saying puberty or menstruation is a social contract. They’re physical things, they involve physical changes. The strange stigmas people place on them are certainly through social constructs, but virginity itself is not. The “value” we place on it is.”
Here’s another one in the slings and arrows category: “There’s nothing wrong with being a virgin. There’s something very wrong with people who think being a virgin is a problem.” But of course Miley can take the blowback and the scolds — she gets to push out a message, create a discussion, and all the while add to her outrageous fortune.
