14 DAY TRIAL // Former Disney star turned full-time exhibitionist Miley Cyrus has just recently said that she is “one of the biggest feminists in the world,” much to the delight of celebrity bloggers and the outrage of real feminists. In her interview with Elle magazine, Miley elaborates on that a bit.
As she sees it, a feminist is a woman who can do the same things as a man, at least where she’s concerned as an artist. Miley militates for equality and hopes the entire world will just shut up and let her do her thing – you know, for feminism.
“I’m just about equality, period. It’s not like, I’m a woman, women should be in charge! I just want there to be equality for everybody. I still don’t think we’re there 100 percent,” she explains.
Artistically, being a feminist translates for Miley into being able to do the exact same things male artists do and not be held by a double standard.
“I mean, guy rappers grab their crotch all [expletive]-ing day and have [women] around them, but no one talks about it. But if I grab my crotch and I have hot model [B-word]-s around me, I’m degrading women? I’m a woman – I should be able to have girls around me! But I’m part of the evolution of that. I hope,” Miley explains.
So, for Miley, feminism means being able to degrade women in music videos just because men do it too. It’s wrong when men do it but if it’s a woman who’s degrading them, then it’s ok and that makes her a feminist, she implies. It sounds to us like Miley is using feminism to justify her radical change in style and sound, and to defend herself against critics saying that she should feel confident in her own talent not to have to resort to naked antics to get attention.
But to each their own, as the saying goes. At the very least, Miley is no longer speaking out against Disney like she was doing some time ago, when she was saying she got the worst deal possible by being launched by Disney.
“You know, I’m really thankful that I started on Disney. I got the most intense training. There’s times where I wish I could have just started as a new artist, but the world has kind of allowed me to do that. I feel really lucky – a lot of kid stars get all crazy or stuck in what they were, so they can’t actually become what they’re meant to be,” she says.
Not her, though. Miley says that, with her image and sound overhaul, she found out that she could be her own man (pun intended) and, regardless of her skewed views on feminism and regardless of how offensive you perceive her to be, she has a point: Miley is controversial but she’s also very successful, perhaps more so than she’s ever been.