Miley Cyrus and Rihanna damage girls' self-esteem - and could harm education and job prospects - says academic

Sep 13, 2013 By Sofia Munez 0

Birmingham university's Dionne Taylor says stars give 'mixed messages' to impressionable girls
Points out men are clothed in pop videos while women are scantily clad
Says 'video vixens' make sexualisation of women 'part of everyday life' and fuel negative attitude towards women
Says girls' confidence, education and even employment will suffer

By Deni Kirkova

PUBLISHED: 09:45 EST, 13 September 2013 | UPDATED: 09:55 EST, 13 September 2013

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Steamy performances from pop sirens such as Miley Cyrus and Rihanna are destroying the self-esteem of young girls, according to a university academic.

The leading Birmingham City fellow claims the use of scantily-clad females in raunchy music videos is also impacting on the lives of women.

Criminology lecturer and researcher Dionne Taylor accused stars like Miley Cyrus - who sparked criticism after her provocative gyrations with Robin Thicke at the MTV music awards - of giving 'mixed messages' to impressionable females.

Miley Cyrus sparked criticism after her provocative gyrations with Robin Thicke at the MTV music awards

'She has appropriated the video vixen persona,' said Prof Taylor.

'There was a part where she had black backing dancers and she smacked their bottoms. It was ignorant. The men we see in these videos are fully clothed and women are scantily clad.'

She says hip-hop and dancehall music depictions fuel negative attitudes towards females, and ultimately affect everything from their confidence to education and even employment. And she said young girls she interviewed for her study now see sexualisation as 'part and parcel of life'.

Growing up in Birmingham as a young black woman of African Carribean heritage, Prof Taylor experienced the problem first-hand.

Her raunchiest video yet? The full length version of Miley Cyrus's video for her new song We Can't Stop was released on Wednesday

Taylor says the part where she had black backing dancers and she smacked their bottoms was ignorant

'As a teenager I was told "you"ve got a big bum" - the focus was always on my body parts,' she said.

'There was a feeling that you had to conform in some ways to these images to be worthwhile.

'I have a younger sister and she used to say that she didn't feel confident in herself and that was mainly derived from from popular black music genres.

'Hip-hop and dancehall music depictions fuel negative attitudes towards females, and ultimately affect everything from their confidence to education and even employment'

'The majority of my participants said the hyper-sexualisation of music videos and magazines impacted on their confidence, education and employment. It damaged their self-esteem.'

Black women aged from 15 to 29 from Birmingham and London took part in the study.

But Prof Taylor admitted confidence issues caused by steamy performances also affect white and Asian girls.

Prof Taylor called on the music industry to feature more balanced images of women.

She is not the first to speak out against the sexualised image pop stars portray.

The majority of women 15-29 said hyper sexualisation impacted on their confidence and self-esteem

Liz Jones spoke out against the 'toxic' message Rihanna is sending out to her fans.

'Young women are far more impressionable than young men,' wrote Liz, in an article for this newspaper.

'They want to be Rihanna, have her lifestyle, her clothes, her men, her habits.

'I wish she’d stop infecting our High Streets with her gun tattoos, her false nails and fake hair, her bogus bad-ass shenanigans that try to portray her as 'real', as 'street', as her own person, as strong and single-minded.'

Growing concern for pop's increasingly sexual message

August 2008

Teachers report a rise in sexualised behaviour in children aged seven. Birmingham City Council set up an Inappropriate Sexual Behaviour Unit to tackle this problem.

April 2012

David Cameron suggests that 'inappropriate' pop videos should be slapped with an 18 certificate

July 2013

Walkwood Church of England Middle School in Redditch becomes the first to ban skirts for girls aged nine. The ban comes as increasing numbers of young girls copy the 'sexy schoolgirl' look popularised by celebrities such as Rihanna and Katy Perry. David Doubtfire, headmaster of the Worcestershire school, said the ban would eliminate 'unladylike' short skirts.

June 2013

Liz Jones writes that Rihanna is a toxic role model.

Liz says the message Rihanna sends to young fans, through lyrics, dance moves and Twitter, is toxic

'Young women are far more impressionable than young men. They want to be Rihanna, have her lifestyle, her clothes, her men, her habits. I wish she’d stop infecting our High Streets with her gun tattoos, her false nails and fake hair, her bogus bad-ass shenanigans that try to portray her as ‘real’, as ‘street’, as her own person, as strong and single-minded.

'While Rihanna knows when to tone it down in order to pull in advertising deals and keep her record label sweet - so much so that she has enough dollar bills to use them as a carpet, and so many diamonds she can pretend to smoke them in a spliff, both things she's been pictured doing - the message she's sending to her young fans, through her explicit lyrics, vile dance moves and pictures on Twitter, is utterly toxic. This poisonous pop princess should come with a government health warning.'

August 2013

Shona Sibary is astounded at her daughter's blase reaction to Miley's VMAs twerking performance.

Shona's daughter Flo thought that Miley and Robin's performance was 'quite a cool act'

'What stunned me even more than Miley's excruciating display of pornographic innuendo was my daughter's reaction. For rather than sharing my dismay at the route her once favourite TV star has taken, Flo's response to the debacle was that it was 'quite a cool act'.

'It is this insouciance, this almost jaded retort from my teenage daughter at what was blatantly a dance routine choreographed to cause offence that, as a mother, I find so disturbing. Yes, of course, Miley Cyrus is 20 and no longer a teenager. And it's nothing if not predictable that she is hell-bent on letting the world know it. But what of her fans - those girls who, just like Flo, loved Miley as children and are on the brink of womanhood themselves? I can't help but feel they are on the receiving end of a seemingly endless barrage of sexual imagery.'

The Parents Television Council issued a statement in which executes called Miley Cyrus' performance 'twerking' on stage in a flash-colored latex bikini 'sexually exploitative' and said it 'simply substituted talent with sex.'

The Family Television Council, a non-profit group, blasted MTV for allowing the show to air and demanded 'heads should roll' at the cable network.

A member of the Council's advisory board, former BET network executive Paul Porter, said: 'The Miley Cyrus/Robin Thicke performance simply substituted talent with sex... While the performance was shocking to the audience, MTV approved it during the show run prior to the broadcast.

Dan Isett, public policy director for the Parents Television Council called on Congress to change cable TV rules as he criticized MTV. He singled out Miley's on-stage performance.

'MTV continues to sexually exploit young women by promoting acts that incorporate "twerking" in a nude-colored bikini. How is this image of former child star Miley Cyrus appropriate for 14-year-olds?' he demanded.

Tags: Entertainment