People are talking: why Miley Cyrus matters

(The Latest: Morgan Freeman reads the OED definition of “twerking”.)

Writers, if they want to stay sane, have to realize that they are swimming in the same ocean Miley Cyrus swims in. Miley Cyrus is like the Great White Whale, and she has the power to destroy us, yet we can’t stop pursuing her.

Or how about this. Miley Cyrus is the latest innocent soul we’re throwing into the volcano. We must corrupt the most innocent among us because we know (not even subconsciously) that everything and everyone is corrupt, or corruptible, in this culture, so we might as well hand her a foam finger phallus and make her twerk in front of millions of people, not to mention Will Smith.

Or, or or… Miley Cyrus is just another in a long line of entertainment freaks doing perverse things on TV. Maybe you remember Madonna and her pointy bra cups. Or Michael Jackson’s 11-minute “Black or White”video, wherein he “simulated masturbation,” to put it benignly.

Or, come on now. None of this was spontaneous or unexpected. The girl’s been practicing her twerking for six months to get ready for the VMA’s. The band, the production crew, the director, and executives all up and down the MTV hierarchy have been working on this thing and knowing it would have a huge, if temporary, impact. The Robin Thicke number had precisely the effect everyone on the inside wanted it to have, and Miley played it like the pro she is.

CNN fell for it all like a john in a prostitution sting.

But back to writers. How do you deal with a culture that serves up something that sucks up every molecule of oxygen so that everything from the MLK anniversary to imminent bombing of Syria vanishes in a cloud of artificial smoke? (You’re going to want to click on this link to a Tumblr!) How can any book we might write and publish compete? Maybe it’s a matter of: If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.

We can always learn to twerk.