SALON

Monday, Dec 13, 2010 9:01 PM UTC

Miley Cyrus doesn’t owe you an apology

The Disney star isn't showing regret about a recent video showing her with a bong -- and it's the right move

By

Topics: Miley Cyrus,

Miley Cyrus doesn't owe you an apologyMiley Cyrus

America isn’t angry with you, Miley Cyrus. It’s just … disappointed. Just in time for the Disney queen’s recent 18th birthday, the Internet has been all aflutter ever since video of her working a bong like Woody Harrelson at a NORML convention surfaced on TMZ this weekend. TMZ’s source’s claim that Cyrus wasn’t enjoying marijuana but salvia, a psychoactive herb that’s legal in most states including California, has led to a sudden retail rush among consumers who want a piece of whatever Hannah Montana is smoking. And Cyrus’ father has posted the inevitable Tweet of Regret, saying, “Just saw this stuff for the first time myself. Im so sad. There is much beyond my control right now.”

Cyrus, she of the occasional over-the-line booty shaking and Selena Gomez dissing, is certainly no stranger to the self-incriminating video. And yet, because a nation of little girls bear her face on their lunchboxes, the public outrage whenever she behaves like, well, an 18-year-old just never quits. 

New York’s pop radio station 92.3 has already referred to her as “every parent’s nightmare”  and E! more tactfully called the incident “reputation-damaging.” Adding fuel to the fire, Cyrus’ childhood friend Nicole Mullen-Holm Monday gave an interview to Radar online in which she referred to her former pal as “a liar who bullied girls and was a real b*tch to everyone.”

But Cyrus herself has been conspicuously mum about it all. She’s back at work filming a new movie with Kelly Osbourne and generally getting on with her life. She is not using the incident as an opportunity to make a statement to kids about responsible behavior. She could, but as an 18-year-old woman whose main crime has been smoking a legal substance, she doesn’t have to. She could tweet a public statement of remorse, but after a brief flirtation with Twitter, she quit over a year ago and hasn’t looked back.

Yet Gawker’s dry observation Monday that perhaps “early and repeat exposure to scandal shut off the part of her brain responsible for shame” suggests Cyrus’ silence is somehow unusual, and reveals a strangely presumptuous expectation of contrition. It speaks to a cultural assumption that our celebrities, when they do something screwy, owe us something. Oh please, heroine to America’s tweens, say something to satisfy the outrage of a concerned populace! Preferably something random trolls on the Internet can tear you down for!

The footage of Cyrus sighing, “I’m having a little bit of a bad trip,” and OMGing about a fellow partygoer’s resemblance to her boyfriend — all while a friend devours Frosted Flakes straight out of the box — isn’t exactly a family values Hannah Montana-in-3-D affair. And as a parent I’d be none too pleased if that was my daughter guffawing helplessly for all the world to see. But since when did Gawker or E! or anybody else get to decide what Miley Cyrus should be ashamed of?

Sure, the relentless chronicling and disseminating of every action — whether it’s from a celebrity or one’s Facebook friends — gets off-putting fast. And I believe if you’re doing something you don’t want shared with the world, you should consider not recording it. That’s why I give credit to Cyrus, who, for all her consistently typically adolescent behavior, at least knows when to pull back and use a little restraint. She may have let her antics be filmed, but at least now she’s not commenting, she’s not apologizing, and she’s not doing some insincere public walk of shame. Unlike her dad and a whole lot of other commenters, she’s moving on. She lives in the spotlight, but she knows she doesn’t have to explain or answer for or express public shame for her every move. And that makes her more than just the chick with the big bong and the giggle fits. It makes that 18-year-old party girl — surprise — pretty damn mature. You might even call her a role model.

Mary Elizabeth Williams

Mary Elizabeth Williams is a staff writer for Salon and the author of "Gimme Shelter: My Three Years Searching for the American Dream." Follow her on Twitter: @embeedub. More Mary Elizabeth Williams.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 55 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: Chekhov's story mirrors Russia's own

Recommendations