Miley Cyrus: The Tip of the Iceberg

*Warning --  This post contains mature content*

Unless you've been living under a rock, you've probably heard by now that former Disney Darling, Miley Cyrus, just expanded her repertoire to include a nationally televised performance that was two tiny pieces of flesh-colored vinyl away from being fully X-rated.

As the future Mrs. Hemsworth gyrated and thrusted her way through a performance that would have felt dirty at a strip club, she was joined on stage by Robin Thicke, who sang his mega-hit "Blurred Lines" and didn't seem the least bit bothered by the fact that a 20-year-old was honing her lap dance skills on him.

I only watched ten seconds of the performance in a news clip on CNN, but that was enough to stop me from ever picking up a giant foam finger without using tongs.

And yet, I find it telling that in the news and social media explosion that occurred during and after the performance, there was complete radio silence about the relevant fact that Ms. Cyrus was humping her way through a song about men "smacking a****" of "hot b******", men propositioning women to "get nasty" and guys so... er... well-endowed that they could "tear your a** in two."

Sounds like Miley was just playing along.

Yes, she should be ashamed of her disgusting performance, but you know what?  She is a product of a culture and industry that degrades women and devalues sex to the point that it is nothing more than a commodity to be bought and sold.  So who can blame her for thinking she had some selling to do?

I'm much more bothered by the fact that Robin Thicke's depraved and offensive song is celebrated and fawned over.  Why, as women, do we ignore this sort of thing?  Why do we decry a performance like that of Ms. Cyrus and refuse to see that we are partly to blame by downloading "Blurred Lines" from I-tunes?

Miley Cyrus isn't the disease, she's a symptom of the disease.

The simple fact is that anything that degrades women also degrades men, and anything that degrades men also degrades women.  We diminish ourselves when we engage in any sort of demeaning behavior toward the opposite sex.

In the case of "Blurred Lines," women, we deserve better than this.  Miley Cyrus deserves better than this.  And men, you know better than this.  So let's quit attacking the tip of the iceberg.

It's time to work on what lies beneath.