Right before the entire broughha of Miley Cyrus’ performance during the Video Music Awards, I had an odd idea. It came while discussing how people view things today, and even how they study them. I came up with the idea of some things being foreignized, and then used to sell the idea. I wondered if it applied to sex, because it seemed to be pushed a lot, even though the ideas themselves didn’t quite make sense. The next day Cyrus was on the NEWS, and I saw my idea had a great deal of merit.
The first thing that needs a really good explanation is the idea of foreignization. Within the more academic setting there are plenty of books, and papers on the subject. The biggest book is called Orientalism by Edward Said. He is a literature professor, and points out that in most cases the people of the East, which include his own people in the middle east, are made to be odd, and very foreign. In fact, he concludes that the explanation for cultural ways is to emphasize the foreign. In fact, it takes on a mythological point of view, making the foreignized out to be these weird people with brutish men and sexualized women.
Keep in mind, Orientalism was originally the study of the Orient, or Eastern culture. People with advanced degrees, who visited these countries, and spoke the languages would come back with the idea that the only explanation was that it was weird, and different. These were not foolish men, and women at all. There was a paradigm, and they followed it.
We still have it today. The explanation for many of the terrorist attacks start with the idea that the middle east is full of screwed up weirdos that we will never understand.
Let’s take this in another way though. What is it like to be rich? Not kind of sort of rich, but rich to the point that money doesn’t even have the same concept in it. When you are poor, there are whole shopping ideas that don’t even enter the equation. A designer wallet for $50 is considered weird. The idea that the wallet is the cheapest one in the store is even weirder.
When we describe the rich, we can only use what we know. The TV show Cribs, or various arrest warrants, or whatever the tabloids say is our lense on what it is like to be rich. When we think of the rich, we place the same weirdness onto the people as we would the Orientalist scholar of the past. The rich are weird, and our only explanation is that weirdness. It gets even more difficult when we get more specific. What is it like to be rich, and black? What we have is rappers, Pop artists, sports players, and the president. So in our minds, a black person can fire off nukes, has gold put onto his teeth, and can catch a ball. The weirdness simply adds up.
If you think that is odd, we go in the other direction of absolute poverty, and our minds break. We only know pictures, and documentaries about the lives of people. Whether it is viewed as good, or bad, the emphasis is on the difference and weirdness we see.
Keep in mind, this emphasis can be used for good and bad. There are plenty of people who think that the Native Tribal groups of the Americas know amazing things. They try to live their lives as best they can to be like that. They weird me the crap out. In Sedona Arizona, there are people who emphasize the lives of the tribes, by mentioning older traditions, trying to copy off some of the dances, and making sure to live in tipis. The only problem is that no one lives in tipis, and most of the traditions being talked about are barely like what is actually lived by the Navajo, Pima, and Apache. It makes the ability to talk about the cultures that much harder, because of so many people who are said to be experts, but only emphasize, and even make up differences.
This isn’t to say there is no difference. There are plenty of differences. The problem is that these differences can be explained, understood, and even accepted. The immediate response to difference is to simply say it is weird, and stop right there.
What if there are concepts in our lives that are actually only emphasizing difference? What if we are foreignizing things that should be obvious? What if the reason why we are having so many problems with it is that we are only saying that it is weird.
When Miley Cyrus went on stage for the VMA’s on MTV, there are some things we have to understand. The first is that this wasn’t just her idea. This was an entire team decision, with several people placing money on every item so that it would be perfect. There were camera crews who rehearsed the entire show. Every movement, and every song was planned out, and practiced before it went onto TV.
To give you an idea, Blurred Lines, the song being sung by the guy next to Miley Cyrus was about girls being good and bad. There is a music video for it, and it involves topless women, and was even banned in the US. The singer said,
In America, YouTube found the "Blurred Lines" video to be mostly inappropriate, and banned its unrated, NSFW version, which showed three topless women. "That’s just America," says Thicke. "I definitely don’t have any problem with nudity. I think people that are uncomfortable in their own bodies or are uncomfortable with their own bodies don’t want to see other peoples'."
What is his song about? By the video, and lyrics, it is about women, and how they should become more sexual. In fact, the video pretty much says that the artists within the video should be having more sex.
There is an accusation that the video is about rape. So, it would seem that Cyrus’ act, and the song with it were entirely about how women should be more sexy. Keep in mind, women were hired, an entire video crew was hired, and a sound crew was used to make this video. At no point did anyone question it, or wonder about its meaning.
This is not anything new. The Madonna/ Britney Spears kiss was ten years ago, and was likely just as planned, and prepared.
This is not an accusation that they added sex, it is an accusation that they foreignized sex. They specifically made the entire subject of sex into a way that if broken down does not work in the way expected. In other words, Miley Cyrus was trying to show that she was sexual. Robin Thicke, who wrote, sung, and directed Blurred Lines believes he was speaking about sex, and even moving it forward.
The people involved believe themselves to be experts on the issue. They are pushing their idea forward, and in fact it is what was promoted at the VMA’s. The entire song and dance was treating sex in a way that specifically makes it seem distant, and even foreign.
Selling the foreign is a common enough thing. It’s the reason why Eat Pray Love sold so well. It is about a woman going to foreign places, and doing foreign things to find herself. Every tale of Hawaii is not about how a gallon of milk costs $6, or that many people are living in poverty. It is about about how the women are beautiful, and the beaches are amazing. The image of Hawaii is what causes millions of people to come to the island, and spend billions of dollars.
The idea that an entire industry, and possibly several experts have begun to view sex in this idea of weird with no explanation begins to really become true. Past this point of thought, it takes looking at papers, and the ideas placed on them. In fact, the paper is ending here because of how difficult it would be to go into the idea past the point of hypothesis. Miley Cyrus danced, and flashed her tongue a few days ago. The idea isn’t much older. Give it time.
The basic idea is this. If we can make whole cultures seem foreign and odd, can we do it with ideas? Is sex one of these ideas? Does the Miley Cyrus performance show this idea? I tried to discuss the best I could. This idea needs more time, and work, but this basis seems to be worth checking out more.
