Yup! An AP Lang Blog About Twerking

Last week, as I attempted to teach my volleyball team how to gain power in their hits, a dozen 14-17-year old girls mis-heard my yell of "TORQUE" (meaning "to turn or twist") as "TWERK" (meaning... well, I didn't know. I'm a 32-year old mother of two with three jobs and no cable.) I admitted to my team that I had never heard of the word and didn't know why they were all so giggly about it. They told me to youtube it.

I did. I got it.

Then, days later, in one of those instant karma moments, the internet exploded with outcries about twerking. I figured this was meant to be. I clicked on this CNN article, feeling superior that I actually knew what it meant to twerk.

And then it all began. Miley Cyrus, who I know nothing of and nothing about, has outraged the world by dancing provocatively on TV. And all I have to say is... really?

I mean, really?

This is the example of the sexualization of women that we, as American mothers, are going to choose to be offended by?

Let me say it again-- I don't know Ms. Cyrus, and I don't care about Ms. Cyrus. At. All.

SHOCK! The mothers of America gasp at me! I can hear them judging-- "you have two young, impressionable children! How can you not care the Miley Cyrus twerked on CABLE!"

Let me be clear-- do I love that a girl has gotten up and degraded herself and her body publicly? Of course not! Do I want my daughter to believe that this type of behavior is acceptable or even beautiful? No way! But I chose not to watch it, and you can, too. You can even keep your impressionable young children from watching it, and in the course of doing so, teach them about why we make such choices.

Were you offended by Miley? Let me offend you some more.


Over the course of my lifetime, I have seen literally hundreds of thousands of billbords, magazine stories, magazine ads, movies, TV shows, TV ads that degrade girls and women. So have you. And you'll continue to see hundreds of thousands more unless you turn it off. So, are you going to turn it off, or are you just going to complain about it?

I have to warn you, if you turn it off, you won't be very cool. And realistically, the only way to truly avoid all of it would be to pull a Thoreau. But you can choose to turn off the TV when you see something that offends you. And you can choose to limit, as much as possible, the negative images put in front of your children. And you can choose to counter the negative images they DO see with thoughtful conversation about body image and self-worth.

My dear angry parents, you chose to watch, or allowed your children to watch, Miley's performance on MTV's VMAs, one of the most provocative and boundary-pushing cable shows out there. When you were so offended by Miley, did you turn it off? Did you talk to your kids about why her performance offended you?  Or did you just jump onto your blog and start complaining about it? It's done. It's past. So what are you going to do about it in the future?

You can't change the sexualization and objectification of women tonight. Maybe that's pessimistic, but it's also realistic. What you CAN do is prepare the next generation to view women as people instead of objects. In my ever-so-humble opinion, turning off the TV and talking to your kids is, at least, a start.