Sep. 3rd, 2023

laurabellel: (Default)
I was listening to Used to Be Young by Miley Cyrus. I have (half-baked) thoughts. To be clear, I like the song--a whole lot. (I generally like Miley Cyrus. Flowers was awesome too.)

I'd love to see it revisited in 20 or 30 years or by someone 20 or 30 years older. Miley Cyrus is barely 30, and while it may feel otherwise to her right now, from my perspective "young" isn't entirely a past tense for her.

I adore the implied acceptance and even approval of aging in the song. A 30 year old implying that she's not young anymore and is good with it is wonderful. Our culture idealizes youth in women to a truly fucked up level and in a lot of really fucked up ways. Coming out with a song that says yeah, youth is youth and it can be fun but people (women) grow up and that's not a bad thing is really really countercultural in a way people aren't entirely recognizing. The whole "you used to be fun" is a thing men say to women to try to manipulate them in to not having the boundaries that they've learned to have through hard experience. "Yeah, I used to be young" Yup. Exactly. Now I'm not. I don't think the choice of words is an accident.

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laurabellel

September 2023

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