I doubt that any kid is likely to suffer any quantifiable adverse effect from sexy lingerie. This just can’t be any worse than playing doctor.

If she were selling a line of scrubs, on the other hand…

Seriously? Lingerie for pre-teens? Nothing like teaching them to be slutty early in life, eh?

OMG PUBLIC OUTRAGE!!!!1111eleven

Did you even read the article? What she’s modeling is way more Shirley Temple than it is Victoria’s Secret. Read before you speak.

1.) The newspaper industry as well as other media outlets are experiencing tough times (yeah, just like the rest of us.)

2.) To cut costs, many editors are using these free images rather than paying their photojournalists to cover necessary news events. (My source here is Brooks Craft of the White House News Photographers Association.)

3.) Nothing wrong with trying to save money, but by doing this, editors allow the White House to decide what images are released to the press, rather than the editor choosing which photos make the cut.

4.) Therefore, free speech/freedom of the press takes a hit. The administration would never dream of releasing an image, regardless of its journalistic/artistic impact, showing the president in an unfavorable light. For example, the Pulitzer awarded image by Scott Applewhite of President Clinton exiting the White House after learning that he would face impeachment – had it not been produced by an independent agency – would never have been released. (http://www.press.org/wire/article.cfm?id=458)
Or perhaps more appropriate, this image of Obama ogling the Women’s Movement: http://stupidcelebrities.net/2009/07/10/obama-checking-out-girls-booty-obama-looking-at-mayara-tavares-assets/.

(Apologies – I haven’t taken the time to learn how to include hyperlinks in my comments – just cut and paste.)

#27 Mattocracy

We’ll all bitch about the Cyrus daughter and her lingerie, until the FED’s accuse her of child porn distribution and put her on the sex offenders list. Then we’ll defend her from the culture crusaders. Honestly, I’m more afraid for her safety than I’m angry at her dad. Some prosecutor somewhere has a hard on of excitment ready to make an example out of her.

You hit the nail on the head with your first sentence. In his recent Reason piece called “Ruining Kids in Order to Save Them” Radley cited a case of Alabama photographer, Jeff Pierson, who was prosecuted for taking pictures of children none of which were nude, but were posed in ways that were “illegally provocative”.

I don’t think Noah Cyrus has much to worry about from prosecutors, though. Prosecutors like to pursue questionable cases of child exploitation because the accusation alone is enough to almost guarantee conviction, but that doesn’t always go so smoothly when rich celebrities are involved.

In any case, my feeling goes like this:

1. Kids like to dress like adults. Big deal.
2. I doubt that any kid is likely to suffer any quantifiable adverse effect from sexy lingerie. This just can’t be any worse than playing doctor.
4. My reaction is more like an attaboy for challenging paranoid attitudes about sex on the part of the public and those who claim to “care about children”.
5. I think that in context of the glitz and glamor of their celebrity life style, they may have attitudes about sex that differ from that of most people.
6. I don’t think parents have any obligation to seek public approval of their parenting methods.
7. I think the world would be a better place if people were to challenge the status quo more often, even knowing that they will sometimes be wrong and people will be hurt. Progress doesn’t come from conformity.

To summarize, if one were to prioritize where government should be focusing their attention if their goal is to really help children (which, of course, it isn’t), this would be pretty far down on the list (as would be the case of the Alabama photographer).

Child porn prosecutions are becoming less and less about protecting children and more and more about punishing people for having fantasies (ie: thoughts) that the government and society doesn’t approve of.

http://www.fark.com/cgi/comments.pl?IDLink=4999138

unless, of course, Radley’s the submitter…

At that point we wouldn’t be defending her from the ‘culture crusaders’. We’d be defending her from the statist jackholes that want the government to enforce morality.

That’s exactly the way it is, Dave. There are no such things as innocent mistakes or misunderstandings in our policy driven world.

It’s as if someone has to be charged with something rather than everyone just saying, “Phew! Thank god it turned out to be nothing.””

It’s the school, not the police. I just hope the punishment is something less than expulsion, the usual knee-jerk response. As for calling the SWAT team, my initial thought was what Dave eventually concluded up there in comment #18. You can’t criticize schools and the police for not responding fast enough to shootings one time, and then give them grief for responding quickly the next time just because it turned out to be a false alarm. Well, you can. But that just makes you a hypocrite.

Not sayin’ it was appropriate, but some of those eight year olds are mean little bastards.

In cases of a burning building you’re certainly correct. OTOH, when it’s a combined agency call such as a domestic violence call with injuries, or a report of someone with a weapon where an ambulance is required, in all jurisdictions I know of the FD will always stage away from the scene until the PD reports the scene is secure.

They don’t mention who’s in line for punishment. I suspect it’s not the folks who showed the worst judgment, and who are paid (and trained) to have good judgment.

The comments improve once the token Republican shows up with his copy/paste liberalsbad/conservativesgood chain letter and the flame war kicks in.

#16 SusanK

So the second grader with a cap gun – the school’s response was to call the cops. Clearly no one at the school investigated to any degree (who shot at you, where, were you hit, are you ok). If they did, they dind’t care for the answer and called the cops anyway.

That was my reaction at first, too. But then I thought, if they had decided to wait until they had more info and it turned out the kid had a real gun and someone was shot, they would be blamed for not calling the cops immediately. I think a case can be made that a report of a gun warrants an investigation by those who are prepared (supposedly) to deal with that kind of potential threat.

What I did find irritating is this:

District spokeswoman Kris Sork says school officials met with the boy and his parents to determine possible punishment.

It’s as if someone has to be charged with something rather than everyone just saying, “Phew! Thank god it turned out to be nothing.”