To think that Taylor Swift is a good role model for girls.

[peanutbutterFlapjack]

Her new music video has no sex references, butts or twerking. She has a class that Nicki Garbage, Miley Virus and Kim Kartrashian lack.

ballet I find it hard for a very conventional white girl to take the piss out of black stereotypes. It's not her place to do that. Echoes what PP said about her being quite oblivious to her own privilege.

By conventional I mean, conforming to many conventional stereotypes of female beauty and behaviour.

Lily Allen also made a video that was apparently meant to be a critique of the music industry and its stereotypes.

Basically it involved lots of scantily clad black female dancers twerking and slapping each other's bums while Lily remained fully clothed.

Awful stuff.

Yes I remember that one squooshed. Bloody awful and so hilariously, tragically unaware.

Why does race play such a big role in everything now, this thread and many others always turn into a discussion about race this is about Taylor Swift being a good role model. The shake it off video did not in my opinion have anything to do with race but was probably accidental.

Dadistired If you're a woman of colour, race has always had a big role in everything. This is especially true in the USA where slavery and racial segregation has left deep scars. When discussing whether someone, white or not, is a good role model, surely accusations of them being a bit racist or at least quite ignorant to their role in a music video with horribly racist overtones, are relevant?

It was probably accidental I have no words to respond to that TBH.

There is nothing to admire - she is bland, dull and IMO just another ultra-skinny singer with whitened teeth. Why should my dds admire that?

What about the "white trash type dancers". The arty be a tree type contemporary dsncers or indeed the prim ballerinas.

All stereotypes.

ballet But not all stereotypes have the same effects. For example, ballet doesn't commodify the white body in the same way that twerking commodifies the black body.

Ballet dancers are observed for the way in which all of their body parts move together with grace and poise. Twerking disembodies black women's bums and focuses solely on how they jiggle. It is disembodied. Ballet is celebrated an a performance of high culture. Twerking really is not.

The commodification of 'twerking' by white artists necessarily untangles it from traditional tribal performances and devalues its cultural heritage and meaning.

I'm actually starting to like Miley Cyrus

What do people mean when they talk about someone having 'class'? I only hear it said in a snobby way.

I think she's impressive.

I don't get why people say she's racist either re the shake it off video, if she'd had all white girls twerking there'd be cries of cultural appropriation. There's men and women of many different races featuring in that video.

I like Miley too Especially how she handled herself with Nicki Minaj at the VMAs this week.

I love Taylor, very much despite myself, in the same way I like Victoria B. Both strong, independent business women who are fiercely protective about their brands. And why shouldn't they be?

Plus I love how, at any given award show, the audience will be sat there looking bored and you can guarantee Taylor and her friends will be dancing (really badly. She's a terrible dancer) and just having fun with it.

Who is a better role model for our daughters??

Vacantly I am lost; are you saying only white girls can do ballet and only black girls can twerk?
(and that's a sentence I never thought I'd be writing....)

'What do people mean when they talk about someone having 'class'? I only hear it said in a snobby way.'

Reminds me of Lisa Stansfield. She was always warbling on about being a classy laydee.

MissFitt68 Perhaps we should encourage our daughters not to look up to celebrities who's lives, passions, personalities, causes we can not really know because their very job is to cultivate a particular media image.

Perhaps, instead, we should encourage our daughters to take inspiration from real women we know who are strong, independent and inspirational.

If they, however, need famous role models how about;
Marie Curie
Rosa Parkes
Marie Stopes
Elizabeth Blackwell
Emiline Pankhurst
Mary Seacole
Billy Jean King for beating Bobby Riggs

If we have to go for 'celebrity' types how about Oprah? Or Judge Judy?

Pepperpot No of course that's not what I'm saying.

Having checked the Shake it off video, there is a black/white racial mixture throughout, apart from the ballet group. If anything, there aren't enough asian, possibly latin, people.

I think her image is far more cultivated than it appears at first. All the fan-friendly gifting and surprise visits all over IG and social media are entirely scripted. And the bad-dancing, girls just want to have fun with their friends - is all part of that. She's even got a hashtag hyping it as part of her self-promotion (#squad? #girlsquad?) I admire her success, work ethic and her musical ability. But I don't think I'd be pushing her as a role model to my DC. She might not have had a "nip slip" to get in the papers but she has had a boob job and a string of beard boyfriends ( eg Harry Styles) that got the column inches instead.

Pink is possibly the only female pop star of the top of my head. She didn't conform to pretty girl looks or behavior and was far more attractive for it, without going for the freak shock factor of say lady gaga. And I loved her pop parody, iirc stupid girls.
Closest to well known celebs dd admires are darcey bussell, fergie of black eyed peas dancing, and Ap McCoy. But even they aren't role models, she just likes what they can do. The role models are pro sports people who rarely feature in the general media.

I agree Petallic. There's no way an artist of Swift's mega stardom does many things without meticulous planning beforehand.

I don't get why cultivating and carefully controlling your image is supposed to be a bad thing. She'd get loads of stick if she was papped falling out of a taxi at 5am with her tits akimbo, and frowned upon for being out of control (cf Amt Winehouse). Also, even if it is a carefully cultivated image, it doesn't mean she isn't a real person. You never see her dancing properly (much like Kylie, who also can't really dance) and she has made that into a feature not a bug. The shake it off video (among other things) uses not being a good dancer as a metaphor for not fitting into certain cliques etc. - then at the end it's just everuone of every size, shape and colour dancing how they want to.

I'm a freelancer with a web presence, I carefully cultivate my image, take care not to appear out of control (no drunk sweary tweets for example) and have a number of legal protections in place. That's for a humble sole trader earning only just above average UK salary. Many, many people have to do it and the more public your face, the more careful you have to be, especially if you want to protect your private life.

Because attitudes towards race inform my opinion on someone, especially someone we're holding up as a role model.