While chatting with British Vogue, Miley Cyrus reflected on the scrutiny she faced throughout her early 20s. Sharing how the backlash that some of her career choices caused led her to feel “shame” in those earlier years.
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“I carried some guilt and shame around myself for years because of how much controversy and upset I really caused,” Miley said. “Now that I’m an adult, I realize how harshly I was judged. I was harshly judged as a child by adults," she added, "and now, as an adult, I realize that I would never harshly judge a child.”
But let's be real, Miley’s been surrounded by controversy since her teen years, like her artistic photoshoot with Annie Leibovitz for Vanity Fair and the bong incident, are just a couple that come to mind. But things really ramped up during Miley’s Bangerz era, which included her much talked about music video for “Wrecking Ball” and her Robin Thicke twerk session at the 2013 VMAs, and just general consistency of nakedness.
“I was creating attention for myself because I was dividing myself from a character I had played,” she said of that time. “Anyone, when you’re 20 or 21, you have more to prove. ‘I’m not my parents.’ ‘I am who I am,’” Miley said about that time in her life.
Cyrus also spoke on the headlines from her early popstar years as she was transitioned from being a Disney star to a career beyond Hannah Montana. Specifically reflecting on a headline that spoke about her acne that read “A Breakout Year.”
“Right? Like who thought that I was not a person who would be hurt by that? Like I was clearly a 20-year-old girl," she said. “Sure, at 20, I was like every 20-year-old. You think you’re grown, but now I’m like, ‘Oh, no, I was fully a kid.’”
As the true artist she is, Miley’s taking a not so happy experience and using it for inspiration. Noting that the scrutiny she faced is set to be the subject of an upcoming song she plans to release. A song for which she shared some of the lyrics with BV — “I know I used to be crazy. I know I used to be fun. You say I used to be wild. I say I used to be young.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Miley shared the original lyrics to “Flowers,” talked about her boyfriend Maxx Morando, and shot down the idea that her album Endless Summer Vacation is some kind of diary meant to be interpreted literally, or that her music videos and album rollout are littered with clues about her past. And while plenty of theories and conclusions have already been drawn from clues that may or may not be there, Miley’s intent on not explaining a thing. She's too busy bein’ Miley.
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