Sinead O’Connor to Miley Cyrus: “The Music Business Will Prostitute You for All You’re Worth…”

Irish singer-songwriter, Sinead O’Connor posted an open letter to Miley Cyrus in “the spirit of motherliness and with love” in response to Cyrus’s claim that O’Connor is a role model. The letter is slightly humorous, littered with moments of heated curse-words and sarcasm, and tells Cyrus to “kindly fire any motherfucker who hasn’t expressed alarm” at her overt sexual display.

Dear Miley,

I wasn’t going to write this letter, but today i’ve been dodging phone calls from various newspapers who wished me to remark upon your having said in Rolling Stone your ‘Wrecking Ball’ video was designed to be similar to the one for Nothing Compares… So this is what I need to say… And it is said in the spirit of motherliness and with love.

I am extremely concerned for you that those around you have led you to believe, or encouraged you in your own belief, that it is in any way ‘cool’ to be naked and licking sledgehammers in your videos. It is in fact the case that you will obscure your talent by allowing yourself to be pimped, whether its the music business or yourself doing the pimping.

Nothing but harm will come in the long run, from allowing yourself to be exploited, and it is absolutely NOT in ANY way an empowerment of yourself or any other young women, for you to send across the message that you are to be valued (even by you) more for your sexual appeal than your obvious talent.

I am happy to hear I am somewhat of a role model for you and I hope that because of that you will pay close attention to what I am telling you.

 

The music business doesn’t give a shit about you, or any of us. They will prostitute you for all you are worth, and cleverly make you think its what YOU wanted… and when you end up in rehab as a result of being prostituted, ‘they’ will be sunning themselves on their yachts in Antigua, which they bought by selling your body and you will find yourself very alone.

 

None of the men ogling you give a shit about you either, do not be fooled. Many’s the woman mistook lust for love. If they want you sexually that doesn’t mean they give a fuck about you. All the more true when you unwittingly give the impression you don’t give much of a fuck about yourself. And when you employ people who give the impression they don’t give much of a fuck about you either. No one who cares about you could support your being pimped … and that includes you yourself.

Yes, I’m suggesting you don’t care for yourself. That has to change. You ought be protected as a precious young lady by anyone in your employ and anyone around you, including you. This is a dangerous world. We don’t encourage our daughters to walk around naked in it because it makes them prey for animals and less than animals, a distressing majority of whom work in the music industry and it’s associated media.

You are worth more than your body or your sexual appeal. The world of showbiz doesn’t see things that way, they like things to be seen the other way, whether they are magazines who want you on their cover, or whatever … Don’t be under any illusions … ALL of them want you because they’re making money off your youth and your beauty … which they could not do except for the fact your youth makes you blind to the evils of show business. If you have an innocent heart you can’t recognise those who do not.

 

I repeat, you have enough talent that you don’t need to let the music business make a prostitute of you.

 

You shouldn’t let them make a fool of you either. Don’t think for a moment that any of them give a flying fuck about you. They’re there for the money… we’re there for the music. It has always been that way and it will always be that way. The sooner a young lady gets to know that, the sooner she can be REALLY in control.

You also said in Rolling Stone that your look is based on mine.  The look I chose, I chose on purpose at a time when my record company were encouraging me to do what you have done.  I felt I would rather be judged on my talent and not my looks.  I am happy that I made that choice, not least because I do not find myself on the proverbial rag heap now that I am almost 47 yrs of age… which unfortunately many female artists who have based their image around their sexuality, end up on when they reach middle age.

Real empowerment of yourself as a woman would be to in future refuse to exploit your body or your sexuality in order for men to make money from you.  I needn’t even ask the question…

 

I’ve been in the business long enough to know that men are making more money than you are from you getting naked.

 

It’s really not at all cool. And its sending dangerous signals to other young women. Please in future say no when you are asked to prostitute yourself. Your body is for you and your boyfriend. It isn’t for every spunk-spewing dirtbag on the net, or every greedy record company executive to buy his mistresses diamonds with.

 

As for the shedding of the Hannah Montana image … whoever is telling you getting naked is the way to do that does absolutely NOT respect your talent, or you as a young lady. Your records are good enough for you not to need any shedding of Hannah Montana. She’s waaaaaaay gone by now… Not because you got naked but because you make great records.

 

Whether we like it or not, us females in the industry are role models and as such we have to be extremely careful what messages we send to other women. The message you keep sending is that its somehow cool to be prostituted … its so not cool Miley … its dangerous. Women are to be valued for so much more than their sexuality. We aren’t merely objects of desire. I would be encouraging you to send healthier messages to your peers… that they and you are worth more than what is currently going on in your career.

 

Kindly fire any motherfucker who hasn’t expressed alarm, because they don’t care about you.

 

20 Responses

  1. Visitor

    “The letter is slightly humorous, littered with moments of heated curse-words and sarcasm, and tells Cyrus to “kindly fire any motherfucker who hasn’t expressed alarm” at her overt sexual display”
    It’s sad that Cyrus, Spears and other female artists still are not allowed to be as sexually aggressive as Elvis and Jagger.

    • Yves Villeneuve

      You are obviously female.
      Seriously, are you either Kesha or Gaga? Or maybe work for either of them? There are a lot of hints pointing in the direction of you being a famous pop star or under their immediate direction.
      Elvis and Jagger never performed naked, by the way.

        • Yves Villeneuve

          They wore see-through costumes?
          If they whipped out their lizard like Jim Morrisson did, they would have been charged. Did they?

      • Bandit

        History Quiz!!!
        Sinead OConnor became famous singing a song written by a person who regularly used overt sexual themes to promote their career. I believe performing in assless pants occasionally.
        Name that person and you win a prize.

          • Bandit

            Was the assless pants hint too much?
            Anyway, congratulations you win a link

            Be sure to check out all the exploited folks on the side over their to the right (I don’t know what tech/marketing geeks call that)
            You win bonus points if you can tell me how much she gets paid after 58,761,868 views.

    • GGG

      They are not famous. The hints are that they may have had a hit or two in the past (probably 80s or 90s) with a song they wrote, and now blame their current lack of success on everyone and everything else besides themselves.

  2. Bandit

    I like this quote and I am not being sarcastic.
    “If you have an innocent heart you can’t recognise those who do not.”
    Unfortunately, Sinead’s condescending premise is that Miley Cyrus is somehow unaware of the consequences of what she is doing, and what others are doing with her career.
    Would it be OK if she knew exactly what she was doing?

  3. JTVDigital

    All Sinead’s statements about the music industry are correct BUT she’s oversimplifying things in a kind of right/wrong concept.
    Miley is young but she’s adult.
    Nobody forces her to adopt the marketing strategy she currently follows.
    She may be under influence, but the (condescending) tone of the article tend to say she does not have her free will…which is either a simplified way of viewing things or is somehow insulting for her…
    The real underlying question might be: nowadays how far a (male or female) performing artist / singer should go for selling music?
    See the latest Rihanna’s video…
    Also it’s not like Miley was an Indie artist trying to make some noise and break into the pop music scene…
    What is more legitimate?
    Prostitute for yourself / independently or for a pimp (the major record labels)?

    Food for thoughts…

    JTV Digital | Digital Music Distribution

  4. proof

    for proof of what sinead is saying, see Rihanna’s new vid for Pour. clearly, song/video written & produced & marketed by pimps.
    for the first time i actually thought: music really has died.
    who buys rihanna (or miley)– i’d be willing to bet it’s not men who go to strip clubs… which is the video p.o.v.
    and if it’s mostly 14 yr old girls (almost definitely), then wtf?

  5. Yves Villeneuve

    I’m going to weigh in here.
    The occasional sexual expression is totally fine. Some will do it slightly more, some slightly less.
    I thought the Wrecking Ball video was very tastefully done. There may be different incarnations of the video, but when she took a long lick of the sledgehammer this could easily represent “relishing revenge” and fits in with the lyrics.
    Sinead’s message that the music industry will try to prostitute the artist is totally true. Unfortunately, at the very end when she urged Miley to fire those who did not stop her from this type of expression, she was in fact telling her to fire her parents.
    Miley’s natural response to anything she doesn’t like is “disrespect”. Personally, though her parents may fear her disrespect, I don’t.

    • DUDE

      “I thought the Wrecking Ball video was very tastefully done.”
      Of all the stupid shit you’ve posted here, this is the stupidest

      • Yves Villeneuve

        You’ve been watching to many parodies, in my opinion.

    • mdti

      There is a 3rd letter from Sinead o’connor, and it looks like it might be going to court 🙂
      it can be found on sinead’s facebook, because for some reason, sinead’s website is down due to high traffic (or denial of service attacks from the Evil Industry??)
      there’s no business like show business 😀

    • GGG

      “but when she took a long lick of the sledgehammer this could easily represent “relishing revenge” and fits in with the lyrics.”
      Sorry, Yves. It represented a penis.