Having warned MTV about a repeat of last year's Miley Cyrus twerking exhibition, the Parents Television Council had mostly nice things to say about MTV's Video Music Awards telecast Sunday night.
“MTV showed the world that it can act responsibly when it wants to, knowing that children – and especially young teens – are in the audience," said PTC President Tim Winter, saying MTV appeared to have toned down the broadcast compared to what he labeled last year's "cringe-inducing mess."
He said the bright spot was likely Truth's "Finish It" anti-smoking campaign, which showed the "power of celebrities to influence behavior for good."
But it was not all props for MTV. “It is perplexing that a performance would include, on the one hand, strong, positive written messages above the stage about honoring and respecting young women and ending gender-based double-standards," he said, "while on the other hand the female performers are on stripper poles with backup dancers in flesh-toned bikinis, and with female backup dancers wearing next to nothing while the males performers are mostly clothed ... MTV should follow the lead of Truth and empower young women by helping to combat these sexualized images and messages that it promotes on the VMAs and on its programming.”
