Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana Photos Are Completely Innocent

I'm sure news websites and TV shows saw this as a terrific, headlining, traffic-generating story -- seemingly innocent teen star Miley Cyrus caught in racy photos! No one is truly innocent, right? A 15-year old girl in the spotlight must be doing something wrong.

Photos of Cyrus, star of the hit TV show Hannah Montana, began circulating on the internet over the weekend. The photos show Cyrus and a friend who she describes as "one of my best friends" monkeying around during a sleepover in a hotel room. The key photo is of Cyrus and friend passing a piece of candy from mouth to mouth. This one is being described as "racy" or as "hot girl on girl action."

Ridiculous, says Cyrus. In an interview with Niko of radio station Z100 in New York, Cyrus asserted that the incident was completely innocent and not a big deal. "It's two girls at a sleepover, and if all of a sudden that's bad, then what is the world coming to?" says Cyrus.

After viewing the photos, I believe her. The supposedly racy photo isn't even close to being a kiss or any type of erotic pose. It's an innocent kids' game. I've seen church youth groups do games in which the participants eat candy or other food items together -- one on each end, until they meet in the middle. This is exactly the same sort of thing. I'm sure some people find it gross to move candy from one mouth to the other, but if the girls aren't worried about it, I'm not either. The HUM blog on E! Online agrees, saying it may be "unsanitary", but that's about it.

I'm just sorry that this news is out there for Cyrus' young fans to see. I have an almost-eight year old daughter who loves Hannah Montana, and I'm sure she'll be wondering what all of this is about if she sees it on the news. How am I supposed to explain it to her? My best bet may be to keep the TV off tonight.

Let's leave Cyrus alone. She's a talented girl, and so far appears to have plenty of family support to enable her to survive Hollywood. I'd like to see her succeed without the media trying to make her out to be just another teen star gone bad.

SOURCES
Z100 New York, "Miley Cyrus Hits Back At Rumors", http://www.z100.com/cc-common/videos_on_demand/
The HUM, "Sweet, Spit-Swapping Sleepover for Cyrus", http://www.eonline.com/gossip/hum/detail/index.jsp?uuid=5317d70a-a02e-4582-8324-6f9af475db5e&sid=fd-hot2-txt