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"It was a simple question, posed by actress Rashida Jones in our January issue: Have pop stars gotten too naked and provocative? But as your heated responses showed, the answer is complicated. So we asked some of the country&amp;#x27;s top experts&amp;amp;#8212;and 1,000 of you&amp;amp;#8212;to talk about it all. From Rihanna&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;Pour It Up&amp;quot; poledance video to Robin Thicke&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;Blurred Lines&amp;quot; topless backup dancers, 2013 was one steamy year in pop culture. But was the in-our-face nakedness good for women? Actress and writer Rashida Jones didn&amp;#x27;t think so: First on Twitter in October, then in the January issue of Glamour, Jones wished for &amp;quot;a slightly more clothed, more original 2014&amp;quot; and called on all of us to &amp;quot;take a look at what we are accepting as &amp;#x27;the norm.&amp;#x27; &amp;quot; She challenged stars as well, saying, &amp;quot;Please stop saying you don&amp;#x27;t want to be role models. Because guess what: You are.&amp;quot; As she explains today: &amp;quot;I was trying to engage in a call to arms. Like, &amp;#x27;You guys, I feel bombarded by this. Does anybody else?&amp;#x27; &amp;quot; Yes, yes, and yes, you told us: &amp;quot;Finally, a voice of reason!&amp;quot; posted one reader. &amp;quot;Can I get a &amp;#x27;hell yeah&amp;#x27;?&amp;quot; wrote another. The blogosphere lit up too, with commenters chiming in: &amp;quot;There&amp;#x27;s a big difference in being proud to be a woman and selling yourself,&amp;quot; said one. Declared another: &amp;quot;These women set us back [years in becoming] equals to men.&amp;quot; Even guys applauded Jones&amp;#x27; appeal for rein ing in the sexiness. &amp;quot;I agree with Rashida,&amp;quot; wrote one. &amp;quot;What ever happened to class and leaving something to the imagination? But some women took issue with Jones&amp;amp;#8212;saying it was sexist to ask women to cover up, or hypocritical to criticize female performers more than the music-industry execs who profit from them. Perhaps the strongest backlash was to a hashtag Jones had used on Twitter: #stopactinglike whores. &amp;quot;Implying women are &amp;#x27;whores&amp;#x27; for behaving sexually in ways you may not like? Really not cool,&amp;quot; posted writer Jessica Wakeman on thefrisky.com. Tweeted reader Sarah Rules: &amp;quot;Stop judging people by what they do with their bodies.&amp;quot; As blogger Courtney Enlow summed it up on pajiba.com: &amp;quot;I&amp;#x27;m torn. I want a world where baring it all doesn&amp;#x27;t make a woman a whore.... But I also want a world where a woman&amp;#x27;s body isn&amp;#x27;t a commodity [to be] bought and sold.&amp;quot; It&amp;#x27;s a major issue in our culture today: Over-the-top sexuality is everywhere. And the images reach even the youngest girls; according to the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, the percentage of female characters wearing sexy attire in G-rated films is very nearly the same as in R-rated films. &amp;quot;We need to have a conversation about all of this,&amp;quot; Jones tells Glamour. &amp;quot;How do we navigate this murky sea? What&amp;#x27;s the next step, for us and for girls?&amp;quot; The next step, if you ask us, is to keep talking. Glamour asked six experts who have devoted their careers to speaking (and singing) about these issues to have a little debate on T&amp;amp;A. .bio {width:352px; float: left; font-size:13px; line-height:110%;} .bio img {padding:0 10px 0 0; float:left;} .bio .pin-it-button{ display: none; } OUR PANELISTS EMILY BAZELONis the author of Sticks and Stones: Defeating the Culture of Bullying and Rediscovering the Power of Character and Empathy. KELI GOFFis a columnist for The Daily Beast and author of Party Crashing: How the Hip-Hop Generation Declared Political Independence. CAROLINE HELDMAN, PH.D.is chair of the politics department at Occidental College in Los Angeles and coauthor of Rethinking Madam President. AMANDA PALMERis a singer-songwriter who broke with her label after claiming it told her she looked &amp;quot;too fat&amp;quot;&amp;amp;#8212;and raised nearly $1.2 million from fans to make her top 10 album, Theatre Is Evil. SANTIGOLDis a songwriter and singer. Her second album, Master of My Make-Believe, hit number one on Billboard&amp;#x27;s Dance/Electronic Albums list. ROSALIND WISEMANis an expert on teens, bullying, and social justice. Her book Queen Bees and Wannabes was the basis of the 2004 film Mean Girls. First off, do you think female pop stars are hurting girls and women by playing up their sexuality? KELI GOFF: Some are. Women have to stop pretending the choices we make, particularly if we have a platform, don&amp;#x27;t affect others. We have to be held accountable. AMANDA PALMER: But Keith Richards and Mick Jagger go out there night after night and shake their asses, and everyone oohs and aahs. Why shouldn&amp;#x27;t a woman artist do the same? A female performer who wears a sexpot outfit one day, army pants the next, opens up space for all women to experiment with our clothes and sexuality. Without that freedom, we&amp;#x27;re still in a cage. SANTIGOLD: Pop stars are sending the message that their sexuality is the strongest thing they have to offer, and that&amp;#x27;s confusing and misleading to girls and women, especially since there&amp;#x27;s not enough of a counterbalance from those who rely on their other assets, like their music. Also, with the new obsession with all things &amp;quot;booty,&amp;quot; it&amp;#x27;s important that women&amp;amp;#8212;and it&amp;#x27;s often women of color&amp;amp;#8212;aren&amp;#x27;t turned into mere caricatures. Right now it&amp;#x27;s: &amp;quot;Bend over.&amp;quot; That&amp;#x27;s all people want to see. That&amp;#x27;s crazy. It&amp;#x27;s so far from where we should be. ROSALIND WISEMAN: We can&amp;#x27;t deny it&amp;#x27;s damaging. In some of Rihanna&amp;#x27;s and Miley&amp;#x27;s videos, the images are a nod to porn, which research shows most girls and boys have seen by the age of 12. So all of this is out there at once, giving kids powerful images of what women and men are supposed to want and expect. CAROLINE HELDMAN, PH.D.: And more than a decade of research has found that the pressure on girls to be sex objects can raise the risk of eating disorders, depression, and lower self-esteem. WISEMAN: The bright side is that a lot of girls I meet are really riled about what they&amp;#x27;re seeing. I&amp;#x27;m counting on these girls to show us a new, positive version of sexy that goes beyond the clich&amp;amp;#233;s and stereotypes. HELDMAN: And I don&amp;#x27;t think we should blame performers. I&amp;#x27;m reminded of that line in The Hunger Games: &amp;quot;Remember who the real enemy is.&amp;quot; A profoundly sexist music industry is the enemy, not the artists who face incredible pressure to stay relevant. NEXT: Who Deserves the Blame &amp;amp;#187; So should we blame record execs? HELDMAN: There&amp;#x27;s a double standard in which female musicians are generally thought of as sex objects first and musicians second, regardless of how talented they are. Miley Cyrus and Selena Gomez didn&amp;#x27;t just wake up one day and decide they wanted to go from being Disney princesses to sexy pop stars. They turned 18 in a culture that doesn&amp;#x27;t know what to do with talented women, so their handlers immediately turned them into sex objects. PALMER: Yes, but Miley, from what I can gather, is writing her own script. She&amp;#x27;s signing the checks, and I don&amp;#x27;t think any manager masterminded her current plan to be a raging, naked, twerking sexpot. Miley knows better than anyone: Swinging naked on a metal ball gets you more hits than swinging on a metal ball wearing clothes. EMILY BAZELON: Right, these young women aren&amp;#x27;t automatons. They&amp;#x27;re making choices. SANTIGOLD: It starts with the marketers; they push for it, and now people&amp;amp;#8212;including women!&amp;amp;#8212;buy into it. At this point everybody&amp;#x27;s drinking the Kool-Aid. Women say, &amp;quot;Oh, I want my body to look like that. How much do I have to pay? What doctor do I have to visit?&amp;quot; But ultimately the power lies with women artists, because we can change how we&amp;#x27;re marketed if we choose to. Can an overtly sexy woman be a good role model? BAZELON: If there&amp;#x27;s a balance, if sexy isn&amp;#x27;t the only way she presents herself. Katy Perry has talked about covering up sometimes; being at the top, she has tremendous power over her image. It would be great if she showed girls there&amp;#x27;s a range of ways to present yourself: tomboy, professional, sporty. HELDMAN: Celebrities are often bad role models because they teach girls the &amp;quot;sexy lie&amp;quot;&amp;amp;#8212;that being a sex object is empowering. Truth is, the pressure to be sexy leads many women to hate our bodies and compete with other women for attention. PALMER: I think a good role model has to be sexy. Real, empowered, self-possessed women are sexy. When you&amp;#x27;re really in control of your choices, your mood, your body, and your opinions, people find you sexy. WISEMAN: I tell young girls, &amp;quot;The world is going to exploit and manipulate your sexuality. If you benefit from that financially, then you are part of the problem.&amp;quot; That said, I thought all those parents flipping out over the Video Music Awards were ridiculous&amp;amp;#8212;women have been twerking in clubs for 20, 30 years. There&amp;#x27;s a real lack of awareness about what&amp;#x27;s going on across many layers of our culture. .bio {width:352px; float: left; font-size:13px; line-height:110%;} .bio img {padding:0 10px 0 0; float:left;} .bio .pin-it-button{ display: none; } YOU RATE THEIR LOOK: PRETTY...OR PORN? ADELEThe Brit Awards 201298% say sexy and empowering. 2% say too revealing and objectifying. TAYLOR SWIFT2013 Victoria&amp;#x27;s Secret Fashion Show94% say sexy and empowering. 6% say too revealing and objectifying. BRITNEY SPEARS&amp;quot;Work B**ch&amp;quot; Video42% say sexy and empowering. 58% say too revealing and objectifying. NICKI MINAJIn French Montana&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;Freaks&amp;quot; Video16% say sexy and empowering. 84% say too revealing and objectifying. After she initially tweeted #stopactinglikewhores, Rashida Jones was accused of &amp;quot;slut-shaming&amp;quot;&amp;amp;#8212; insulting women for expressing their sexuality. Is there a difference between shaming and holding someone accountable? GOFF: I don&amp;#x27;t see a big difference. I&amp;#x27;m of the old-fashioned opinion that shame can be used for all sorts of good in society. An example of this is smoking: When someone lights up around a crowd, people now usually say something. So I don&amp;#x27;t understand why it&amp;#x27;s not OK to apply the same logic to other behaviors. Playing the sex object may not be dangerous for Miley, with her bodyguards to protect her, but for a 13-year-old girl hanging out at a party at night, it can be. So I think it&amp;#x27;s fair to say to musicians: &amp;quot;Objectifying yourself is not the best choice.&amp;quot; PALMER: How about this? Forget shaming celebs for not getting the perfect balance of sexy and conservative. Instead, grab a 10-year-old and point to Miley and say: &amp;quot;That&amp;#x27;s one option. But there are infinite options. This is Patti Smith. And this is Yoko Ono and Mae West. Now decide who you want to be. And while you&amp;#x27;re deciding, who looks happiest?&amp;quot; In our survey, 65 percent of Glamour readers admitted they&amp;#x27;ve criticized a woman&amp;#x27;s sexual behavior or called a woman a slut. Is it ever OK to use the words whore and slut? HELDMAN: It&amp;#x27;s never OK to use these words. I wanted to give Miley Cyrus a big hug after reading that tweet. BAZELON: Agree. When you&amp;#x27;re trying to get a dialogue going, it&amp;#x27;s so important to be careful about the language used. Rashidawasn&amp;#x27;t saying, &amp;quot;Stop acting sexy!&amp;quot; She was saying, &amp;quot;Can&amp;#x27;t performers give us a little more variety?&amp;quot; But all people heard was the W-word. SANTIGOLD: If you&amp;#x27;re going to use a loaded word, know why you&amp;#x27;re doing it. [But] the message in Rashida&amp;#x27;s tweet was more important than the hashtag. It said women should recognize they have more to offer than only their bodies. That&amp;#x27;s why I retweeted it. PALMER: Let&amp;#x27;s be real: The W-word has come to mean something completely derogatory. When you call someone a whore now, you&amp;#x27;re talking about someone who sells her soul, her life, for money. I don&amp;#x27;t want to insult that person or yell at her. I want to help her. GOFF: I&amp;#x27;m less concerned about Rashida&amp;#x27;s word choice and more concerned about the end result. Is calling someone [a whore] more harmful than if this conversation had never started? No way. This is the conversation we need to be having! &amp;amp;bull; &amp;amp;bull; &amp;amp;bull; WHAT YOU THINK ABOUT ALL THAT NUDITY Glamour asked 1,000 women across the country: Do we sell ourselves short by stripping down? 1. Most of you are tired of all the toplessness and twerking. 50% say you&amp;#x27;ve never liked it. 40% say, &amp;quot;I&amp;#x27;m over it&amp;quot;&amp;amp;#8212;since every pop star is doing it, there&amp;#x27;s no impact. 10% love it all as is. 2.And a majority think it would be a step forward if stars covered up. 81% feel it&amp;#x27;s time artists were appreciated for their music, not their sex appeal. 19% say, &amp;quot;We&amp;#x27;re finally able to express our sexuality. Why take that away?&amp;quot; 3. But you don&amp;#x27;t just blame the stars&amp;amp;#8212;only 18 percent believe a celeb has full control over her look. 63% say the media pressures celebrities to bare all. 14% blame industry execs. 5% say it&amp;#x27;s the fans. 4. Most of you believe pop stars do have a responsibility to be role models to women. 61% say that with fame comes responsibility! 39% say celebs deserve to make mistakes just like the rest of us. &amp;quot;They are only people&amp;amp;#8212;they should have the right to dress and behave how they like,&amp;quot; said one respondent. 5. But the word whore? You say that&amp;#x27;s going too far. 43% believe it&amp;#x27;s never OK to call a woman that. 40% say it&amp;#x27;s acceptable... to describe a prostitute. 17% say it&amp;#x27;s fine to use. 6. Who&amp;#x27;s the most empowering woman in music? You said, in order: Beyonc&amp;amp;#233;, Adele, Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga, Carrie Underwood, Katy Perry, Pink, Miranda Lambert, and Kelly Clarkson Which stars do you think get sex appeal right, and which take #pornification too far? Tweet us @glamourmag or comment below to weigh in. Genevieve Field is a contributing editor for Glamour."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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