Screenshot: Twitter @MTV
Ladies, Gentlemen, and those in-between, I just finished writing about Pink’s acceptance speech at last night’s Video Music Awards on MTV.
That post was all about the triumph and strength of Pink’s music career, the love she has for her daughter, and the powerful message she shared to both her daughter and the audience about accepting yourself so that others can accept themselves.
But, while writing up that article I had a moment of surprise and confusion.
Before giving her speech, Pink gave a performance where she sang multiple songs from throughout her career. She ended it by singing her latest single, “What About Us.”
The performance is enhanced by having several dancers performing alongside Pink, and two of those dancers have their own dance solo. (That dance duet mimicked the one that starred in the original music video).
But here’s the problem. Did you catch the quick cut away that MTV did during the dance? If you didn’t, here’s a clip that someone tweeted of it.
When that cut away happened, I at first was in disbelief and confusion (some part of me still is). I thought, “Wait, did they just censor a gay kiss?” The suspicious timing of the cut away and the position that the two dancers are in gives way to that thought.
But, trying to not be the stereotype of an easily offended millennial on the internet, I decided to see what other people thought. I googled if anyone else was writing about this moment, I looked through the tweets talking about the #VMAs, and I found nothing. No one was talking about it.
I eventually looked through the tweets directly responding to the MTV video and found the comment above, but that’s all I’ve found. Is no one else concerned? Does no one else think this looks suspicious at the least?
Again, I don’t want to raise red flags when there are none, but there are clearly flags flying.
Under the context of the dance we can assume the dancers are telling us the story of a gay couple. The cut away happened just as the dancers fell over each other and came back as they stood up again with their heads pressed up against each other.
This doesn’t necessarily mean that there was a kiss (and again, no one is talking about it so I can’t confirm or deny if there was indeed a kiss in the first place), but the timing of the cut raises suspicions.
Even worse, a censor would contradict Pink’s words of acceptance and love for yourself and all.
Keep in mind, the fault isn’t on Pink (which is why I didn’t bring this up in the other post about her and her speech). This would be the fault of MTV and whoever’s behind the camera giving the commands.
On a night when artists at the VMAs talked about self-love & acceptance, suicide prevention, racism, mental illness, and more, MTV decided to censor a gay kiss? That just seems wrong to me.
But what do you think? Do you think MTV knowingly censored the kiss? Was there a kiss in the first place? Or, was this just bad timing from the production team?
Share your thoughts down in the comments below
Totally. I saw this cut away
Totally. I saw this cut away and I was like wait what? Why to just hands. There was no reason except they want to push an agenda obviously that it's still taboo or that they wanted the night to be about other things other than pink.