Miley Cyrus is getting a ridiculous amount of money for her memoirs, so it’s only fair that she should at least attempt to make them somewhat interesting. In a short excerpt leaked from the forthcoming book, the teen star reveals that she was the victim of bullying – both physical and verbal – by other girls at school in Tennessee.
MILEY CYRUS was so badly bullied at school that a cheese sandwich she clung onto for dear life became “pretty much my best friend”. Now a multi-millionaire TV, music and film star, she says her school days were “friendless, lonely and miserable” – leaving her in constant fear of physical abuse.
In her new book Miley Cyrus: Miles To Go, the Hannah Montana star talks candidly about the sad memories from her Tennessee high school. She wrote: “The girls took it beyond normal bullying. These were big, tough girls. I was scrawny and short. They were fully capable of doing me bodily harm.”
One on occasion she was locked in a bathroom by her tormentors and challenged to a fight by ‘The Anti-Miley Club’. She said: “It seemed like Operation Make Miley Miserable was escalating to a new level. More like Operation Take Miley Down.
“Three girls strutted up and stood towering over me. My stomach churned. I clutched my grilled cheese sandwich like it was the hand of my best friend.
“It pretty much was my best friend those days. I was done for.
“They started cussing me and telling me to get up. I sat there, frozen. I didn’t know what to do. Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore. I wasn’t chicken.
“What could they do to me? I was surrounded by people. I stood up, still a foot shorter then they were, and said: ‘What’s your problem? What did I ever do to you?’”
In the book, the 16-year-old star also spoke of “the hardest day ever” when she split up with JONAS BROTHERS star NICK, who she refers to as Prince Charming. Explaining why the ended their relationship, she wrote: “Deep down I know we weren’t being our best selves. And that was what I wanted – and thought I deserved – in a relationship.”
I’ll tell you what: there’s no amount of money on Earth that would make me want to be a girl in middle school again. Girls today are so much nastier -and at a much earlier age. If you are a girl who is different or stands out in any way, you can expect to be hassled by other girls who are either jealous or looking to take you down to establish themselves. It’s like “Heathers,” on steroids. I’ve seen it first-hand thanks to my 14-year-old. And it’s much more socially acceptable for girls to get in knock-down, drag-out fistfights today.
It’s pretty well established that I can’t stand Miley Cyrus and think she’s a giant phony, but if this story is true, it’s the first thing I’ve heard that actually makes her sound like a normal girl.
Here’s Miley and boyfriend Justin Gaston bicycling around the Cyrus home in Toluca Lake, CA on Friday morning. Images thanks to Fame.com and BauerGriffinOnline.
I dunno, I’ve always been quite weird and never got really got bullied or picked on, mostly because it was obvious I had no desire to be like the normal/popular kids or be part of their friend group. I could definitely feel their disdain, but I don’t think all “different” kids get targeted.
I grew up in the 90s, went to high school in the early 2000s and let me tell you, those c*nts were horrifying. Makes glad I was a quiet reserved bookworm type.
But life is like kinda highschool when you think about it. Theres always (unfortunately) going to be that assh*le round the corner thats not satisfied with him/herself so, they have to dump their misery on some one else.
SO RIDICULOUS! How in the world did Miley Cyrus get a book deal to write her so-called memoirs? Who would possibly want to read this “fluff” book besides maybe other teenage girls? How do you have the life experience and insight necessary to write memoirs at athe age of sixteen? As an adult reader, I barely got through the above excerpt…
I’m not surprised, considering her and her family’s attitudes, that she was bullied. But I also know, as a proud Nerd, that some people can be relentless in trying to make your life living hell. Unfortunately I didnt’t have million of dollars, my own tv show, and a 20-year old model boyfriend to make it all better! So I don’t really feel all that bad for her. I can understand how she might have been (and still is!) extremely unlikeable.
“I didnt’t have million of dollars, my own tv show, and a 20-year old model boyfriend to make it all better! So I don’t really feel all that bad for her.”
Jeez, jealous much?
Miley is so pretty.
I have a hard time believing that junior high girls are worse today than they were in the 90’s when I attended. The bullying I endured on a daily basis was horrific. The best I could do was try to stay under the radar, but the utter disdain, contempt and undeserved hatred directed at me has marked me forever. I’ll never forget after my wonderful father died, being told “your dad was a loser, I’m glad he’s f**king dead.” Sorry- a little off topic, guess I needed to vent!
I went to school in the 70s and 80s so I guess I got out just in time.
There were a couple of girls who were bullies in my class, but they were not popular. They were big, scary girls who used their size to intimidate the rest of us. It was nowhere near the level of social, psychological and physical bullying going on today. With the internet and social networking, there are even more ways to torment someone!
Yea, it’s tough being a teenager these days, just in the sense of like, kids have gotten meaner and meaner. I never had to deal with this in hs, and I’d like to think I’m not THAT far out of it.
Either way, if this is true, it saddens me that she hasn’t learned sensitivity to others’ feelings from this experience.
No one should have to deal with bullying, but to turn around and deal the same hand…..*le sigh*
I’m here to tell you, the mean-girls thing starts in first and second grade now.
I really don’t think girls are worse than they used to be. There are certainly more ways to bully people via technology so in that respect, it might be worse. I’ve heard stories from my mom’s childhood and it seemed girls taunted each other just as much back then as today. I remember in 6th grade there was this one specific girl everybody was terrified of. One mother complained to the school about this girl’s bullying (she spread around the rumor that a girl had herpes… it wasn’t true) and this bully’s mother was actually a teacher at the school. Then I think a few more parents came forward about it.
Parents-watch your young girls. Teach them to treat others with respect.
I call BullShit!
Memoirs? At age 16? My God, I hate kids. Although, when I was 16 I’d probably be arrogant enough to think I had enough life-changing experiences to publish to the world.
I don’t believe it. I was bullied in junior high and high school. Her story doesn’t ring true.
scorpiogal: Junior high was a nightmare for me, too. I still look back and wonder how I survived.
yasmin – You’re funny. I was merely trying to illustrate a point. It’s a little hard to feel bad for her when she’s got a lot of other things to focus on. Like you and the rest of her “fans”.
Oh, puh-leeze. These kinds of buzzard situations just don’t happen at the private schools she’s probably attended her whole life, let alone private high schools. Scarring, emotional, underhanded, maybe, but never physical.
Also I’ve met this chick in her natural habitat. She’s the last person I would single out as a former bullying victim.
Note to Miley: Boo hoo hoo. Am I supposed to feel bad for you? Nice try, no cigar. And those stories sound a tad too over dramatic.
Memoirs? You’re 16, sweetcakes; Sorry to be blunt, but you don’t know shit. Nice attempt at an attention grab with the ‘I was bullied’ bit, though.
Sounds like the script of a made for TV movie geared towards 12 year olds. I don’t buy this for a second.
The writing style makes it pretty clear that the book is aimed towards young readers, and it’s probably part of her Disney contract. BTW, does anyone else think that Disney is like, a giant plantation? They work all those kids WAY too hard, and sooner or later, they’re going to crash and burn.
I was bullied until I spent a year in the psychiatric ward at the age of 13.
funny how nobody fucked with me after that.
I wonder how many people who post insulting comments about celebs on gossip blogs to make themselves better are bullies in real life?
WAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!!!!!!!
There are dynamics in society today that, I freely admit, make things more physically dangerous for teenagers now.
I grew up in the 80’s and graduated high school in the early 90’s. We didn’t have to fear that our classmates would show up and shoot people if they got angry, and no one got raped in the girls’ room at lunchtime. In many ways, then, my generation had a much easier time of it than does Miley’s.
Even in 1988, though, girls were cruel– unabashedly cruel and threatening. Not ALL the girls, of course. Not everyone got picked on, and not everyone was a bully. That said, I don’t think the emotional abuse and sociological pecking order phenomena that are so unique to adolescent females is any different today than it ever has been.
I have been known to jokingly comment that there is no creature on earth more capable of inhumane cruelty than a 14 year-old girl. In many ways, I think it’s a true statement.
I will never forget the names of the girls in that small group of emotionally abusive brats at my junior high school…I remember their names, first and last, though I haven’t seen any of them for 21 years. I will never forget the humiliation, disdain, and malice they dosed out to whoever they trained that bored and malevolent gaze upon whenever a whim struck.
It was awful…and I wouldn’t volunteer to live through it again for anything. It was a time to be survived, and I think many women feel the same way I do about that age.
I’m very sorry Miley Cyrus dealt with that. Sadly, it’s a fairly common life experience.
pix: I’m with you. This sounds out of a script. A terrified girl doesn’t stand up to her abusers, even in public. And she’ll never be abused in front of people.
An entire club dedicated to bully Miley ? I can’t believe it. Miley is of the bullying kind, not of the bullied one. Remember, this controversy with Asians ? Everyone on her show hating her ?
And there’s Britney. She has been a consistently nice teenage star and never reported bullying in school.
She’s playing the pity party here.
This is the oldest sympathy trick in modern history. Shame on Miley for belittling those who really suffered to gain some sympathy fame/vote.
Aspen, I can honestly say that what doesn’t kill us must make us stronger, because it sure seems to be the case when I listen to/read your conversations. I grew up around the same time as you did and things weren’t that easy then, but it sure wasn’t as bad as things are today.
I’ll never forget the abuse one girl ALWAYS took – she was very tall, overweight, and prematurely balding. Poor girl… I still shake my head remembering how cruel people were. But she was always nice and gracious about it. I ran into her years later and she was like ‘why don’t you come to the reunions?’ – I responded with, “why do YOU?” “I didn’t like those people when I went to school with them, why would I want to socialize with them now?”. I was lucky in that I had good friends and was in one of the “good” crowds, but even they were unnecessarily cruel. I think I was the only person outside that girl’s social circle who ever defended her.
I call B.S. on Miley’s story,too, and agree she’s more the bullying kind. Remember that video she made mocking Selena Gomez and Demi Lovato? Classic bullying, except, as a “star” she got to send it out to the world to try to humiliate those girls even more. I can’t stand her.
Seriously this sounds more like she just wants us to feel sorry for her. In reality there are worse bullies out there than the the ones she had. Like the manipulating bitches I had at my school. I was the quiet, reserved kid who just remained isolated and out of the way. It didn’t stop them thought.
I was bullied in the 50’s and the 60’s until my brothers taught me how to fight like a cornered rat lol Thosee girls can be vicious and when it happened to my daughter who was a lways small ,I taught her how to fight too. I can believe Miley went thru this. The minute my kid played in some sports a few of the older girls went after her. The schools took after the brats but they couldnt be there all the time. When she walked home from school is when they went after her.
Kids can be real bastards and their folks wont do anythin g about it either so you know where they got it from. I believe Miley.
Most of the comments on many sites focus on the wrong areas. The important areas to focus on are: It happened to Miley, it happens to most kids, it happens to our kids. What can our children and teenagers do and what can we do?
Other people can take forever trying to educate and convert bullies and their parents while the rest of the kids remain victims. But educating bullies and their parents begins when they find out that the old tactics don’t work. Protect kids now; stop bullies first and then educate them.
The lessons we can learn from Miley Cyrus are that we need:
1. Principals and other administrators who want to stop bullying.
2. Federal laws that require each school to create programs defining and prohibiting specific bullying behaviors and that hold principals liable for their failures.
3. School anti-bullying policies with specific behaviors spelled out. That way, principals and teachers will be supported in preventing bullying and in tackling bullies and their parents. And the principals who don’t want to act will be forced to.
4. Children, teenagers and parents who respond immediately. They’re alerting the rest of us and rallying us to be their allies and to help them resist.
In addition to professional experience, I learned practical, pragmatic methods growing up in New York City and then watching our six children and their friends and enemies. And we live in Denver, home of Columbine High School.
Disclosure: I’m the author of the books and CDs “How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks,” and “Parenting Bully-Proof Kids.” See my web site and blog at BulliesBeGone (http://.BulliesBeGone.com).
i am in the 6th grade, and no one ever would try to do that to me, cuz i am 5.6″ but what they did to poor miley was just awfull