Controversy: the new Heroin?

Something has been brought to my attention today regarding the subject of controversy. Something which has disappointed and annoyed me and which I would like to address.

The thing that I am speaking of, which I am sure will be common knowledge to everyone before the week is up, is an outfit that Lady Gaga wore to the Video Music Awards this month; an outfit made of raw meat. Firstly, I saw her picture on the cover of Vogue sporting a meat bikini a few days ago, and I wasn't shocked by this. A little grossed out, but hey, it's Vogue, I assumed it was making some obscure statement, which I can usually accept with fashion (except fur, which I will never accept), because fashion is, after all, a form of art, and artists have done far worse.

But I have to draw a line here. Don't get me wrong, I am not a "hater"; one of those people who records videos of themselves to post on YouTube. I love Lady Gaga, I have listened to The Fame Monster for months on end, and know most of the choreography to Bad Romance and Telephone, and I usually adore her outfits. Until now. This "dress", along with shoes and purse, is not awe-inspiring. It is disgusting. It is not cool. It is offensive. And worst of all, I can't even find a valid point behind it. She stated that she didn't want to wear "just another award show dress", but since when has Lady Gaga ever worn just and award show dress? She also said that it worked alongside her protest against the US Military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy on homosexuality within the armed forces, and that "if we don't stand up for what we believe in, we're going to have as much rights as the meat on our bones." Now is that a valid and structured reason, or a vague and roundabout justification for a blatant attempt at controversy? She has reached a plateau at which the Lady Gaga effect of shock and surprise has begun to ebb, as the public become accustomed to her outlandish outfits, so larger steps must be taken for the same effect, kind of like drug addiction. Only in this case she hurdled, and overdosed.

A meat dress, I ask you. The cover of Vogue wasn't enough? She had to have a dress made for the VMAs? An article in a fashion magazine is one thing, which I can just about put up with. But to walk around a ceremony dressed in rotting animal flesh is something quite different. Something beyond tolerable. Now although her past outfits haven't exactly been to everyone's taste, they could still be considered beautiful or at the very least interesting in their own respect. People may turn up their noses and brand them "ridiculous" or "silly", but not necessarily "revolting" or "offensive". This is both of those things and worse, because it makes no significant statement/ And at the risk of sounding like a typically opinionated vegan, I quote PETA in saying that "meat is the decomposing flesh of a tormented animal, and after a few hours under the TV lights, it would smell like the rotting flesh that it is." Vegetarianism aside, I can't imagine that many carnivores appreciate the Meat Dress either. This is no less offensive to me than the infamous pictures which surfaced of the Iraqi prisoners, tortured by US Military Personnel at Abu Ghraib. And this is precisely why my stance is so passionate. Because people are free to dress up in the shredded skin of a pig and it's forgotten in a few weeks, but people like Ed Gein, who used human skin went down in history as one of the most notorious and hated serial killers of all time. Why then, are human rights and animal rights so different? I would just like to say thank you Lady Gaga, for completely undermining the opinions of every animal rights activist for a frivolous publicity stunt.

Returning to the first point, why was this even necessary? To stand out in the crowd? When you are Lady Gaga I'm pretty sure that blending into the background hasn't been an option for quite a while now. To have her opinions about the US Military heard? Her opinion on this has been common knowledge for months now already (without the need of animal carcasses). So what? Publicity remains the only conceivable reason. But exactly how much publicity does one person need?