With Miley Cyrus releasing her “admitting to aging” anthem, “Used to Be Young,” at a time when admitting to aging as a woman somehow seems less acceptable than ever, Selena Gomez has opted to veer in an entirely different direction with her own ditty (released the same day as Miley’s on August 25th): the far more upbeat “Single Soon.” In contrast, to the lament of “Used to Be Young,” which focuses on letting go of “frivolous things” and overall folly, “Single Soon” seems to be Gomez’s bid to ignore the idea of any sense of aging whatsoever. For, at almost exactly the same age as Cyrus, Gomez is ready to hit the bars drinking and the clubs dancing. Something that belies Cyrus telling British Vogue back in May, “[This songwriter had brought me] like, you know, the standard fucked up in the club track. And I was like, ‘I’m two years sober. That’s not where I spend my time, you know. You’re more likely to catch me and my friends literally walking through rose gardens or going to a museum…’ It’s not about being self-serious. I’m just evolved.”
Not to say that Gomez can’t be “evolved” either just because she’s still setting her videos in clubs and portraying puerile scenes of jumping in pools, running through alleyways and having “girlie” sleepovers. She just happens to be “evolving” in a slightly more “resistant-to-aging” way. Hence, lyrics like, “I know I’m a little high/Maintenance, but I’m worth a try/Might not give a reason why (oh well)/We both had a lot of fun/Time to find another one/Blame it all on feelin’ young.” The operative word being feelin’. And it seems appropriate that, as though to reflect the inability to “act one’s age” that most women in the public eye suffer from, Kim Kardashian would also post a video of herself jump roping on the eve of the “Single Soon” release with the caption, “I don’t know how to act my age; I’ve never been this old before…” Famous women, of course, have an especially challenging time dealing with this “issue.” Which should really be a non-issue if we actually lived in a non-judgmental, non-patriarchal society. Alas, we do not…and that’s why we’re met with this schizophrenic reaction among women vis-à-vis aging. The split persona that results in a pop star like Britney still playing the Lolita coquette or someone like MARINA saying “fuck it” and letting her hair go gray (for a while, anyway). The divergent reactions women can have merely to entering their thirties is telling of the weighty societal pressures placed upon them from an early age to “stay young” forever. Even though that ends up getting them condemned, too (see: Madonna).
While Cyrus seems to be running an offensive on being called “old” by branding herself with the euphemistic label “used to be young,” Gomez is on the defensive by embracing the idea that being single in one’s thirties is nothing to be ashamed of. Ergo, drawing on an homage to the premier single girl show, Sex and the City, for her music video. Except, rather than mirroring Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Gomez chose to lip sync some of Samantha’s (Kim Cattrall) dialogue (in a teaser for the single) from the season one episode, “Three’s A Crowd.” Even though she might have done the “Who is this?” line one better by quoting Samantha saying, “If you’re single, the world is your smorgasbord.” That’s what comes across, for the most part, in the video for “Single Soon,” although we never once see Gomez with any “variety of men” to prove that smorgasbord point. Rather, she plays up the kind of sologamist angle that shines through in Ariana Grande’s “thank u, next,” ultimately a clip show collection of tributes to Grande’s favorite “00s teen girl” movies, including Mean Girls, Bring It On, 13 Going on 30 and Legally Blonde, that involve no sign of her enjoying her singledom in ways that involve men.
As for Cyrus, the absence of anything whatsoever in her video apart from herself also speaks to the current landscape of self-obsession posing as “self-love.” Indeed “the self” appears to be the primary fixation of the twenty-first century (which certainly makes it easier to be single). A reality solidified as social media mutated into what it is today. Not only a powerful platform for narcissism, but also hatred and bullying. Something Gomez was reminded of when devoted Selenators came for Hailey Bieber earlier this year after Gomez posted a TikTok of herself saying she had accidentally over-laminated her eyebrows. Hours later, Kylie Jenner, “bestie” to Hailey, posted a photo of herself with a heavy filter that featured a caption placed directly over her eyebrows that read, “This was an accident?????”
Immediately presumed to be shade at Gomez’s looks (because, unlike Stefano Gabbana, not everyone can just come right out and call Gomez “brutta”), Bieber was triangulated for being “@’d” in the story by Jenner with a picture of Bieber’s unkempt brows screenshotted from a FaceTime call. If it was, in fact, as calculated as everyone insisted, not only is it tragic how underhanded things have to be “nowadays” (as opposed to a good old-fashioned, on-blast feud like the one between Joan and Bette), but it also serves to both affirm and undercut Gomez’s message about being single.
Sure, on the one hand, you don’t become a petty, possessive little bitch like Bieber, but on the other, those petty, possessive bitches like Bieber view you as a threat because of your single status. As was the case for Carrie Bradshaw in “Bay of Married Pigs,” during which she’s exiled from her married friend Patience’s (Jennifer Guthrie) Hamptons house because her husband, Peter (David Healy), strategically chooses to walk around without any underwear on in the hallway so that Carrie will be able to see his “pepper mill-(sized) dick.” When Patience finds out, she sends Carrie packing, prompting the latter to continue her thesis for that week’s column: “Married people don’t hate singles. They just want us figured out.” And so long as they stay single, they never will be. Thus, the enduring divide.
As for Miley, she seems on the Charlotte (Kristin Davis) track at the moment with all this talk of putting aside “silly (/slutty) youthful behavior” and perhaps focusing on a more stable life. Whatever that might actually mean for a Sagittarius. As for Gomez, a Cancer cusping Leo, it would seem her own security-craving sign betrays any genuine desire to be single. So maybe, in the end, they both mean the opposite of what they’re saying out loud…
