My dear friends, you’ve no idea how brutal this world can be to an artistic soul. One by one, it eats them alive. Raymond Chandler. Dashiell Hammett. Dorothy Parker. Damon Runyan. Anita Loos. Ernest Hemingway.Mother Goose.

Yes, for is there any soul as fragile and artistic as that of a child’s storyteller? And yet as each tender Easy Reader, picture book, or pop-up manuscript is born, it is ruthlessly wrenched from its creator’s loving embrace and cast upon the heaving black waters of the heartless book market, there to sink or swim as its now-helpless progenitor can only clutch pearls or fedora and gape, wreathed in cigarette smoke and sheer terror (and then write about it on the Oprah forums). Oh! The Humanity!

Here, thanks to Kids in the Hall, perhaps the greatest sketch comedy troupe in history, is archival footage of one such writer’s brutal struggle through the long, dark, teddy bear’s picnic of the soul.

I was going to use their Teddy Bear’s Picnic skit, but that’s too dark even for me.

Sigh. I didn’t really want to go here. I really didn’t. But…

Who exactly are we trying to kid?

All these people who are screeching in outrage at the photo above of a “naked” Miley Cyrus need to step back for a second and take a deep Zen breath. And unfortunately, it seems I must disagree with my esteemed colleague on this issue.

I happen to live in an area that is not only hot, but not too far away from the beach.

Compared to half the girls parading around the area, Miley is looking pretty freaking demure.

A year or two ago it was de rigeur  for teen girls to wear tight crop tees with micro minis, which as a combo happen to show quite a bit of flesh. I mean, go take a look at one of the dresses from Juicy Couture’s current line. Go ahead, I’ll wait for you. Now ask yourself, what is the huge difference? And then tell me, because I’d really like to know.

Is it the sheet? Is it the tousled hair? Is there an uncomfortable whiff of something post-coital about the picture?

Because I don’t remember quite this type of outcry when young Jamie Lynn Spears announced her pregnancy, and she obviously didn’t just hint around at the whole sex thing.

Why are we so surprised that young people are embracing the provocative and sexual?

I mean, we are the country of Brazilians for young girls, of plastic surgery for teens, of flaunting everything we’ve got.  The media role models of these girls are the likes of Paris “Skank” Hilton and Lindsay “Drunk” Lohan.  They see Britney flashing her hoo-ha practically every month, naked photos of Vanessa Hudgens,  and I don’t think they give it much thought.

I’m not saying that it’s a good thing, but there it is.

Frankly, I’m shocked that anyone else is shocked.

And if you truly think this picture is trash-tastic, then I advise you to never go onto MySpace.

*Hat tip to superfantastic reader Seana for alerting me to the SFGate article!