Miley Cyrus's much talked about and controversial performance at the weekend's MTV VMAs has now been addressed by the supposed creator of the foam finger, a prop which she used provocatively on stage at the ceremony.

Steve Chmelar told FOX News that he was upset to see the item, which he claims to have invented at just 16-years-old to use at his high school's football games, being used in such a manner:

"I would say that it certainly misrepresented its intent to encourage team support. She took an honourable icon that is seen in sporting venues everywhere and degraded it."

"Fortunately, the foam finger has been around long enough that it will survive this incident. As for Miley Cyrus, let's hope she can outlive this event and also survive."

He added: "For people that like that kind of entertainment, I'm sure that it met their needs. If I had a choice between Julie Andrews singing 'The Sound of Music' and Miley Cyrus doing '[We] Can't Stop', I'd go the Julie Andrews route, but everyone has their choice and their decision."

Yesterday, a spokesperson from the Teddy Bear Fund criticised the superstar's set for using the childhood toy in an "offensive" manner: "Miley made a poor choice to use a universally loved children's teddy bear in an offensive way. There is always good art and bad art - unfortunately... this was bad art. Hopefully she might consider reversing this situation by giving lots of teddy bears to children in need of comfort."