Middle School Girls Gone Wild

New York Times ^ | 29 December 2006 | LAWRENCE DOWNES

[shrinkermd]

It’s hard to write this without sounding like a prig. But it’s just as hard to erase the images that planted the idea for this essay, so here goes. The scene is a middle school auditorium, where girls in teams of three or four are bopping to pop songs at a student talent show. Not bopping, actually, but doing elaborately choreographed re-creations of music videos, in tiny skirts or tight shorts, with bare bellies, rouged cheeks and glittery eyes.

They writhe and strut, shake their bottoms, splay their legs, thrust their chests out and in and out again. Some straddle empty chairs, like lap dancers without laps. They don’t smile much. Their faces are locked from grim exertion, from all that leaping up and lying down without poles to hold onto. “Don’t stop don’t stop,” sings Janet Jackson, all whispery. “Jerk it like you’re making it choke. ...Ohh. I’m so stimulated. Feel so X-rated.” The girls spend a lot of time lying on the floor. They are in the sixth, seventh and eighth grades.

As each routine ends, parents and siblings cheer, whistle and applaud. I just sit there, not fully comprehending. It’s my first suburban Long Island middle school talent show. I’m with my daughter, who is 10 and hadn’t warned me. I’m not sure what I had expected, but it wasn’t this. It was something different. Something younger. Something that didn’t make the girls look so ... one-dimensional.

It would be easy to chalk it up to adolescent rebellion, an ancient and necessary phenomenon, except these girls were barely adolescents and they had nothing to rebel against. This was an official function at a public school, a milieu that in another time or universe might have seen children singing folk ballads, say, or reciting the Gettysburg Address.

[shrinkermd]

"...What surprised me, though, was how completely parents of even younger girls seem to have gotten in step with society’s march toward eroticized adolescence — either willingly or through abject surrender. And if parents give up, what can a school do? A teacher at the middle school later told me she had stopped chaperoning dances because she was put off by the boy-girl pelvic thrusting and had no way to stop it — the children wouldn’t listen to her and she had no authority to send anyone home. She guessed that if the school had tried to ban the sexy talent-show routines, parents would have been the first to complain, having shelled out for costumes and private dance lessons for their Little Miss Sunshines.

FYI East of the Apple Chain Mountain Alert

[nctexan]

I'm sad to say, it's some of what the mussies see and hate about us... I hate it too. Just a prig I guess.

[Mr J]

Destined to become tomorrow's man-hating, childless, therapy-seeking, 32-cat owning spinsters, IMO.

[operation clinton cleanup]

Well June, If girls want to be hoochies, who are we to stop that?

[EQAndyBuzz]

"It’s hard to write this without sounding like a prig."

He writes for the NY Slimes. He is a prig.

[Enterprise]

Well, the school administration could step in and set standards, but that might be asking too much.

[kerryusama04]

They have these "dance" classes where my 4 year old son takes gymnastics. Parents actually watch and encourage their 6 year old and up girls to do this. It is despicable. My daughters will never do this. Balet, yes, air sex, no.

Interesting enough, my 12 year old nephew saw this with his parents and siblings at his school in CA. His younger sister (9) said, "look at those dancers". The 12 year old said, "that's not dancing, that's sex".

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

Since when did the Slimes care about pre-teens dancing sexually? This is akin to abortionists showing concern over miscarriages.

[Mr. Mojo]

As each routine ends, parents and siblings cheer, whistle and applaud.

Parents applaud their daughters bumping and grinding to music with “Jerk it like you’re making it choke....Ohh. I’m so stimulated....Feel so X-rated" lyrics?

Sick.

[battlegearboat]

"Wally, we absolutely forbid you to date Mary Ellen Rogers again. You and Beaver go take a bath."

[SoftballMominVA]

These 'dance' classes started cropping up about 8 years ago and have escalated to some ungodly point. My SIL had her 7 year old niece quit gymnastics after she saw the floor show of an older group and realized that what she was seeing was nothing more than soft core kiddie porn. The mothers were actually showing the 9 year olds how to gyrate their hips and used the words "pout a bit more" "look sexier" "put your hand lower" She told me it was sickening. I can only imagine how these girls will act when they are in high school a few years from now.

[keats5]

You know, parents simply need to set limits. I have two high school boys and one middle school girl. I just tell them certain things are off limits. I speak with confidence and don't overexplain my reasons or try to negotiate. They actually listen, as though they expect me to take charge. It works.

Parents have been sold bill of goods that they have to "choose their fights" and only prohibit the most outlandish behavior while letting little things slide. Parents have to be parents of the little things before kids will listen about the big things. If you can't get your boys to keep their underware covered or have your girls cover their midriffs, you won't have much clout when you need to set more important sexual standards.

[SoftballMominVA]

make that "my" 7 year old niece, who btw is now in Teeball, a much better sport where the bodies stay covered and noone is judged on how cute you look.

[kerryusama04]

You're too late. It's already in the government High Schools. Schools that my kids will not be attending, either.

[lainie]

I'm very lucky to have a good dance studio for my kids, which is popular and successful, but really in tune with parents' wishes when it comes to this stuff. There is no booty-popping in the hip hop classes for kids. No belly shirts. No t-shirts are allowed with lewd things on them. It's nice.

[blondee123]

He writes for the NY Slimes. He is a prig.

He might be a prig, but this is what IS happening in the schools. My grandson is 10 and hasn't experienced it yet, but I've heard about it from parents of older kids & also heard a radio show with call-ins about this also.

YES, it's the parents who need to set limits, but it's the same parents who seem to be encouraging it & pushing their daughters to do this! SICK is right!

[operation clinton cleanup]

Awe geeze Mom, Mary Ellen does some really neat stuff!

[liberty or death]

Homeschool

[ClearCase_guy]

Usually on threads like this, we have one or two freepers who say "I graduated High School in the 1950's, and believe me this is nothing new ... I remember all the girls in 6th grade dancing like this to Buddy Holly."

Myself, I graduated HS in 1978 and the school dances back then were nothing like what goes on today. I can't believe the decline in standards (and the standards in 1978 were not all that high).

[CFC__VRWC]

This is probably just one of their rare times that they try to look "objective." And now they'll eagerly look forward to (and print) all the hate mail that comes in from their "enlightened" readers castigating this guy as a "prig" and a "Republican" and a "fundie." Anyone who writes agreeing with him will, of course, have zero chance of getting their letter into print.