Posted on 12/30/2006 7:27:56 PM PST by 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.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The thing is though, if the Principal wanted to, he could tell the little darlings that he will not allow overtly suggestive sexual performances, and that it is a privilige to be at or in some school functions, it is not a right. The ACLU might beat him on a dress code, but it might be hard to beat him on a code of conduct matter. He could simply cancel all further functions where they danced or performed as cheerleaders.
Yep...then they move on to MYSPACE and post their simulated sex scenes for all to see......believe me....I have "relatives" I monitor who are doing this....
Glad I homeschool.
The actor who played "Ward" was homosexual. Holy irony Batman.
Well, I wouldn't say that.
But I think Camille Paglia has a good approach. As I understand it, she feels that rapists should be locked up because such behavior is abominable and inexcusable -- and then the victim (if she's been dressing and dancing like a whore, or perhaps drinking excessively at a fraternity) should be slapped and told "You deserved it, you little slut! I hope you learned something!"
Hey, the students have rights. At least that is what they are taught. Definitely not taught the 3 R's.
20 years ago the gym teacher at the nearby elementary school was teacing her girl charges "go-go dancing".
No, I was just not clear. I am NOT saying rape should be OK.
Sorry for my bad formulation!
my wife is a cheerleader sponsor at a Jr. high. Her girls are not allowed to do the suggestive dances. At school dances the kids are not allowed to do suggestive dances. The teachers, principal, and parents are pretty much on the same page.
There is another Jr. high in our area that is a feeder for our high school and things there are completely different. The kids act horrible and the teachers and principal stand there not knowing what to do.
The kids actually want discipline, but some lazy adults don't want to provide it.
I must remember this line!
I must remember this line!
I must remember this line!......................FRegards
"I guess I'm a dinosaur."
The older I get, the less trouble I have being a dinosaur.
One of my favorite things to say to my kids when they think I'm being completely out of touch is "Hey...I'm old school, remember?".
Funny thing is, I heard my son say that to a buddy of his a couple weeks ago. They may not agree, they probably won't like it, they'll even make fun of it....but they do soak it in. Not just what you say, but how you act too: like when my youngest asked if road rage was taught at that old school.
hugh beaumont. I had not heard he was a homo. I know he was married with 3 (I think) children and was involved in the methodist church in some way tho. oh well.
"The actor who played "Ward" was homosexual. Holy irony Batman."
No he wasn't. You're thinking of the guy who played the father on the Brady Bunch.
At our town's 300th anniversary celebration there were two sets of dancers - ladies in their sixties to eighties with tophats and canes doing a dignified patriotic softshoe, and 12-14 year olds doing the pelvic-thrusting leg-spreading putting-out-on-stage dance. Thoughts going through my head, "Do those girls know what they're signalling...what are their parents thinking...time to marry them off...no wonder the Muslims despise us...their grandmothers had more fun..."
So I'm a prude.
Mrs VS
Or the parents could.
Little Suzy: Mommy, Daddy, can I take part in a talent show? I'm going to dress up and act like a two bit whore!
Parents: What? Did you say something? Now quiet dead momy and Daddy are trying to watch Despertant Housewives.
I know it has be come really PC to condemn any suggestion that a woman's dress or behavior contributed to a rape. But I have no doubt it does. If you set your wallet down on the hood of your car before you walk into the mall to shop, don't be surprised if someone steals it while you're gone. It's theft, of course, and that it wrong. But to say your action in putting it there did not contribute to the crime is silly. If a woman sets out to arouse a man, and then gets raped, yes it's rape and rape is always wrong. But to suggest her behavior did not contribute is dumb.
When has it not?
The NYT writer is to be complimented, not jeered at, for having the conscience and fortitude to publicly have made his observation.
How many of the anonymous keyboard warriors on this site have gone forward with like observations in, say, letters to the editor of a print medium??
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