Posted on 10/31/2007 11:58:37 AM PDT by tuffydoodle
Somebody should tell teenage girls that a high school homecoming is no place for a Carmen Electra lap dance.
And by somebody, I don't mean the stodgy Argyle school superintendent.
High school girls themselves should tell one another to turn around. Stop grinding. Make the boys look up.
Parents should demand it.
If you think I'm just old and out of touch with teenagers -- ask a counselor.
In all the reams of news coverage about Argyle High School's crackdown on "dirty dancing" and its homecoming-night cleavage ban, I have yet to see anyone ask a counselor whether rumped-up dancing is psychologically healthy for girls.
So I asked.
"This is all about wanting to be noticed, and boys definitely notice," said Carolyn Kern, a University of North Texas associate professor and director of the school's successful Counseling and Human Development Center.
"But provocative dancing isn't going to get these girls what they really want. They get attention. But they want an emotional connection."
That doesn't happen with your backside turned.
The flap about Argyle's homecoming dance has now stretched across three weeks.
New Superintendent Jason Ceyanes, 34, a straight-arrow type from an ultraconservative Houston suburb, has apologized for a surprise dance-night crackdown against spaghetti-strap dresses and plunging necklines.
But he still says he might "bring in dance instructors" to teach students other dances -- perhaps the foxtrot.
After two public meetings -- including a special trustees' meeting Monday -- school officials now promise to let parents help revise the dress code by Nov. 9. In other words, school officials are listening.
But some parents, and even one local newspaper, also seem to think Argyle officials should quit worrying about the "freak dancing" or "dirty dancing" that was interrupted at the homecoming dance.
In an editorial, the Denton Record-Chronicle wrote that schoolteachers shouldn't have to worry about whether teenagers "shake too much booty" and generally made it sound as if adults were wasting their time policing dances.
Look, I don't think Ceyanes' idea will work. I don't think teenagers want to learn the waltz. (Maybe the cha-cha.)
But I also don't think parents and school officials can just let every school dance turn into tuxed-up Greco-Roman wrestling.
And if some parents think low, hip-grinding dances are OK for high school seniors, then what age is too young?
Sophomores? Middle school? The Little Miss Argyle pageant?
The Argyle dispute "is a picture of what's going on today in society," Kern said.
"We're struggling to define what's OK for young people and at what age," she said. "A lot of research says that adolescents aren't emotionally ready to be sexually active, from a psychological perspective. But here they are, and we're left struggling over where to set boundaries."
What's fun -- and what's hurtful?
Unlike some national experts, Kern didn't go so far as to say that suggestive dancing is particularly demeaning to women or that it reduces teenage girls to faceless, twistable toys for boys.
But she did say that girls risk more.
"They don't realize that they're sending the message, 'This is what I want.' They might have to explain later that it's not what they want. That explanation might not be easy."
Argyle school board President Debbie Cantrell, a doctor, has defended students. They're not "dirty," she said, and she wishes we wouldn't describe the dances that way.
"We have some very good, intelligent young adults who stood up at our meetings and said, 'We don't know any other way to dance,'" she said.
All they have to do is turn around.
The only thing upsetting to liberals about underage girls doing lap dances would be if homosexual boys weren't given equal fawning attention when they did it.
“When you and Mrs. Medic have a 14 year old daughter, your opinion might change.”
But he might want the local high school boys humping his daughters backsides in public.
I have got to use that line, thank you.
ROFL.
Ding. Ding. Ding!!! We have a winna!
as annoying and irritating as i find the show “dancing with the stars,” and the movie ‘take the lead’ i’ve hoped that the popularity of them would teach girls that there are other styles of dance than bootie shaking, that are a heck of a lot more fun.
alas, most of the girls still learn how to dance from MTV.
I tried that a couple of times and found out that my girls weren't cheap dates. Expensive restaurants etc.
They even expected the super size box of pop corn at the movies and milk duds.
I’m sure there will be a differant form of music and dancing for me to disapprove of while fomenting that in my day we did things differantly (And had respect for our elders!) when I have a 14 y/o daughter.
Denton is a college town. UNT and TWU . . . old arthritic hippies and college professors are the “grown-ups” there. I wouldn’t expect the local girls to know how to dance without acting like twenty dollar, sticky floor hookers.
That’s harsh dude, what’s up with that?
At the rate things are going, your kids will have to be naked to top it.
That stuff is not easy to do ... lots of fun, though, even if you're not very good at it.
do you have any daughters?
And if so...would you be willing to go to the school dance and observe her grind with a number of boys (sometimes they grind in “clumps”)? Would you mind if the boys nuzzle her cleavage while the grinding occurs?
Would you do this without strangling the boys and order her to get her coat it’s time to go home?
Editorials at the Denton Wretched Chronicle are written by the Dallas Morning News' puppet there, and reflect the DMN's principles, or rather the lack thereof.
With your way of thinking don’t be shocked if your 14 year old daughter has a 1 year old son.
the basic steps for all of them are actually simple- easier than square dancing. its when you start getting to competition levels that they get hard.
Actually, thinking about this - it's not a bad habit to get them into. The gentlemen will have to understand that she requires a serious resource commitment in order to date her.
One night I realized that everything I had told her, and how I had helped raise her to be independent and have respect for herself had sunk in. I got a call about 10:30 from her needing me to come pick her up. Evidentially, the young man she had been with wanted a little more than just a movie. She knocked two of his teeth loose and walked out of the theater. That's where I picked her up.
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