because raves aren't always appropriate...

I was at homecoming this past weekend and, given my miraculously heightened sense of male gender roles, I made a few interesting observations that I would like to share with the wild internet west. Alright, I have taken a sip of coffee, so here we go.

There is no such thing as a male dance move. I noticed this as I was trying to dance to various rap and pop songs. I would sort of try and get into it and then I would grudgingly realize that I really had no dance repertoire to draw on for that selection. I had two options: either dance like a heterosexual douchebag or dance like a flaming homosexual.

Let us look at the dance routine of the douchebag. Put yourself in the scene. The lights are flashing, there are smoke machines coughing up some questionable substance that you are not entirely willing to inhale. The douchebag places his concealed penis strategically in the small of a girls back. They begin to grind. The douchebag sways back and forth as though he has a serious inner ear condition. The girl does her thing, and she tries to arouse the boy by rubbing up and down and all around. Chances are they are not even going to have sex; it’s a fruitless ritual. But the guy looks around with a sense of superiority and he raises a hand and wags a finger back and forth in the air as though he’s signaling to the men wearing sunglasses that he has made contact with the hit.

I, of course, did not feel very comfortable because I don’t have any desire to grind with a girl. What is a guy supposed to do if he wants to dance to rap music but doesn’t want to grind? Can’t a guy enjoy himself without having to display his sexual prowess?

Now, a few minutes later, Lady Gaga bursts out of the speakers. I was able to identify more with this music because I’m gay. Don’t start screaming about how I’m setting back the gay rights movement by a thousand years. Frankly, Lady Gaga is a gay icon and her music is great to dance to, especially when Bad Romance is being played at like a million decibels. I grabbed my glow-sticks and I began to rave. I stomped and I aggressively thrust my hands in the air and it was so great. But this was the dance of the homosexual who was clearly enjoying Gaga a little too much. I think the room may have caught on to this fact when I started screaming the lyrics at my friends. It was just one of those moments.

I think in retrospect, however, that dancing to this song would have been about forty times more appropriate if I had been dancing with other gay men, instead of straight girls. Conversely, if I had had a girl to grind with during the straight music, then I would have been much less out of place as well. Men need a happy medium when they are dancing, and they need to be able to dance for their own enjoyment without having to display machismo.

Is there some sort of neutral, masculine dance move? I was trying to figure this out, and the conclusion I reached was as such: just spaz out and then no one can even identify you as anything other than crazy. Admittedly, I tried to do some sort of fist pump jumping combo at first, but then I felt as though I was making a guest appearance on Jersey Shore. Fortunately for me there were no grenades to throw myself on, and Snookie was not in the building messing around with her poof. I tried to sway back and forth, but then I felt like a tool as well for not coming up with a better dance move. But if you try a legitimate dance move as a guy, then you come off as gay and that does not really help you either. So my options are to be a buzz-kill, a flamer, or a guido.

I’m really hoping that someone out there as found a nice in between dance aesthetic because I want to be able to feel comfortable dancing to all different types of music instead of feeling shafted when something comes on and I don’t want to grind. I think that Americans have a highly inflexible dancing tradition that requires men to dance as a symbol of sexual bravado rather than for personal fulfillment.

Alec also writes for B.A.M. Be A Man

Grinding...truly a subdued picture.

I had been at college for three days, and my friends and I were anticipating the First Chance Dance, an annual tradition meant to facilitate fun and friendship during the notoriously uncomfortable orientation process.  My dorm’s resident advisor encouraged us to go, advising that it provides “a great opportunity for sexual exploration.”  Some of my newly minted classmates obviously saw it that way; the First Chance Dance would be better described as “a room full of sweaty teenagers in varying states of sobriety engaging in fully-clothed sex on the dance floor.”  Not an exaggeration.

First of all, the “grinding” phenomenon demands a discussion.  Let’s be honest: grinding is basically simulated sex on the dance floor.  I try to be sex-positive and am generally comfortable with open expressions of sexuality.  But isn’t dry sex in a public setting, and with someone who you’ve known for less than a week, just kind of awkward?  For me, yes.  Maybe for some it’s not, but this questions leads to the broader idea of consent and its applications. 

Consent doesn’t only belong in the bedroom; consent should follow ambiguity wherever it may lead, which, in this setting, is the dance floor.  “But,” my friends object, “isn’t it super awkward to be dancing and then to suddenly be like, ‘Hey want to grind?’”  Yes, that is awkward, but wouldn’t it be easy to ask, “Is this ok?” as you move closer?  Or even to pay attention to your dance partner?  ?I recently witnessed a girl engrossed in gyrating against a fellow freshman’s groin, as he TEXTED.  I’m not implying that he wasn’t appreciative or consenting.  However, this situation clearly lacks mutual interest and communication. 

I love to dance, meet new people, and sing along to blasting music.  But when the lyrics are “Shush girl, just shut your lips…  do the Helen Keller and talk with your hips” (shudder), it’s hard to dance to the beat while completely ignoring the words and the underlying message of objectification and misogyny that they promote.  As much as I want to dance to 3OH!3 or Lady Gaga (and I do dance, despite my unease with her word choice about disco sticks), I often feel like a hypocrite at dances where I should just be enjoying myself.  I feel like a strange superhero: young feminist by day, self-objectifying dance-floor maven by night.

the good old days?

I’m wary of criticizing youth dance and music trends, because there exists a long tradition of censorship of American youth popular culture.  I’m not one of those anti-rock n’ roll fanatics à la “Footloose” who claims that the new dance styles are the devil incarnate and that our country is going to hell in a hand basket as a result of promiscuous dance floor antics.  In fact, my first week at college has indicated the opposite: overall, my classmates are a smart, articulate, generous, interesting, genuine, diverse, and empathetic group.  But imagine a dance with music that doesn’t objectify women, or music whose beat could be conducive to dancing that consists more than just simulated sex—dancing that would be more inclusive, more inviting, more energetic, and more fun. 

Ok, so maybe the DJ was just bad.  After all, his turntable did have a sign that advertised “Phat beats, skinny bitches.”  But, as many people my age would surely corroborate, the grinding trend is indicative of our overly sexualized culture that extends far beyond my college campus.

I’m looking forward to the Feminist Prom, sponsored by my school’s feminist organization.  I just wish that my friends and I, both male and female, didn’t need a special event to dance to music that doesn’t reduce us to vehicles for sex and nothing more.