| FUCK THIS |
[30 Apr 2008|12:34am] |
Thongs & Freak Dancing Equal Trouble 5/22/2002
Thongs & Freak Dancing Equal Trouble
Meanwhile, A&F’s at It Again, this Time with 10-year-olds
By Martha Kleder
This year’s prom season has chaperones and school administrators blushing as students engage in the dance floor’s hottest trend: “freak dancing.”
What is “freak dancing?” Well, as Marshall Peterson, principal of Oak Mills High School in Columbia, Maryland, told The Washington Post, “If they didn’t have their clothes on, you would swear they were having sex.”
Teen and pre-teen clothiers, including the Abercrombie Kids line, are capitalizing on the popularity of thong underwear with bare midriffs and micro-miniskirts. The combination of skimpy outfits and “freak dancing” is becoming volatile.
Rita Wilson, vice principal of Rancho Bernardo High School in suburban San Diego, came under fire nationally for conducting thong checks outside a school dance on April 26. Wilson told the Associated Press that her concern was for students’ safety.
“I was very concerned about short skirts and having their bottoms covered. That’s really what I wanted was if they were going to freak, at least their bottoms were covered,” Wilson said.
Although some observers decried an “invasion of privacy,” others found that charge absurd.
“Let’s not forget these young girls were about to display everything under their skirts to everyone at the dance,” Dr. Janice Crouse, senior fellow with the Beverly LaHaye Institute (BLI), told C&F Report.
Some freak dancers don’t even keep their clothes on. Wilson’s much maligned actions came in the wake of a “jungle fever” dance at the school in 2001. Some students wore loincloths, and during a frenzy of “freaking,” a girl removed her clothing on the dance floor.
Many schools are trying to keep a lid on the explosive combination of skimpy clothing and erotic dancing. Some have drafted explicit rules and require permission slips to attend dances.
Walnut Hills High School in Cincinnati, Ohio, bars students from “grinding, bumping, fondling, humping, licking, booty dancing, rolling, kicking, mashing, shoving, wallowing, disrobing, sexual kissing, freaking, jacking and whatever else a chaperone deems improper or indecent.”
The most creative response goes to Stone Bridge High School in Ashburn, Virginia. According to The Washington Post, the deejay calmed students down several times by playing the “Barney” theme song.
Some schools have clothing restrictions. Lenora Lee, vice principal at Seattle, Washington’s Garfield High, explained to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer her “five finger” rule: skirts and shorts must be at least fingertip length, shirts must have a front and a back, and midriffs must be covered.
No matter which way you hold it, or how large your hand is, fingertip length is short.
Such is the clothing Abercrombie & Fitch is marketing to pre-teens in their Abercrombie Kids line, made for 10 to16 year olds. The pink and blue underwear has the words “eye candy” and “wink wink” printed on them. “Eye candy” is a term often used to describe porn models.
“It’s cute and fun and sweet,” Abercrombie & Fitch spokesman Hampton Carney told The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
Brian Camenker, head of the Massachusetts-based Parents’ Rights Coalition, said this latest marketing trend is playing into the hands of pedophiles. He told the American Family Association: “A&F is selling clothes to make children sexually stimulating to adults.”
The appearance of thong underwear in a children’s store has outraged many parents. “I think of myself as fairly hip, and I think it’s just disgusting,” Julie McNamara of Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin told the paper. She was one of several customers to storm the sales counter at the mall over the issue.
The underwear, in the smaller children’s size, could easily be worn by children even younger than 10. Carney defended the company. “It’s not appropriate for a 7-year-old, but it is appropriate for a 10-year-old. Once you get to 10, you start to care about your underwear, and you start to care about your clothes,” he told The Journal Sentinel.
So, if trends are left unchecked, even elementary schools will be forced to police clothing before recess.
“Thongs and freak dancing for teens and even pre-teens! How sad,” added BLI’s Janice Crouse. “Childhood is disappearing from our culture. In its place we have lewd behavior.
“Such dancing, while inappropriate and disgusting behavior for adults, is appalling and dismaying behavior for children. We express shock and horror that Palestinian children are taught to be suicidal martyrs while teaching our own children to become sexual beings without barriers, limitations or consequences.”
Meanwhile, as parents remain either unaware of the trend, or find it cute, teachers are finding themselves backed into a corner on dress and behavior issues. Educators who accept the challenge and try to fill gaps in their student’s parenting have come under fire.
Rita Wilson is on administrative leave while her “thong check” is being investigated. Some parents are demanding she be fired over the incident. Wilson told the Associated Press that if she had it to do over again, she would have refused to supervise the dance.
Meanwhile, 35 teachers at Rancho Bernardo High expressed support for Wilson. They are being led by English teacher Michael Ball, who told The San Diego Union Tribune, “Maybe she [Wilson] went over the line, but she was the only one doing anything.”
|
|
![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
xrusterx's journal
