Anonymous wrote:Who is teaching them this? I went out eat at a pizza place and there was a group of girls softball players eating out with their coach and parents presumably after a game. We all ended up leaving at the same time and as I was pulling out of the parking lot 5 of the girls got in front of my car and began twerking and showing off their behinds laughing. Parent said nothing but laughed. Who is parenting these kid?!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t see why this is a big deal. My only concern is that they were in a parking lot, which seems unsafe. They were dancing, for heaven’s sake.

Dancing like strippers. I see why op was concerned.

Anonymous wrote:It's vulgar, but the kids don't understand the sexual connotations, and the parents are lax and allow it.

What are you going to do? Change the mindset of millions of families? This is today's world, OP.

Anonymous wrote:It's vulgar, but the kids don't understand the sexual connotations, and the parents are lax and allow it.

What are you going to do? Change the mindset of millions of families? This is today's world, OP.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I teach kindergarten and have students twerk. They copy whatever they see on TikTok, IG, YouTube, etc. Sone of them come to school wearing very inappropriate clothing too. They have fake nails. So many of the girls seek validation that they look good. “Aren’t my nails beautiful?” It’s sad.

What is inappropriate about fake nails? They’re cute, fun, and make the kids feel great.

My kid could care less about nails, as they get in her way. One of her slightly older friends has a mom who was an aesthetician and she always has the cutest nails. My kid, on the flip side, loves to color her hair. So I won’t bleach it because I don’t want to damage it, but I don’t care about whatever color she wants to do it in. This is her time to figure who she is out and none of it does her or anyone else any harm. I also don’t police her clothes. She’s kind of partial to the Billie Eilish big baggy look, but as long as it’s clean, in good repair, appropriate to season as far as her not being cold or overheating, and it’s not a special event that requires a certain costume, why do I need to tell her what makes her happy and comfortable in her skin?

For one, they can’t write with them. Two, they are a huge distraction. Third, they aren’t safe. One girl poked another one in the eye when she was fooling around.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gross. My 9 year old boy doesn’t do that. He doesn’t have an iPad or cell phone and only watches cartoons. It doesn’t “have” to be this way.

Little girls doing dances that are relevant for their time is gross? And somehow it’s meaningful that your boy does not do the same dances as the little girls?

Is twerking (or whatever variation they managed) some sort of gateway to….what? Better dancing? Fun memories with friends?

Yes. Twerking is gross, as is much of modern sexualized TikTok dancing. It’s a gateway to being a slut, like their mothers likely are.

Anonymous wrote:A lot of the world is not brought up with refined values and behavior expectations.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I teach kindergarten and have students twerk. They copy whatever they see on TikTok, IG, YouTube, etc. Sone of them come to school wearing very inappropriate clothing too. They have fake nails. So many of the girls seek validation that they look good. “Aren’t my nails beautiful?” It’s sad.

What is inappropriate about fake nails? They’re cute, fun, and make the kids feel great.

My kid could care less about nails, as they get in her way. One of her slightly older friends has a mom who was an aesthetician and she always has the cutest nails. My kid, on the flip side, loves to color her hair. So I won’t bleach it because I don’t want to damage it, but I don’t care about whatever color she wants to do it in. This is her time to figure who she is out and none of it does her or anyone else any harm. I also don’t police her clothes. She’s kind of partial to the Billie Eilish big baggy look, but as long as it’s clean, in good repair, appropriate to season as far as her not being cold or overheating, and it’s not a special event that requires a certain costume, why do I need to tell her what makes her happy and comfortable in her skin?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gross. My 9 year old boy doesn’t do that. He doesn’t have an iPad or cell phone and only watches cartoons. It doesn’t “have” to be this way.

Little girls doing dances that are relevant for their time is gross? And somehow it’s meaningful that your boy does not do the same dances as the little girls?

Is twerking (or whatever variation they managed) some sort of gateway to….what? Better dancing? Fun memories with friends?

Yes. Twerking is gross, as is much of modern sexualized TikTok dancing. It’s a gateway to being a slut, like their mothers likely are.

And rock music and dancing were considered the same 60 years ago.

Anonymous wrote:Twerking is a dance form that originated in central Africa and kept alive by slaves to keep connection to their culture, even used as a form of rebellion.

It’s uptight weirdos and perverted men who turn it into something sexual. It’s perfectly fine for people to move their pelvis to dance, and it someone wants to project their ideas of sex onto it, that’s their problem.

You’re sexualizing little girls. You’re the problem. I’m guessing you don’t tell little boys they need to avoid doing certain things, because you don’t see the male body as inherently sexual like you do the female body.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Twerking is a dance form that originated in central Africa and kept alive by slaves to keep connection to their culture, even used as a form of rebellion.

It’s uptight weirdos and perverted men who turn it into something sexual. It’s perfectly fine for people to move their pelvis to dance, and it someone wants to project their ideas of sex onto it, that’s their problem.

You’re sexualizing little girls. You’re the problem. I’m guessing you don’t tell little boys they need to avoid doing certain things, because you don’t see the male body as inherently sexual like you do the female body.

That is entirely unsupported by evidence, PP. Twerking came to the fore in the 90s in New Orleans in the African diaspora communities, and it was DIRECTLY linked to sexual signaling, since some of it was pushed out from brothels and assimilated businesses. There is no direct link to any specific dance or specific African culture from actual Africa, but the New Orleans diaspora it originated from generally speaks Bantu, a group of languages spoken across multiple central and southern African countries.

Ergo: yes, it is a sexualized dance originally. And please do not confuse diaspora artistic creations with country-of-origin artistic creations (regardless of which ethnicity and region of the world you're considering). Some diasporas are so ancient and/or so dynamic, that they've spawned their own specific cultural nodes.