Dance Immodesty?

By Bobby

In The Inner Voice, Renée Fleming said she gained enough respect to toughen standards when it regards to what she can and cannot wear on stage. There are certain situations and manners of dress in which she will not appear on stage.

Fleming’s rules are greatly appreciated, and should be a high standard of which today’s children need to see. At a recent dance concert I attended, the standards of dress have deteriorated to the point young girls were wearing costumes similar (or worse) to what their MTV heroines wear on television every day. It came to the point Biblical standards of modesty had been removed in favour of the “whatever comes in Vegas is perfectly legal here”.

In almost every song, the girls – some of whom are as young as six and as old as eighteen – would dare to bare as much as possible. There were some routines where the girls would go with the bikini look on stage, and almost every top worn by even the youngest of girls was cropped that they would show at least their midriff, and with the amount of skin they showed, it had gone out of control, and some of these girls are under ten years old! The entire look was reminiscent of a brothel, only this time the attendees at the brothel were not adults, they were young boys and girls, some as young as six, participating in the brothel act.

The brothel act has become very popular through recent years through the popularity of NBA cheerleaders, of which all 30 NBA teams now feature, and their immodest looks, through music videos on MTV and the showgirls of Las Vegas, complete with the popularity of commercial popular music through many of its female artists, many of whom show as much of their bodies in simulated sex acts.

A few years ago, the state of Texas had a legislator propose a rule banning “sexy cheerleading” to prevent such outrageous acts. The National Federation of High School Associations added “no bare midriff” rules into costuming for cheerleading and dance teams. But private dance studios, college dance teams, and other organizations, urged by choreographers and children who want to mimic what is popular at the clubs, MTV, and in dance halls, have violated the common sense of modesty by permitting the outlandish costuming of children.

One of the absolute worst routines when it comes to decency was one built named “Cookielicious,” complete with half-dressed Brownie (Girl Scouts) lookalikes, with bare midriffs and very short skirts. The routine was grossly offensive with the simulated sex and outrageous music, especially with the ages of these children, Kyle Busch would have sent them to the Oval Office for consultation*. The outrageous act of these young children in adult club costumes, jiggling to hip-hop music that demeans people is something I thought we would never have seen 20 years ago.

When the choreographer attempted to try such outfits with the adult team, the entire team balked, noticing that we were mostly in our 30's or older, and wanted modesty. The ladies’ dresses were longer than the girls, and showed no bare midriffs. Also, there were none of the “booty” looks popular with today’s young girls who mimic everything from the smut peddlers. There were no “Las Vegas Showgirl” identity with the outfits of the adults.

This outrageous weekend reminds me today that today’s parents should be very cautious of what their children are doing in schools or even in their extracurricular activities. Even in churches today, we are seeing a byproduct of this as church music leaders today prefer having children dance to hip-hop music with similar routines as a replacement for having children sing sacred music in church.

Our society has permeated the MTV/Las Vegas look into our children today, and the problems of such have created a monster that parents need to restrain children to prevent them from hiding into the Dark Side of the modesty battle.

* A division of The W. K. Kellogg Company bakes Girl Scout Cookies.