[Tango-L] Flaming women at classes

[ceverett@ceverett.com]

On Sun, 22 Jul 2007 04:12:55 -0400, "Jake Spatz (TangoDC.com)"
<spatz at tangoDC.com> said:
> 
> We self-important tango assholes like to believe that so many people 
> don't come back for a second lesson, or second month, because they're 
> intimidated, or had a boo-hoo time, or some BS like that. And that's 
> pure condescension on our part. Chances are, they just Weren't impressed.
> 

A thought:

We give them multiple reasons to be unimpressed.  many reasons 
have nought to do with the quality of our dance.  I think most 
often they are not impressed with us as people.

Plenty of people come to a tango practice or class to meet new 
people.  They tend to be rather nice people, IMO.  However they 
want more than just a sense of welcome, but a feeling of being 
around people just like like them.

In a small community, it doesn't take much to get them to decide 
that they won't be happy, and so off they go.  This in fact has 
little to do with how nice the people in the group themselves 
are.  It's a matter of perception, and how other people interpret 
minor events we don't see as important.

It's hard to get out of the trap of being a small community in
a smaller city.   There seems to be a barrier at 20 people they 
find hard to break through.

In larger towns, multiple small circles interact; those truly 
motivated to learn the dance can go elsewhere if they don't 
like their current location.

Christopher