[Tango-L] gender imbalance

[Nina Pesochinsky]

David,

Sad, sad... this is very sad. :)

You dance with people because of their level of dance?! beginner or advanced?!

And what if they have bad breath, look desperate, and have nothing 
intresting to say?  What if you say "axis" to a woman, and she smiles 
and says "yes, of course", but is thinking "this guy is crazy, I have 
no idea what he is talking about"?

The sad part is when people dance with people only because of what 
they perceive the other person's dancing level to be.  Once, in 
ancient times, I danced with a man who, as I recall, may not have 
been a great dancer (but I can't be sure).  While we danced, he was 
telling me hillarious jokes in my ear.  I was hurting from 
laughter.  I laughted at those jokes for years.

You can teach someone to find his/her axis (and even someone else's 
:), and whatever else, but you cannot teach them to be witty and entertaining.

On a serious note, dancers hold real power to mold other dancers.  A 
man who is a fabulous dancer, can teach a woman, any woman, almost 
any basic technical element non-verbally, while simply dancing with 
her.  But why would we do that?  Social duty? Not at all.  Instead, 
more from a recognition that people are much more than their dancing 
abilities, and that it may be a mistake to dance with a proficiency 
level instead of a person.

Best,

Nina



At 05:59 PM 4/28/2008, David Thorn wrote:

>Although I am a lead, I contribute negatively to the gender 
>imbalance situation.  I am an adequately decent dancer, perhaps one 
>of those terminal intermediates who "prey" on the beginners.  I 
>dance with beginning and with advanced follows.  I almost never 
>dance with the intermediate follows.
>
>When a beginner is dangling off my neck, pulling me over, clamping 
>my arm or jumping from foot to foot and generally making my dance 
>unpleasant, I will politely ask ask her to manage her own axis, or 
>to wait, or whatever, and explain that I have a bad rotator cuff, or 
>whatever.  Thinking that I am a good dancer, she will say OK, do so, 
>and then the dance is fine.
>
>The local follows who are advanced know that I am a good, but 
>certainly not excellent, dancer.  However I am good enough that I 
>can give them a decent dance and they will have a good time.  They 
>can also manage their axis, they wait, don't clamp my arm, etc, and 
>no requests are required.  They say yes to my dance invitations and 
>we have a fine dance.
>
>But the intermediate follows, which means most of them, or at least 
>very many, often can not manage their axis, and or don't wait for a 
>lead, and/or....  But, since they know that I am only an 
>intermediate myself, are quite offended if I make any requests, even 
>regarding my damaged rotator cuff.  They KNOW that they are not 
>clamping my arm.  I have simply quit asking them to dance.
>
>Probably slightly passive aggressive, but it does avoid conflict, I 
>can have an excellent evening of dance, and I only feel slightly bad 
>about all those sad intermediate follows lined up against the wall 
>looking hopefully out at the floor.
>
>Cheers
>
>D. David Thorn
>
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