Support women's sports and SHARE this story with your friends!

Photo from Fitbie.comPole dancing has become a popular exercise trend for women in recent years, but a dance studio in Duncan, British Columbia (which, by the way is nowhere near Vancouver) has opened a new can of worms by introducing a pole dancing class for kids.  The Little Spinners class is a product of parental requests.  According to studio owner, Kristy Craig, a number of the mothers in her existing classes asked for a children's class to be added because "They were saying, 'My daughter plays on my pole at home all the time, I'd lover her to actually learn how to do things properly and not hurt herself." Craig also explains that the Little Spinners class is aimed at "climbing and holding" and that she's "not teaching them any sexual moves."  Currently, there are 3 girls and one boy registered in the class and the youngest is 5 years old. There are also attempts to get pole dancing (the fully clothed version) into the Olympics.

Craig argues that there is nothing sexualized about the moves that she teaches the children and that pole dancing merely appeals to active children - it's like a mini jungle gym in the house, I suppose.  This is not the first pole dancing class created for children, apparently last year a class was started in Essex, England that also came under a firestorm for sexualizing little girls.  The argument being that "The children will innocently enjoy copying the raunchy moves they learn, but be completely unaware of the sexual messages these send out which inevitably can have dangerous results."

Overreaction or appropriate response?

I don't know. I will admit that if little Sally were to be seen sliding down the pole at school in a "professional" manner, shall we say, that it would be out of place; but, I'm not sure that pole dancing for little girls is inherently "dangerous".  I interpret the reference to "dangerous results" as an assumption that young women who behave in overtly sexual manners will draw unwarranted sexual advances from young men.  To which I contend, if that is the case then we need to challenge how we teach young boys and men to view and relate with girls and women.  Are we saying that little girls who participate in pole dancing are more likely to be victims of rape when they grow up than little girls who participate in soccer? If this is the argument then I think there are major flaws in the logic.  Unfortunately, victims of sexual crimes come from all walks of life and I guarantee you that none of them intentionally put themselves in harms way.  I don't have any statistics but I am willing to put a large sum of money down to say that every sport (including physically combative sports such as the martial arts, rugby and hockey) has a young girl or women who has been a victim of a sexual crime.

On the other hand, there are sooooooooo many other options for kids to be physically active that pole dancing classes don't seem necessary.  I am all for alternative forms of activity and movement but is pole dancing the answer? The jungle gym was designed for just that purpose - to let kids climb, jump, and hang in the manner that kids do.  I do agree that pole dancing requires a certain level of physical fitness and that it is essentially gymnastics with a pole, but...

I don't have a definitive answer, or even a strong opinion to provide here.  I also don't have kids so I'm not entirely sure what I would do if my kid wanted to take pole dancing lessons (although, I can guarantee that he/she would not have learned it from playing on my home pole).  I think we need to figure out where our discomfort comes from and if it is warranted or not.  Yes pole dancing is sexualized, but isn't it because we sexualize it?  We have said this is an erotic industry that makes women sexual objects for the male gaze.  Men are supposed to like it and only "certain types of women" are supposed to engage in this type of behaviour. These are all social constructions.  We want to protect the innocence of our children and yet the music they listen to, the television they watch and the clothes they wear have all become increasingly sexualized.  I'm not saying that one is right and the other not but where do we draw the line in the sand?  One could argue that bikinis for little girls could also lead to "dangerous results".  Personally, I find it offensive when I flip open a fashion magazine and see nothing but twelve year olds modeling clothes for women in their twenties and thirties.

Support women's sports and SHARE this story with your friends!

• SportsPLUS
• Family/Parenting

View Original Post at cszto.blogspot.com

View Resident_Badass's Full Profile