“Any teacher who encourages a young child to dress provocatively for a stage performance is culpable of gross misconduct”
“..what is deeply troubling is that (dance) schools are actually soliciting obscenities.” “it is not the kids who should be held accountable. Adults decide costumes & what the pre teen kids perform”
“Teachers are supposed to protect the innocent and nurture values that better the individual.”
On May 25, 2008, Queensland, Australia’s Newspaper The Courier Mail, published these lines in articles entitled “Dance of Innocents” and “Children Pawns of Errant Teachers”. Rather than stand by and watch, it is possible for you to take social action.
Mary Bawden, an American dance teacher from California writes:
I am writing to let you know about an issue I am deeply concerned about. Over the course of the last decade, dance for young children, particularly little girls, has changed. Alarmingly, young girls are becoming increasingly sexualized through dance. If you have recently attended a dance recital or viewed any one of many reality shows on television, you have no doubt viewed choreography that exploits and sexualizes children, using sexy moves, adult costumes, and mature, sexually charged songs to make little girls look and act like mature women.
When the beauty of dance is used to sexualize young children, it is a departure from its intended purpose. Because of this, I have decided to partner with ECPAT-USA and start a petition that brings education and awareness to dance studios so that we can stop this trend.
ECPAT-USA, the leading policy organization fighting the Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children (CSEC), belongs to an international network of organizations that have offices in 73 countries around the world. They have agreed to support this petition.
I hope that you will join me in this effort by signing. Thank you!
This is the petition link: http://www.change.org/petitions/dance-studios-stop-adult-sexual-choreography-and-costumes-for-girls-under-12
