Leave Ballroom Dancing Alone

It would seem that Portia de Rossi will not be doing Dancing With The Stars next season. At first, I was kind of disappointed, as I really like what she does with her life and how she handles herself and I thought that she'd be interesting to watch on the show. The fact that she is smoking hot doesn't hurt, either. Then I heard what the producers had in store for her if she were to join the show and I have to say that I'm really glad that she's not going along with their idiocy.

From the lovely Rob Shuter over at PopEater, what the producers had in mind for Portia was for her to dance with another girl. You know. Because she's gay and all. That is the most ridiculous thing I think I have heard in quite some time. Are they serious? Apparently they were. According to an "ABC insider" who corresponded in some fashion with Rob, "If Portia had agreed then this would have been a done deal...She was the only star that could have pulled this off without completely offending the program's conservative viewers." What about offending the rational thinking viewers?

Let me get this straight (no pun at all intended). If a woman is gay and wants to ballroom dance, she has to do it with another woman? Because....why? I can't think of a single reason why this would have to be. Ballroom dancing isn't about one's sexuality. It's about two people dancing. And the way that it works is that one of the people is a male and one of the people is a female. That's just how it is. You don't need to feel obligated to change it because one of the participants is gay.

Some Hollywood casting director told Rob that "With all the debate going on about Don't Ask, Don't Tell in the country, this would have been the perfect time to do this...Yet, the show has never been about pushing the envelope. It's a huge hit because it doesn't make anyone uncomfortable." So much to like and so much to dislike in that statement. First of all, there would never be a perfect time to do this because it shouldn't be done. And second of all, not only should a show not make people uncomfortable, it shouldn't make them watch something that is patently absurd.

And let me just make the statement right now and say that if you think that ever male dancer on that show is straight, well, you'd better think again. (For cryin' out loud, judge Bruno Tonioli is about as flaming of an individual as you can be.) You don't see them paired up with other men, do you? No, you don't. Why? Because it would be ridiculous, that is correct. Don't they realize that the dance partners are just that? Dance partners. There's nothing sexual going on between them. They're just doing their job. So why couldn't Portia be on the show and dance with a man? I just don't get it.

I don't know how else to make this point. I'm kind of surprised that I have to make it at all. I'm definitely annoyed I have to make it. Just because a man or a woman is gay, that doesn't mean that they have to ballroom dance with another person of the same gender. I'm so glad that Portia turned them down. It would have been an embarrassment if she had gone along with it. Maybe the season after this one, the producers will have come to their senses and have her on and dancing with a male partner like it should be. People are so damned worried about being politically correct that they forget to be worried about looking like a jackass.

Single Children Put Some Clothes On It

The video below disturbs me in more ways than one. Don't get me wrong. I'm not against showing a little skin. It's not like I'm a member of the FLDS or anything like that. Skin is good. Let me rephrase that. Adult skin is good. Why must people insist on letting their children parade around like hooker-ific pole dancers? It's not attractive. It's disgusting and disturbing. Seriously, folks. When allowing your small children to re-enact Beyonce's "Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)" (a fabulous little ditty, by the way), I think that the rule of thumb should be that they have to be wearing at least as much clothes as Beyonce was wearing. Would that be so bad?

Actually, now that I think about it, I have a couple of rules I'd like to implement. We've already gone over the first one, you must be covering the same ratio of your body as Beyonce is covering hers. Rule number two: Do not dress your children (especially those whose ages appear to still be in single digits) in something that a horny boyfriend would buy for his girlfriend after stopping by a 7-11 on his way home on Valentine's Day. What in the world are those girls wearing? I didn't know that you could get five dollar hooker outfits that small. If I can't see Beyonce's midriff, I don't want to see your seven-year old girl's midriff, either. Got it? For God's sake, I hope so.

Rule number three: If you do not have anything to shake, please don't try to shake it anyway. Clearly, these girls are not quite at the breasticle stage yet. There's nothing to shake. And that's FINE!! Yet, there they are, shaking their money makers when they don't even have change, let alone real money.

Rule number four: This one pertains mainly to this example only. The song basically talks about if some dude likes what he sees, perhaps he should "put a ring on it" if it's that important to him. Marry the chick, for cryin' out loud, is the message here. I don't know that you can have that message be spewed by little girls dressed in cheap lingerie who look as if they're all missing a brass pole or two. Seriously. Who are you people who are letting your kid do this and who are you people who are cheering these girls on?

Listen, the girls are talented. They have great dance moves. But why are they darn near naked? These are little girls! Where are their fathers? (Or their mothers, for that matter. But I'm really surprised that Dads would let their little girls prance around like that.) My Dad sure as hell would never have let me wear anything like that in public when I was eight OR when I was thirty, for that matter. I'd be a little afraid to wear anything like that now, lest he come back from beyond the grave and haunt me and my scantily clad booty for dressing like a ho. My brother (who is 3 years younger than me) is raising his step-daughter by himself (don't ask) and he's told her she's not dating until she's eighty. (He tells her that as he's cleaning his gun.) She certainly isn't walking out of his house looking like those girls do. She's kind of lucky he lets her walk out of the house at all (she's gonna be hot).

Seriously, why couldn't they have had on leotards or one piece swim suits or something? (After viewing that, I'm kind of leaning toward parkas, but they seem like they'd be rather bulky to dance in. See? I'm not unreasonable about the whole thing, nor impractical!) Why do they have to look like there is a midget hooker and pole dancer convention in town? Cover up your children when they're in public. Please. There's enough sexual exposure out there in all forms of media that they're going to be saturated with beginning at birth. Hypersexualizing the kids themselves by allowing them to parade their bodies in public when they are SEVEN years old can't lead to anything that's going to be great, I'll tell you that.

Again, I think that they're fabulous dancers. They're all very talented. However, the outfits that they are wearing are inappropriate and disturbing. And do you know what would have happened if they had wore outfits that were just a touch more modest (ie, I'm not looking at a 7-year old's belly button)? The ONLY thing that everyone would be talking about was how awesome the dance was. And that's how it should have been. Instead, the obvious talent that is there is lost and under-appreciated because all you can focus on is all of the sex that is there. It's sad, really. I can only hope that it won't be sadder for them as they get older.