Time to move location, or time to not worry about what others think.
I am straight, I dance with straight men, gay men, straight women, gay women, single women, single men, married men, married women... Blues, sexy, normal, comical, lifts and drops or just plain mucking around... It is just dancing.
In my opinion anyone who is looking to teach should be able to both lead and follow well, before they try to instruct both leaders and followers.
I want to see a proper role reversal class. None of this wimpy "men be followers, women be leaders" nonsense, any fool can do that.
I want to see a class where the leaders do the follower steps and the followers do the leader steps - but the leaders still lead. Now that'd sort the men out from the, err, followers, or something like that.
And for the experience of following is different to why women follow how ? I've been enjoying following lots and I'd love to do more of it. There are quite a few female leads out there that I enjoy dancing with but I'm not looking to improve my following with men to be "good enough" to ask those women to lead me . I'm there to enjoy my dance, I might learn more about leading or following doing it but it isn't a primary goal.
That's a shame, if I'm leading or following I'll try and make the dance feel nice irrelevant of the gender of my partner. Obviously to the onlooker I've failed so far .
There still is a bit of a difficulty with dancing with other guys though. I was looking around for a bloke to dance with last night (there were extra men ) and struggled to find a guy I thought would be fine with it (in the end I asked a guy who I figured would be fine with it and was turned down ).
I also find, with the exception of Jamie who I love to lead and follow, that I prefer to follow when dancing with another guy. It's more to do with them generally being better leads and most women on the dance floor being better followers however, since I'm aware the reverse is true as well, I'm happy leading too.
I agree with this and have found myself in the same situation recently having just started to learn to follow ...... still got some catching up to do with you KT..... but think I'd be put off completely if turned down by a man.
Quite by accident I ended up dancing with a very experienced man on Monday at my local venue and had a great dance, but on the whole I think it is generally less well received at local level than say weekenders like Southport.
I dance with men as a follower and as a leader and the same with women.
I think there is nothing better than 2 men dancing together when they both swap to leading and following thro the dance.
On the Jivetime Camber weekend i danced with Kyron aka Vegtable loads of times and a gang of women from Ireland was gobsmacked by our antics.
Whilst leading Andy McGregor to a slow and smooth blues track we had a fab dance and right on cue to the end note i dropped him.
Literally on the floor whilst we both cracked up laughing, this is what it all about my lovelies fun and playing on the floor.
At the end of the night i went home with my lovely Trouble and Andy went home with his lovely Sue.
IMHO a man who can lead and follow must be a more experimental and ergo a better dancer than the run of the mill men who lead only.
Woodface cartwheeled me at Southport...frightened the life out of me, Trouble laughed so much and passed so much fluid that a plumber was called.
XXX XXX DTS Dave
Cool, I shall lead you at some stage (*though I prefer following other men, perhaps that means two dances?).
I wouldn't be put off by being turned down by one man. I tried expand my list of "guys that are fine with it" and failed. Certainly won't stop me trying to ask other men in the future or dancing with the ones I already know are fine with it.
I agree, the more people see it the more the "novelty value" will wear off.
I did only say 99% maybe your the 1%
Hmm I've just had an interesting thought.. maybe to a guy, what feels 'nice' is different to what feels 'nice' to a girl?That's a shame, if I'm leading or following I'll try and make the dance feel nice, irrelevant of the gender of my partner. Obviously to the onlooker I've failed so far .
And sadly KT, your right, I can honestly say, I've never seen two men dance together and looked at them and thought, hey, they look really amazing together, or that they look so 'into' it or 'lost in the moment' that i've thought, Wow..
But I have many times, with two girls!
I know I've experienced feelings of being lost in the moment myself, many times, when dancing with a girl but I'll have to take your word for it, if you say you have?
Anyway, its not all negative! Girls can't make me laugh, the way men do.
You never see them attempting ambitious death defying arials, the first time they dance for a start! (my mind instantly recalls Underpar and Yoval's dance at Southport! )
MODERATOR AT YOUR SERVICE
"If you're going to do something tonight, that you know you'll be sorry for in the morning, plan a lie in." Lorraine
At my venue last week - a quieter night than usual - we had men over. And due to staffing shortages, the lady who usually demonstrates flitted between the end of the line (maximising the number of ladies available to dance), and manning the door. That left the male teacher demonstrating with a male taxi dancer. Unusual, but necessary.
Who knew that Bognor was so progressive?
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