My thoughts on Dance Moms - Dance Saturday
Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post,
Today I'm doing something a little bit different and I'm going to be talking about the controversial reality show, Dance Moms.
If you don't know about the show Dance Moms, then it's basically a reality show all about a group of young dancers from the Abby Lee Dance Company, who attend different competitions every week in a bid to win a group dance, solo, duet, or trio. As well as Abby's competitive pyramid where each dancer has to fight to be on the top, the show's main centre-piece, the "dance moms," as well as supporting their children in dance, are also seen fighting amongst each other in nearly every episode to add a bit of drama for the audience. The show was initially aired as a documentary-style program series, based on the life of the dancers at the ALDC, but after it was premiered in July 2011, it hit a huge fan base and the show turned into a popular reality series.
When I watch Dance Moms, I mostly watch video clips of it on YouTube because I like finding out about other well-known dancers and I think it's important to broaden your knowledge on the types of dancers that are out there. I also like watching some of the dances that are performed by the dancers on the ALDC competition team, since some of the routines are genuinely really good and are choreographed really well. I think my favourite dances are Boss Ladies from season 6 and Lilliana's Straight Escape from season 8.
Lifetime
However, I'm certainly not a fan of the toxic image that is often brought around dance, through the show and there are many questions that I end up having about what's portrayed on Dance Moms. Why do the mothers of the dancers always have to be arguing with each other? Why are 10-13 year-old dancers forced to work to their absolute limit each week? Why are all the mothers more concerned about getting their children famous than asking if they're actually happy? Why are children having panic attacks about the pressure that is put on them? Why is a dance instructor, who has little respect for people, idolised as one of the best dance coaches in the industry? These are the sorts of questions that I end up asking myself and I'm sure other viewers can relate to this.
There is no doubt that Dance Moms has brought success to some of the dancers that were featured on the show. The classic example is Maddie Ziegler. She was spotted by Abby as one of the best dancers on the team when she was just 8 years old and now she's the main dancer featured on Sia's music videos. There is also Jojo Siwa, who although was disliked by a lot of people, including her dance teacher Abby because of her loud personality, she too also became an internet sensation and built an "empire" of young people who support her work.
However, Dance Moms has also been disliked, nearly as much as it has been liked. This is mainly because the show isn't a true representation of what dance is actually like and many things have been manipulated by the producers on the show. Although Dance Moms involves real people, some of the events and arguments that occurred on the show, were forced just to cause a reaction and to make it "entertaining" for the audience. Some of the dancers were also portrayed in a negative manner by acting spoilt and mean, when in real life, they were actually decent people. In the end, this created one big negative aura and built the storyline of the show which was that the mothers wanted to get their child ahead in dance and that the children were super competitive, selfish, "bratty" dancers, who only cared about themselves.
I remember when I was doing my work experience at a dance studio, me and my teacher were talking about Dance Moms and we both said "this isn't what dance is about." In my opinion, like with anything, dance should be enjoyed by people and it shouldn't be primarily about making the next child superstar or becoming a famous professional dancer. At the end of the day, if you don't like what you're doing, then there's no point in pursuing it just to be famous because then you're just becoming a fake version of yourself. I think that most of the mothers were pushing their children to become great dancers, which suggests to me that maybe they don't really love dance as much as they could because if you love what you do, you shouldn't have to be guided nearly every step of the way. Parents should be supportive but not controlling in the way that the mother's are portrayed on the show. Abby has made amazing professional dancers but I would also personally want to send my child to a place that has teachers who can teach without being belligerent or mean because to me, that matters more than fame and fortune.
Overall, whilst Dance Moms may be in some ways entertaining because of its chaotic storyline and whilst the dancers on the show are good at what they do, the storyline has progressively become toxic and I don't agree with that in the slightest. Dance Moms has brought the life of competitive dancers to the surface but I don't like the way the dance industry was represented by the producer's of the show. This was supposed to be "reality" TV and not much of it was truly realistic in my opinion.
I hope you liked this post. It was a bit different and you may not like reality TV that much like me, but I thought that it would be interesting to talk about this since Dance Moms is popular and known among the dance world.
Do you like Dance Moms? Do you like reality TV? Let me know in the comments below and I'll be sure to reply to them. I ♡ hearing from you!
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See you next time,
Bye,
XOX, Juliette
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