I went to a party on Saturday night. There was a jukebox that displayed video clips when the tracks were played. A girl, who was eight years old, came along to the party for a short while. She loved the jukebox because it played karaoke. She picked a popular dance track to sing to. I thought it was great that she had such confidence to get up there and sing. But I was concerned by the dance moves that went along with it.
At only 8 years of age she had mastered the sexually provocative dancing that she copied directly off the video clip. I haven’t watched any TV shows like Video Hits for a long time because well, basically I hate the US dance crap that’s on it. But this really made me think about just what’s being shown on these video clips and to whom.
I used to love watching shows like this as a kid but there wasn’t the sexual explicitness that’s in them today. I know there’s been a lot of media about young teenagers dancing in a provocative manner because they’re copying the dance routines out of video clips, but here we’re going even younger, to an eight year old. I wonder why there is no censorship or better TV rating on some of these clips. Many I have seen are very sexual and yet they’re shown on TV on Saturday mornings. Or is it the parents’ responsibility to check what their kids are watching? Maybe a bit of both, but the mother of this girl didn’t seem at all concerned by the way her daughter was dancing.
Do I need to lighten up a bit more? I don’t know. Maybe girls should be taught a little more about their bodies and how to use them and what particular moves suggest? I don’t get why there’s so much of this sexual objectification of women out there in video clips at the moment. And why are women choosing to do it? Are they thinking about who’ll be influenced by their video clips?