About the only thing I can think more inappropriate than "Vagina Monologues" being performed in a church, is for it to be performed in a high school.
In 2004 Amherst Regional High School was the ONLY high school in the nation to allow such adult oriented material to be performed by teenagers under the age of 18.
Yet now they wonder why kids think it's okay to use the "N-word."
I wonder if the church allowed "The Little Coochie Snorcher That Could" vignette to be performed? You know, the one where an adult female plies a 16-year-old girl with alcohol and then takes sexual advantage of her.
Gotta be some sort of Commandment against that.
Interestingly when Ensler originally wrote her "groundbreaking" work, the girl was only 13. But in response to all the evil conservative criticism she changed her to 16 -- still illegal in most states.
And she also edited out the final line, "If it was rape, it was a good rape."
So my buddy Izzy Lyman a former People's Republic resident and former (token conservative) Daily Hampshire Gazette columnist asked for a quote a couple days ago on this pre-teen risque public performance, knowing of course what my response would be.
The World of Dance is a high-energy, national urban dance contest. As a result of a recent WOD event, held in Pomona, Calif., last month, a spontaneous referendum on modern cultural ethos has broken out, due to the antics of some of its younger contestants.
Here's what happened: The proverbial YouTube video materialized -- which could have had a "viewer discretion" advisory on it -- showing a group of cute 8- and 9-year-old girls performing in the competition.
The little gals' routine, however, was anything but endearing. Arrayed in costumes that resembled suggestive lingerie, they gyrated to the Beyonce tune "Single Ladies."
The two minutes of racy showmanship were disturbing enough that mental health gurus, like Dr. Phil, were pronouncing it a pedophiliac fantasy.
Given how muscular and polished the performance is, it's obvious the small single ladies have spent many hours synchronizing their moves and effectively channeling Jay-Z's sexy wife.
So it was only natural, as it is in a country with a legal tradition of shielding its young from predators and which historically frowns upon age-inappropriate activities and dress codes for kiddies, when sensible folks muttered, as the video went viral, "Where are the moms and dads of these children?"
I'd add, "And who is the indiscreet choreographer?"
It turns out the parents of at least two of the girls -- Cory Miller and Melissa Presch -- were enthusiastically behind their daughters' "decision" to shake their petite behinds.
Miller and Presch, whose postures alternated between defensive and hip, appeared on Good Morning America, and coolly told us fuddy-duddies to buzz off. They explained that the risqu moves were "completely normal" for dancing that the video was "taken completely out of context" that they are "proud of their daughters and their accomplishments."
Really? This "accomplishment" was no spelling bee victory, folks. To be fair, it is jarring to be at the center of a national controversy and have strangers aggressively question your personal choices. But the lack of introspection, on the part of Miller and Presch, was also jarring.
Contrast their responses to the dance routine to that of Larry Kelley, who is a dad to a pair of active young daughters and once loudly complained on The O'Reilly Factor, when teenagers in his town's public high school wanted to perform The Vagina Monologues.
Kelley told me, "In this climate of constant bombardment, reiterating 'sex sells,' we should be especially vigilant about protecting our innocent children from growing up so exceedingly fast."
Most morally-engaged, common-sense mothers and fathers would not want their little girls sashaying, in skimpy ruffled outfits, in the spotlight, to music-impersonating drivel.
Besides, whatever happened to lasses rearranging doll house furniture, hosting tea parties, and reading Pippi Longstocking books or being inspired by Charlotte's Web? As for physical exercise, a capital choice is to enroll your daughter in a martial arts class, if she's game, and let her learn, early on, that her body, if need be, can be a potential weapon of self-defense instead of an object of lust.
The dance fiasco is not the first time kids mimicking socially-suspect adult behavior has created a rumpus. Nor will it be the last.
But it may well be a watershed moment. It has caused many of us to come to grips with how mainstream this practice of sexualizing minors in the name of art has become, and how too many parents, who should know better, are comfortable with an ugly trend.
Izzy Lyman is a freelance columnist and former Belgrade resident who contributes "A Woman's World" exclusively to the Belgrade News. Reach her at ilyman7449@aol.com.
So I was just doing research on using a key card system to reduce overhead at the health club, while expanding hours of operation, and I landed on the Eagle Tribune carrying an AP story “24-hour fitness clubs popular, but controversial.”
I couldn’t help but notice another local article about the Lawrence School Superintendent being overturned by the School Committee for his ban on the kids performance of ‘The Vagina Monologues’ later this month.
Amherst of course opted out this year. Too busy I suppose, or those damn budget cuts, or the kid that lead the charge graduated (and like canceling ‘West Side Story’ there’s always one kid who leads the charge) and nobody else picked up the ball.
Or maybe because a few months ago the elderly, married Co-Superintendents were a tad old fashioned (after 40 years in the business) and probably would not have allowed it.
Superintendent Laboy should have cancelled the performance not for the word Vagina but for that other word used so repeatedly (rhythms with bunt); or the little vignette that glorifies sex between an adult and underage 16-year-old child (13-years-old in the original publication of the Play but Ensler because of controversy upgraded her to 16 in later editions) after the child is given vodka.
Makes me wonder if four school committee members who rallied to the play’s defense have actually even read it. And if the KKK wanted to rally in Lawrence on school property and were going to donate $10,000 to a local battered women’s shelter, would the School Committee allow that?
Back in 2004 when Amherst was the only high school in the nation to allow the play the diffident Regional School Committee was asked repeatedly to overrule golden boy Jere Hochman’s decision to allow it: they did nothing, claiming it was not their job to micro-manage the schools. The Eagle-Tribune reports
What’s worse: Amherst Regional High School’s canceling ‘West Side Story’ or later embracing ‘The Vagina Monologues’?
Four years ago when ARHS became the only high school in the nation to perform ‘VM”, I couldn’t quite decide. Like asking a death row inmate to choose between the electric chair or cyanide gas.
But now that Amherst school officials have allowed adolescents to reprise that feminist manifesto, we have a winner!
In 1999 a 17-year-old Puerto Rican girl collected 158 (out of 1,300) student signatures on a petition decrying the production of ‘West Side Story’ for the annual school play because of ethnic (hers in particular) stereotyping. The School Committee took it a tad too seriously and things went downhill pronto.
Although School Superintendent at the time Gus Sayer showed some backbone with his original memo on the matter: "No group, neither in the majority nor in the minority, should have the ability to censor the decisions our community’s educators make about what to teach, what to read, or what to produce on the stage.”
But bureaucrats can be spineless. Sayer backed off, as he didn’t want to micromanage the High School Principal. and the School Committee did nothing as they didn’t want to micromanage the system.
Six months prior to the ‘West Side Story’ rumble, however, another enterprising 17-year-old activist collected 400 signatures on a petition protesting the policy of restricting students ‘off campus privileges’ during the school day, thus preventing kids from going out for a smoke.
Superintendent Sayer sympathized: “It’s not easy for students who are addicted to refrain from smoking all day”, while also applauding their “activism.”
Izzy Lyman, then co-director of the private Harkness Road High School, said with a sigh, “makes me long for the days when the only rights students had were the right to remain silent.”
To summarize: when the ‘West Side Story’ fiasco started the School Committee deferred to Superintendent Sayer, who deferred to Principal Scott Goldman who deferred to the play’s producers…who caved, saying the controversy had become too “distracting.”
And so Amherst Regional High School became the only entity in history (a record still intact) to cancel a play based on the timeless Shakespearean tragic love story ‘Romeo and Juliet’.
One of the more famous ARHS (1989) graduates Eric Mabius, recently voted “Sexiest man alive” by People Magazine started his career as Paris in ARHS production of ‘Romeo and Juliet.’ Luckily he attended our bucolic High School back in the pre-activism days .
At a rally I organized on the Town Common to support ‘West Side Story’ about 100 folks attended, a few high school students, parents--but mostly media. State Senator Stan Rosenberg and ACLU attorney Bill Newman spoke eloquently about free speech and their was much buzz about bringing in a production of the play to the High School with a big-name volunteer cast, but nothing ever came of it.
Fast forward late-December, 2003: When I first read buried in the Amherst Bulletin (who refused to use the word “vagina” in a headline) about senior Kristin Tyler appearing before the School Committee in early-December to inform them (apparently not to ask) about performing ‘VM’, I thought “here we go again with those 17-year-old’s.”
I vividly recall the first school Committee Meeting after the news broke a few weeks later when about two-dozen folks showed up to support the play and only two to oppose.
Although Superintendent Hochman had trumpeted the girls courage to publicly speak out about violence against women he refused to let them come to the School Committee meeting to speak about why they should do it in the form of ‘VM’ because he wanted to shelter them from the brewing controversy. Hmmm.
But a young art teacher, especially supportive of the play, and faculty advisor to it (with a side business of “erotic photography”--specializing in women of course) did appear to read “statements” from the girls.
Immediately the Daily Hampshire Gazette published an editorial citing the strong support at that single School Committee meeting, casting me as a book burner; but then never bothered to issue another editorial after the next three meetings where play opponents far outnumbered supporters.
And the editor-in-chief also forbids me from writing another ‘VM’ column for the Amherst Bulletin, a violation of my verbal contract with editor Nick Grabbe. The same chief editor who accused me of censorship.
