Re: [Callers] That g word

I've been dancing both roles since before I started calling. I remember dancing once with David Cantieni at Spring Weekend in the 80s, and women getting mad at us because we should have danced with them... And, I started using "Men" and "Women" almost when I started to call. I used to say, "Anyone can ask anyone to dance, men can ask women, women can ask men, men can ask men, and women can ask women. You should try as many of these as possible." Then my dance community, Santa Barbara, CA, received a letter about me saying that at a dance in Santa Maria, a little, quite conservative town north west of Santa Barbara. The letter noted that some people left when I said that. After that, on further reflection--for the time and place--I felt the letter writer was correct. I didn't want to drive away homophobic people, though I wanted people to feel comfortable dancing with anyone. But Read W., well, I'm from California, and he's from Massachusetts. Things might have been different back here, rather than out east, since we are the "left coast"... ~erik hoffman Oakland, ca On 1/21/2016 5:33 PM, Read Weaver via Callers wrote: I expect at the time you made the change from "ladies" to "women," very few men would have considered dancing with another man, and those who did would have faced confusion at best, and hostility from some--I speak from my own experience. As that has changed, so has the language. Sorry if you think that's something to sigh about. Read Weaver Jamaica Plain, MA http://lcfd.org