If you wish, you can suggest that the roles might have once been based in gender.  But in the larger picture, there is no reason that one role must be danced by one gender and the other role must be danced by the other.  Gendered terms have suggested that they should, but other than that, there is no reason, and that is why genderless terms have been invented and are now coming into wider use.  

So when you *are* using larks/robins, then we need to completely erase gender from the equation and have people understand that there is a lark and a robin, and you could be either.  Try both roles and see what you are most comfortable in.  That's the goal of gender free terms.

And now we are getting beyond Maia's original request of not relitigating gender free dancing in this thread, so I would politely suggest starting another thread for those who prefer gendered dancing and calling that is not this one.  

Respectfully,

Perry

On Monday, March 11, 2024 at 10:53:02 AM EDT, K P via Contra Callers <contracallers@lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:


John,

<Perhaps, “the roles were originally (completely and utterly) based on gender”!

Ya think?  :)

I had what I assume is a similar response when I read that, John.

Aside to John: In this entire, ongoing discussion, it seems to me that there is an active conspiracy of pretense (along the lines of 'the emperor's new clothes') that the elephant sitting squarely in the middle of the room is actually a blueberry muffin.

Open and honest questions: 

Am I the only living person who has a preference for dancing with the opposite cisgender (realizing that any particular, such opposite, cisgendered individual may, in fact, have a different preference)?

If the above is a reasonable question, what is wrong with saying "If you have a preference to dance primarily with women, I recommend dancing the left role. If you have a preference to dance with men, I'd recommend dancing the right-side role; if you have no preference, it doesn't matter"?

What is the surveyed percentage of dancers in your community who have such a preference vs those who don't?


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