[Callers] Empowering people to say "Yes" while also empowering them to say "No"

Sat Sep 14 07:40:23 PDT 2019

I've noticed that in a lot of community discussion, matters of safety are
getting confused for and mixed together with issues which I would call
Community Norms.

Empowering folks to decline things (or people) which make them
uncomfortable is a matter of Safety. Maia brings up some awesome points
that some dancers have extended this power to a place where they decline
dances for more trivial (at best---discriminatory at worst) reasons. This
is where Community Norms come in.

Established members of any community have the power to lead by example,
just as Maia describes doing in her communities. Things which can be
prioritized and demonstrated by a community include anything which might be
cited as aspects of an individual community's *culture*: don't talk over
the caller; applaud loudly for the performers; ask new people to dance;
dance in both roles; ask before you flourish; etc.

It's easiest to influence a dance's culture in newer communities. Portland
Intown Contra Dance in Maine is my favorite dance because, right off the
bat, they made a lot of important things the priority of the *community*,
not of the individuals which make up the community.

It's important to emphasize the difference between cultural priorities
(Community Norms) and matters of Safety. The latter must and should always
be reinforced verbally, and while the former can be explained verbally, I
think these things are easier (and more important!) to express by example.

Ultimately, the concern here is that lumping everything into the same
category devalues the things which are important to a dancer's safety.

Angela

On Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 9:07 PM Maia McCormick via Callers <
callers at lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:

> This is a really interesting question! I've also certainly worried about
> this tension, especially in re: people's right to decline any dance. A
> friend of mine once described it in a nifty way: "you can always decline a
> dance" is consent 101. It's the basic lesson, and you really want folks
> (esp. the folks with societal conditioning against saying "no") to
> internalize it. After that is solid, though, you get to consent 201: "you
> can always say 'no', but there are all sorts of reasons you might say 'no',
> and it's worth thinking about where those feelings come from. Is it a
> matter of personal safety, or does this person not look like the people you
> usually socialize with, or...?"
>
> I think my biggest follow-up question to you is: when you talk about
> wanting to empower people to say "yes", is this a need you've seen, or just
> think theoretically could exist? Even with the degree to which the dance
> community has started empowering people to say "no", the vast, vaaaast
> majority of people still do the twirls and still make eye contact, and I
> don't see people shrugging off those options just for the hell of it. So I
> guess I'm asking: what behavior are you seeing in these arenas that
> concerns you?
>
> I will grant that declining dances is a thornier subject, because there
> ARE a bunch of folks in our community who people are less excited to dance
> with for some really unfair reasons (e.g. fat folks, disabled folks, etc.)
> This is definitely something we as a community need to talk about and
> address to make contra a welcoming space to all.
>
> I know that my friend group tries very consciously to set examples of
> asking everyone to dance, and I've heard a good line (on SharedWeight?):
> "you never know who might give you your best dance of the evening." My
> personal check on myself (esp. at dance weekends, where I'm likely to be
> really excited about dancing with all my friends that I rarely see) is that
> I need to have at least one "mediocre" (quote unquote) dance per < day /
> session / etc. > -- which means I need to dance with someone who's less
> skilled, or with an unknown quantity/someone I might not otherwise dance
> with. (And then if they turn out to be a splendid dance partner, well, yay!
> I had better go ask someone *else* outside of my usual circle to dance.)
>
> I also want to remind everyone that the burden of inclusivity lies not
> just on the ask-ees, but also -- maybe moreso? -- on the ask-ERs. Our
> concern should not JUST be "if we tell people (often women*) that when
> asked, they may say no, what if they say no to EVERYONE?" 1. Ask-ees
> (women) are not the gatekeepers of the contradance experience, but more
> importantly, 2. If we want to create an inclusive dance community, we also
> have to foster one where ask-ERs (often men, though decreasingly so) will
> ask everyone, regardless of age, size, gender, ability, etc.
>
> * I imagine that the "empowerment to say no" disproportionately comes into
> play for women being asked to dance, so if we're worried about "being able
> to say 'no'" going "too far", that has some implicit gender behind it in my
> mind.
>
> Final thought: we talk so much about how it's okay to say "no" because
> many of us -- especially women -- are so conditioned AGAINST saying "no".
> It would be a pretty cool problem to have, I think, if people felt
> comfortable enough advocating for their boundaries and physical limitations
> that we had to focus hard on empowering people to say "yes" again.
>
> There are a bunch of (not necessarily organized) thoughts. Thanks for
> broaching this topic!
>
> - Maia
>
> On Fri, Sep 13, 2019 at 6:32 PM jim saxe via Callers <
> callers at lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
>
>> In discussions among dance callers and organizers, online and off, a
>> variety of topics come up from time to time that might be grouped under the
>> heading of empowering people (especially new dancers) to say "No".  Some
>> examples:
>>
>>      * Assuring new dancers that it's ok to decline an invitation
>>        to dance as someone's partner, and that doing so doesn't
>>        oblige them to give a reason nor to sit out the dance.
>>
>>      * Telling people that if they're not comfortable making eye
>>        contact, they can look at, for example, the forehead or
>>        ear of the person with whom they're swinging as a way to
>>        avoid getting dizzy from looking at the walls.
>>
>>      * Teaching how to decline a partner's or neighbor's attempt
>>        to lead a twirl or other embellishment.
>>
>> Without downplaying the importance of empowering people to say "No", I'd
>> like to know if anyone has ideas about empowering people to say "Yes"
>> (while still empowering them to say "No").  For example:
>>
>>      * While I agree that nobody should feel compelled to dance
>>        with any particular partner, I think it's nice to be in a
>>        community where most dancers are comfortable dancing with
>>        a variety of partners and where a single person arriving
>>        with no regular partner of group of friends doesn't face
>>        the prospect of being an involuntary wallflower for most
>>        (or all) of the evening.
>>
>>      * While I agree that nobody should feel required to make
>>        eye contact if they find it uncomfortable, I rather like
>>        dancing in a community where people generally do enjoy
>>        making more eye contact on the dance floor than they do
>>        with random passing strangers on the street. I wouldn't
>>        want to emphasize teaching avoidance of eye contact to
>>        point of developing into a community where everyone
>>        habitually looks at or past their partner's ear.  (And
>>        no, that doesn't mean I think it's ok for dancer A to
>>        gaze at dancer B as if he meant to fall through her eyes
>>        into her very soul while dancer B very obviously is not
>>        responding in kind.  [Stereotyped gendered pronouns
>>        intentional, but the same point applies with any other
>>        pair of pronouns.])
>>
>>      * I've sometimes heard the action borrowed from "Petronella"
>>        described with words such as "move or spin one place to
>>        the right."  To me that seems to suggest that just walking
>>        to the next spot around the ring is the standard version
>>        of the figure and that spinning is an embellishment.  I'd
>>        rather suggest that the spin is standard and the leaving
>>        it out is an adaptation for those with limited mobility,
>>        energy, or balance.
>>
>> Perhaps some of you can think of other examples.
>>
>> When someone makes two remarks--call them P and Q--that seem to suggest
>> different courses of action, it's tempting to read them as being connected
>> by a "but" ("P but Q") and to assume that the person means to imply that
>> whichever remark came second (that is, the one after the explicit or
>> implicit "but") thoroughly overrides the one that came first.  That's not
>> my intention here.  I'd really like to get some conversation going about
>> helping people feel empowered to say "Yes" and ALSO helping them feel
>> empowered to say "No".  As an illustration that those need not be
>> conflicting goals, let me mention that IMO one of the things that can most
>> empower someone to say "Yes" is confidence that they'll be respected when
>> they want to say "No".
>>
>> Thoughts, anyone?
>>
>> --Jim
>>
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