I grew up watching Dance Moms. After long days at school, my sister and I would intently watch our television, waiting for an episode or two of Dance Moms to air on Lifetime. It was our favorite show—the costumes, the dances, the drama, the dancers. Everything about Dance Moms was fascinating to us. We would fangirl over the girls, wishing we could be as talented as them. To younger me, it was a 10/10 show. Now looking back on the episodes, I feel a little bit different. Watching in 2021, I can’t help but notice the exploitation of little girls by producers and by their dance instructor, Abby Lee Miller. While I loved the costumes and dances when I was young, now some of them don’t sit right with me. Looking from a mature viewpoint, I don’t love Dance Moms as much as I used to.
One of the most infamous Dance Moms’s episodes is in the second season, episode nine: “Topless Showgirls.” It was taken down soon after it aired because it was extremely inappropriate for young girls. Dance teacher and choreographer Abby Lee Miller decided to take a risky, burlesque number to competition. Miller explains to the girls that it’s “all about crotch and boobs.” She tells them the main idea of the dance is “I’m hot! I’m mean! You can’t have me! You can’t afford me!” I believe this is extremely inappropriate to say to little girls — no girl should have the thought of being sold. Although some mothers voiced their distaste for the dance, they still decided to put it on stage, and some of the mothers even enjoyed the dance. The girls are dressed in nude bras and skimpy, sparkly bottoms. They are holding feather fans in a way to reveal what is underneath; it is supposed to show the illusion of the girl’s being nude showgirls.
Season one, episode two: “Wildly Inappropriate.” The title says it all. In this episode, Miller decides to choreograph a provocative number for her young dancers. While teaching them the number, she states, “you have to be really hot, sexy” and “More butt. It’s all about the butt,” to girls as young as seven. One mother explains, “The gestures and the movement in the dance is unacceptable […] when the girls went down and opened their legs, I almost walked out.” While Miller thinks of it as a fun and hot number, I certainly disagree. Their costumes are extremely skimpy; one mother asked, “Where’s the rest of her costume?” The girls are dressed in tight shorts and tight crop tops, with thigh high socks.
When exploiting young girls on live television, it’s putting them in danger. In 2015, a 36 year old man named Phoenix Sundown was arrested for sending pornography to the P.O. box of dancer Jojo Siwa. Months earlier he “posted photos of kidnap victim Elizabeth Smart online, tagging the dancer in the images with the caption ‘#futuregoals,’” according to Vice Magazine. In 2016, Joe McKinstry was arrested after trying to break into Miller’s studio to read poetry to the dancers. He had an infatuation with dancer Mackenzie Ziegler, sending her creepy messages on Twitter. Dancer Chloe Lukasik said, “Back in the Pittsburgh studio, there would be people coming all the time, and we actually did have a security guard. They would travel with us to competitions.”
Looking back on my former favorite TV show, I feel extremely different. While I used to love the complexity of the dances, the mama drama, and the girls, I can’t help but feel uncomfortable with some of the choices for the dances and costumes. In addition, the inappropriate exposure put the young girls in danger of stalkers and pedophiles. While Dance Moms was a show I enjoyed as a child, the unfair treatment of little girls for the public to see is unsettling and uncomfortable.
Girl Talk is an Opinion column written by a current female student to discuss issues surrounding women, whether it be feminism, current events, personal experiences at Stevens or in life, and more.
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