About every six months in our community, someone sounds the alarm:
“There’s a creep on the dance floor!”
Everyone panics, especially me. No one wants our dance community to be creep-free more than I.
But are we surprised? Should we be?
Creep happens.
The Creep Factor
The versions of creepiness I hear or have experienced go something like this.
“I can’t stand how tightly he squeezes me.”
“He wouldn’t take no for an answer.”
“She presses herself right up against me. It feels sexual”.
“They want to link up off the dance floor, like I should go home with them.”
“She is so flirty. Does she think I am attracted to her?”
“I can’t breathe when we dance. He almost chokes the life out of me.”
“She stops me in the middle of the dance to correct me.”
“He controls the entire dance. I feel like a puppet.”
“He dances like a runaway train. I have to do whatever to keep from getting run over.”
“He keeps leading moves I don’t know and forces me to try and follow.”
“There is no room for my improvising. I have to do whatever he dictates.”
And so on…
Creepy vs. Creep
Have you ever been the designated creep? I have. (Read more below).
Don’t take this personally. It isn’t you. It’s your dancing. (OK, it might be you but let’s assume not.)
Your partner is experiencing your dancing style as creepy, i.e., fitting some of the descriptions above.
What may be experienced as creepy to one person may be comfortable or exciting by the next. So it is not necessarily even your dancing style that is creepy.
Countering the Creep Factor
How do I ensure I don’t dance like a creep?
The secret? Be sensitive and flexible. Adapt to your partner.
Creepy is being insensitive to how your partner is responding to your style of dancing.
Creepy is : One person dancing in a way that is experienced as disrespectful or uncomfortable, psychologically or physically, by the other. This might include physical force or boundary violations or just a disregard for the dance as a cooperative partnership.
A big deal?
Yes, really big.
Tango is a close, sensual and intimate dance dependent upon trust, attunement and vulnerability.
It takes two to Tango. Which means that it is a dance of communication, cooperation, co-creativity, and compromise.
When a partner is not respectful and sensitive it can be experienced as a personal violation and a betrayal of trust. In other words, really hurt, potentially leaving deep psychological scars.
Getting it right.
Argentine Tango is not just a dance, it is a personality makeover. You are going to learn every relational skill you will ever need anywhere, anytime for any occasion.
Great. How many years and thousands of dollars is that going to take?
Depends. Me – 70 – not much more.
The point is, to avoid being a creepy dancer, you need to:
1) be sensitive to your partner’s abilities, sense of musicality, comfort levels with physical contact, and …
2) be able to adapt or adjust your dance to accommodate your partner.
Give me a break! Tango steps are tough enough. I have to learn to be psychic as well? Adjust to what they want or are feeling?
Pretty much, yeah.
Creep is Inevitable
No, I shouldn’t be surprised when the alarm sounds every 6 months or so. Creepiness is inevitable because we are talking about some very sophisticated skills here.
We won’t ever get it perfect and we only learn through making mistakes. But we keep trying because the journey is the destination.
And for all my miscues and missteps and incompetence over the last few decades, I have only been called a creep once (to my face) and that was in Spanish which I didn’t understand so it took some sting out of it. (More embarrassing details below)
Attitude and Intent
Your partner can read your intent and attitude. If you are trying to be attentive, respectful, and cooperative, however awkward or clumsy, you will be forgiven much.
And if you are being bullish and arrogant or lecherous, in it only for what you get out of it, i.e., intentionally a creep, you will find yourself sitting alone in the corner. Hopefully.
Self-Defence
So back to our original question: How to decreep the dance floor?
1) Red flag the offender. Spread the word. Say NO when they come around.
2) If you do find yourself dancing a creepy dance, answer a strong arm with a strong arm. Resist the close embrace. Push back.
3) Walk off in the middle of a tanda or song. Don’t put up with this bullshit. No excuses.
4) Do the lifelong inner and outer work of decreeping yourself and your dance.
My Creep Story
It was our first trip to BA. I knew a little Tango (actually a lot less than I thought) and even less Spanish. Nonetheless, I was determined to strut my stuff on the big floor with an experienced milonguera and prove how accomplished I was.
In the middle of the dance my partner, whom I had almost literally dragged onto the floor with me, started reaming me out in Spanish. I babbled something back in English in self-defence, pleading with her not to walk off in the middle of the dance, (not a good look.) She stormed off at the end of the song which fortunately was the end of the tanda. I didn’t walk her to her seat.
It took me years of reflection and therapy and dance lessons to decipher what her objection was. I was manhandling her. She understood my lead but I was forcing her response. The English equivalent of her outburst would have been, “Quit pulling me. Let go for god’s sake!”
(Read more details of this embarrassing story in Trauma to Tango: Dancing through the shadows. Kindle version on amazon. Hard copies from me.)
Quick Fix
Good news!
Julia and I will be teaching mid-week sessions in the fall on Tango Connection.
Pam and Raymond will be including these concepts in their U of A class this fall as well.
Keep up to speed on everything by checking out YEG Tango’s web link.