The Ten Commandments
- Thou shall wear deodorant and brush thine teeth. Always. And thou shall ask thy friends whether you require more deodorant or teeth-brushing than currently.
- If thine friend asks if they require more deodorant or breath mints, thou shall not lie.
- Thou shall not purposely touch your partner’s bottom, breasts, or other private areas with your hands, or touch any part of their body with your tongue or mouth without their permission. If thou decides to do such things, your partner may leave your company or slap thy cheek (either one).
- Thou shall remember that dips are not necessary in every dance or with every partner. Thou shall realize that the follow shall hold thine own weight, and that the lead shall not force thine follow into awkward and uncomfortable positions against their will.
- Thou shall never give unsolicited advice during a social dance, under threat of social exile.
- Thou shall recognize that dance is a journey, not a race. More patterns at fast speeds does not a great dancer make.
- Thou shall not lift on the dancefloor. Partners are not weights, and the social floor is not a gym.
- Thou shall respect the word and actions of ‘No’. Thou shall recognize that your partner may decline a dance, may decline a move, or may decline thine advances – and that it is thy duty to not force thy will upon them.
- Do unto others as you would do unto yourself. Thou shall treat all dancers with respect and dignity.
- Thou shall dance at thy level, or the level of thy partner (whichever is lower). If ye wish to to use more difficult moves, you shall seek out training. With a professional – not YouTube.
Did we miss something you feel should be on the list? Drop us a note in the comments below!
Thou shall not eat garlic pre social dance or pass wind during social dance
I was about to make the garlic comment. The Passing of The Wind did not even cross my mind. But yeah.
Absolutely, garlic breath is disgusting, and garlic BO too.
Thou shall wear dark colored shirts so profuse sweating is not apparent. It looks gross. Thou shalt change shirts often if thou sweats profusely. ?
And dark pants so you don’t look like you just had an accident in your beige Dockers.
Thou shall not enter the dance floor walking backwards…
Yeah! Exactly. I’ve seen one weird dude doing walking backwards on the dance floor to get to the side of the floor.
Thou should NOT pay attention to any of the above bull butter.
Lol… sorry you feel that way 😉
You shall not be welcome on the dance floor.
It would be manners to watch out for your partner and fellow dancers. Bumps happen but a small sorry can make things better even if you feel it’s not your fault.
Most of the time this can be avoided if the gentleman travels forward and thus can see where he is leading his partner.
Exactly! So many people do not realize that swing, especially, is designed so that the leader is always moving into a floorspace that s/he can see.
I think The Dancing Grapevine is always ‘right on!”
Thou shall not tell your dancing partner that she shouldn’t be wearing a sweater for the social when she is actually wearing a nice and fancy blouse. I also, thou shall not treat your dancing partner as an idiot just because she says she is not in the advanced level yet.
Men (and sometimes women) shall bring extra shirts so that women do not have to touch completely sweat-soaked, nasty, wet shirts.
Thou shalt not stand on the dance floor or too close to the edge or else risk getting wacked with an arm or a leg. Thou shalt get OUT of the WAY!
The leader shalt watch where he/she is going and not use the follower as a battering ram and/or run into other dancing couples.
Thou shall not overdose on cologne, perfume, or after shave!
Whilst thou is dancing with their partner remember the dance floor is also occupied by other dancers who also are entitled to space. Big patterns are great when there is lots of space. When floor is crowded smaller, more intimate dance patterns are more considerate of others.
Well said. Just because thou can take huge strides and use up a lot of the floor, doesn’t mean thou shouldst, good floor craft and manners are paramount on a social floor.
Thou shalt not bring your own drinks, but buy it at the bar…
so the bar owner also makes some money……
If your partner is not grinning like a Cheshire cat thou shalt never say ” Cheer up, don’t look so miserable”
I get this one all of the time :/
If this list is for fun and laughs, sure. If it should be considered an absolute truth, heck no. Somewhere inbetween? Ok, take it with a grain of salt or two.
Especially “commandment” five; If someone behaves badly, or dances in a way that is either unpleasant or potentially harmful to me, him/herself or the surroundings, I *will* give advice on how to avoid this, unsolicited or not. Refraining from doing this is doing myself, my partner and the entire dance community a huge disservice.
I won’t point out everything that isn’t perfect (then I would spend most of the time talking about me and my dance), but when something is severe and my partner seems oblivious to the fact, I phrase it delicately. If he/she does not know how to take helpful advice that comes out of a real concern for everyone, that is not a humble dancer (see http://neokizomba.com/aglanceatawcud/).
But yes, there is a fine line from giving unsolicited advice that ruins a dance and helpful advice that prevents embarassing moments to occur in the future. The line is not clear and different for every person. So just like you have to get to learn how to dance with your partner, you need to learn how to communicate with your partner.
As for “commandment” nine – if someone is disrespectful to you and treats you badly, try to be the bigger person, but do NOT let this destroy you. I let everyone give a first impression and I believe in second (and third, fourth, fifth or even more) chances. But is someone does not respect me, no matter what, they have not earned my respect. Instead of trying to “be the bigger person” in that case, focus on the good people in your dance community. Dancing should be fun – that includes you too! Some people are not nice, and you playing rug and letting them step all over you will just kill your desire to dance in the long run. Avoid them without making a drama out of it and instead give love to those that deserve it.
And I want to second Daz’ advice. A dance floor is a shared space – respect other dancers. On a crowded floor, big sweeping movements that chase other dancers away are not cool. Learn how to dance “smaller”. And yes, I am looking especially at zouk dancers that enter the kizomba floors. Getting repeatedly whipped by a mane isn’t fun when you try to dance.
Kiz dancers aren’t immune to getting in Zouk way either 😉 Everyone has to watch out for each other.
Unsolicited advice is different than telling someone they are hurting you, or are putting you in danger. I have always advocated this anyways 🙂
As for do unto others, I do think it should be a rule. Just because you don’t like someone isn’t a reason to be a dick.
Regarding unsolicited advice; do you only consider cases when harm/danger is included to be warranted? I would tell my partner if they did something that was really unpleasant, ie made the dancing experience bad for me, especially if I thought that they would get the same reaction from other partners (if it is just a matter of my personal preference, I would let it go). Letting someone live in total ignorance about bad habits/poor choices isn’t contributing to a good dance culture within a community.
As for do unto others, being a dick and not giving respect to someone that does not respect you the least, are worlds apart (which is why I do not really like lists like these, there is no nuance, everything is black and white which is false. The world is very much more complex than this). I still maintain, do unto others as you do unto yourself WITHIN REASONABLE LIMITS. If someone repeatedly does not respect you and shows no attempt to better him-/herself, you are in no way obliged to respect that person. But this does not mean that you should behave like a dick, there are other ways to protect yourself from martyrdom.
For example in my world, ignoring people you often meet at socials are lack of respect, but in some cases I think it could be warranted. You might have other definitions of respect, this is the way I was brought up.
Unsolicited advice is, to me, only acceptable if there is harm – particularly during a social dance. After a social dance, on Facebook, off to the side… then talk about the behavior. Like smells, moves that make you uncomfortable, etc. Or, if you know the person, ask as you are going to the floor to not do that.
There is also a difference between advice and bringing a point up. If you don’t like something, a simple ‘please don’t do that move’ or ‘I’m not comfortable being that close’ is perfect. To then stop and give them advice on how to DO a move or how close they SHOULD hold is not you setting boundaries – it is you teaching on the floor, and is only acceptable *sometimes* when they ask for it.
As for do unto others, if you want that person to ignore you, then do unto them as you would want them to do to you. If you would rather they not talk to you, feel free to ignore. But, unless they’ve done something really bad (like the guy who once forced himself into my hotel room at an event), the ‘bigger person’ dynamic has worked well for me.
You are right; respect can mean different things to different people. To me, respect is simply treating one like a human being. It means not trash-talking them, not purposely being mean or injuring them, etc.
I very, VERY rarely meet dancers who are trying to be disrespectful. Some are awkward, some are shy (personally, I get shy sometimes and get extremely anxious going and saying hi to people – even if I know them). Reasonable limits are always applied – just like all the other items on this list.
Lists like this are general. That’s the point: to bring forward issues in a brief way that engages people and makes them say “yes, that’s a good general idea.” It is like something saying “Killing people is bad”. I could put in a bunch of things about if they’re going to kill you or your family, or if you are in a war, or – for some – assisted suicide, but these are exceptions – not the rule.
The rule: killing is bad. The rule: I before E except after C. Yes, there are exceptions – but I could write a several thousand word discourse on the exceptions without breaking a sweat… that’s not the point of this kind of list article. In my experience as a writer and blogger, the people who usually need the message most won’t read an essay on it. They will read a 10-line, psuedo-humorous article that espouses how to treat other human beings.
Then we have a very different view on “advice”. For me “bringing the point up” is giving someone advice. If you stop a social dance to elaborately explain something you have well passed the line bordering advice in my book. Reading what you write it seems that you consider “advice” to starting to teach someone.
As for disrespect: I have the same general experience. After dancing multiple days a week for almost two years I have only come across two or three people that behaved really badly and did not treat me with respect. Compared to the number of really wonderful dance partners I have come across, those numbers are almost negligible. I advocate giving second chances and being the bigger person, but when that does not work I say: protect yourself. As for being a dick, that was your interpretation of what I wrote. Where you got that interpretation I cannot answer. For me it is quite a distance from igoring someone, not giving them the respect a fellow dancer deserves, treating someone like a human being and hurting them on purpose. I know of two dancers that have had several rough run-ins. And one of them is to blame more than the other. That person have ticked off quite some dancers in the local community due to repeatedly poor behavior. But these two don’t talk to each other, or even acknowledge each others existence when possible, which makes it a bit awkward at drop-in lessons when you rotate couples. Not ideal and there is no respect shown between these two. For me, a respectful way would be to politely but firmly decline and ask to sit out. But I understand that this is way past for these two.
For me “do unto others” mean that I am overly generous, even if I don’t get the same back, in hope that I *might* get the same back from someone in the future. Respect falls lower on the scale.
But ok, on that point I see what you mean from your comments, and are more or less on board.
As for short lists and people who need the message most: they most likely won’t get the meaning of that list. That is at least my experience. Unless they have a strong interest in learning, they won’t be able to deconstruct the compact message themselves.
I object to calling something “10 commandments”, which is a really strong statement, especially when it is posted on a blog that has a quite strong status in the online dance community. If it was backed up by the same reasoning you use in your longer pieces, describing WHY one of these rules are a good idea it would be much more useful IMHO, just like you have written about “always say yes to a dance”.
But perhaps you want to keep the blog lighter and not as in-depth as I percieved the aspirations of this blog, or perhaps I have outgrown it. In that case I am sorry for my comments and will move on.
Looking back on the convo, I’m not sure where I made the leap to ‘Be a Dick’ either – sorry!! (Perhaps it was a rough day at work..? Anyways, it was definitely out of context).
I think the biggest thing here is that for me, advice = teaching on the dance floor, and respect = treating others like a human being. I think this is causing the majority in the friction between our two standpoints.
There will always be exceptions to these rules – and it is certainly not my ‘normal’ style to make short-form lists. I really, really like dealing in-depth with things – but unfortunately, the majority of the dancers out there will not read the longer-form articles in their entirety. I do agree, ’10 Commandments’ is strongly worded – but not undeserved. There are exceptions to these rules, but the general rule follows the same spirit.
For example, this article has been more popular than any I have ever written… in large part because it’s quick and easy for reading and sharing, and these are items that resonate with most people. This, in turn, exposes more people to the blog – and drives significantly more people to write the longer, more involved pieces that I do write.
For pieces like this, my hope is that people who read it will take away at least *1* piece of the information and apply it. For example, that someone will ask their friends if they smell, and then be able to change their habit. OR, someone who is early-on and in ‘pattern love’ takes it as a hint to explore other aspects more. It won’t by any means give them an entire picture right away, but even the seed that can grow into a different habit is worthwhile.
Please never apologize for commenting (unless you’re planning on personally attacking me – which you’re not at all obviously). I enjoy comments that I can engage with and talk more about. 🙂
And thou shalt not wear a shirt that had been left in washing machine for two days ( or more)
Thou shalt take all conversations off the dance floor so we know who is dancing and who is not
Yes! Especially when the dance floor is small.
the (mis)use of “thine” and “thy” are really rubbing me the wrong way here….
I do believe that ‘thine’ and ‘thy’ are the possessive forms. In which case, both ‘thine’ and ‘thy’ are being used correctly in the article – particularly since at their creation they were used interchangeably 🙂
(Unless you’re talking about the comments?)
Thou shalt not call what you do “salsa’ if thou art using ridiculous dancesport hand styling and silly dance constumes. For this is not Salsa and real latin dancers will just roll thy eyes. Thou shalt learn what Cuban rumba is, because what thou is doing is NOT rumba.
I agree with thy comment mi hermano, rumba and son dancing is much more enjoyable than Olympics stunts…
1. Leaders need to learn how to craft. Protecting your partner is very important.
2. Inviting someone to dance ex. Would you like to Dance. Should be a commandment
3. Do not tell your partner what to do! Commandment #1
Professionals should be friendly and say hello to all people dancing, not just there own students
Re Commandment 6: Thy shall not ask someone to dance that you know is far more advanced than yourself. It is usually a waste of time for both parties.
Respect yourself and wear nice clothes, not ones that most people would do the gardening in and get yourselves some dance shoes with felt soles, therefore enabling you to dance more easily.
Hmm… I don’t think I agree with your logic here.
Case: I’ve been dancing for several years. I dance with beginners regularly. It’s not a waste of time for either of us: I get the pleasure of fostering a new person, they get the benefit of (hopefully) learning something from the dance and feeling included. It improves my ability to interpret less-refined leads or be more clear for less-savvy follows, and it improves their ability to actually learn how to lead or feel where to follow.
Point: Dancing only with dancers ‘at your level’ is a sure-fire way to NOT improve. Dancing with all levels develops your entire skill set.
Remind thy new dancer that the world’s best dancer had their first day on the floor not knowing what to do to. Thine would also remember that dance survives when old dancers motivate new dancers to dance.
Bravo! IMHO, one of the best advice to building a generous community. Giving back to the community is the best way to make it last.
Snobs/elitists that only come to the dance when the “newbs” have left and consider it beneath them to dance with beginners is a great way to discourage people from getting into the dance. Todays awkward beginner is the dream dance partner of tomorrow. I wish more dancers could realize that.
Also, consider helping out when there are too few leaders/followers at beginners courses. Giving a starting dancer more opportunities to dance with more experienced partners increases the chance that they find it fun, and want to continue.
Remember that at dancing the most important is fun – not your or your partner level and who is better/lower.
I prefer leader who dont smoke and drinks not too much. Who dont chew a gum dancing.
Yes I think in certain parts of the country there is no “fun”, no thanks and pleasantries after the dance or during the dance. They have lost their way ! It should be about enjoying a partner activity not impressing anyone. When I see to people dancing (however technical) if they are not smiling or interacting then the dance is dead.
One of my partners wore Elastoplasts on his fingers as his fingers were getting caught on rings, so I suppose, Thou shalt not wear the Rock of Gibraltar on thy fingers.
Don’t: walk across a dance floor, go around it.
. .And Definitely Don’t: cross a dance floor carrying any drinks.
Thou shalt not dance with a drink in your hand.
If you go out into the depths of the sidelines to ask a follow who is taking a break off to the side to dance, and she accepts, be courteous and bring her to the actual dance floor, closer to the music.
thou shall not do high kicks on a crowded floor, dance to your space. On a crowded floor appreciate your follows feet by not sending them out into nearby danger.
Thou shalt not do ANY kicks on a crowded dance floor. And thou shalt not do aerials on a social dance floor. Limit thyself to the jams, planned or unplanned.
Thou shalt wash thy hands after using the toilet.
And to really prevent the spreading of cooties, Purell is a pretty good germkiller.
When walking onto the dancefloor with a partner during a track, ensure you are not walking into an area either being occupied by another couple or about to be occupied by another couple.
thou shall wear appropriate clothing when coming to socials, it is a dance floor not a run way.
Unless it is an actual vintage party. In such instances, dance gently for the clothing may be decades old.
Laura! This was funny, sad but true
….and so on point! I will be forwarding this list to many offenders…to give them a little reminder. Thanks for sharing!
Thou shalt not squeeze your partner’s fingers tightly when leading them, especially during turns. Thou shalt also be careful not to smack your partner’s head during turns.
Thy partner’s hand is not a Blackberry.
Dance is neither a science nor a fully regulated practice. Thou shall indicate only preferences for dance style as opposed to claiming to know the absolute correct execution of a figure.
The goal is frivolity, collegiality and self improvement. Thou shall view mistakes as humorous and always consider what thou could have done to stop it.
Thou will know that ‘lead’ and ‘follow’ refer to roles, and not gender. Regardless, thou will take thy role seriously.
Thou will accept that dance is all made up and evolving, and the traditional style is neither automatically the correct nor the best style.
Dance sport styling does not always make for better social dancing.
Musicality is more than timing; express the music in thy dance to make it a true journey.
Never let those who do not follow the commandments get thou down or chase thou from dance.
You will leave the floor between dances, possibly even walking your partner back to where you found her.
I have been wounded on the dance floor by women in spike heels
Thou shall not walk across the dance floor and not expecting to get hit by an elbow etc.
Thou is not Moses who walked across the Red sea unharmed.
I thought it was “thou shalt” and “thee shall”. No? Oh… Commandment 5, thee art difficult to follow!
Thou shalt understand that although maximum enjoyment may be had during a dance, it does not mean that thine partner is into you romantically.