Till Sweat Drops Down My Balls: Meditations on the Deontology of Grinding
Good work, Pete. As you know, I’m a big fan of arguing for change within a community on behalf of that community, rather than on behalf of individual rights. MLK did it to mobilize the Civil Rights Movement. You, surely, should do it to overthrow the anti-grinding regime!
There are a couple thing, though. Your argument, in my opinion, veres way too close to a sort of depressing utilitarianism. Should we really be measuring whether a dance move is good based on the aggregate quantity of happiness it produces in a room?
Happiness is definitely something a community needs to consider. We should have a happy citizenry. But this isn’t really a community-based argument, because it is, after all, grounded in the pychology of individual exclusion. This brings up a good point: I don’t think you can call Putnam a communitarian, because he is, at the end of the day, attending to individual satisfaction.
A true communal argument would, unfortunately, need to make claims about the community’s sense of “good taste” and that begins to get sketchy very quickly.
My sense of this is that there is a communal argument here, but it’s not quite the one you made, and not nearly as complicated. I would just say that: dances are dances, and in America cerca 2009 they look a certain way. There’s nothing any more to stand athward yelling stop! at; the community has already spoken.
My second point is that I would be very careful arguing that sexualized dancing is bad because it “illuminates difference.” The alternative to “illuminating difference” is not to bring people up, but drag people down. Like the Harrison Bergeron of grinding, the foreign kid with the oily hair must make his hips less lucious so as to make everyone more equal.
I’m not a meritocrat - far from it. But everything, we should admit, in some ways illuminates difference. That’s because people are different. We engage in a host of differentiated activities every day - from putting on clothes (some are better at that) to driving, to making small talk, to going to school and so on and so forth. All of this illuminates difference.
The key, I think, is not to prevent that difference (not have sexualized dances) but to prevent it from dominating (also sponsor other communal events). Good grinding skills should be embraced. But so should good math skills. And good baseball skills.
This argument, obviously, is a broader one, one about the structure of a well-ordered society. We currently live in a society where dominance in the economic sphere translates into dominance of all other spheres.
And at least we can all agree - let’s thank God - that’s not the case with grinding!
In high schools across the country, there have been debates regarding grinding during dances. Basically, the question asked is: Should people at a public dance be allowed to dance sexually, or should said dancing be regulated?
Many discussions center on rights-based arguments:
- Pro-grinders argue, “We have the right to dance this way,” which is accompanied by sub-points such as “People have always criticized new types of ‘more intense’ dancing” and “It’s free expression!”
- Anti-grinders (i.e. grinding regulators) argue, “We have the right to regulate this,” citing their jurisdiction over the situation (i.e. administrators of a school stating that they have a right to regulate events that happen in their domain). These are accompanied by sub-points such as “this is inappropriate” and “you would not have the right to do this outside of this dance; why should you be allowed to do it inside this dance?”
In my experience with such debates, these rights-based arguments lead nowhere. Therefore, I believe we should work community-based arguments into the mix.
Grinding presents an interesting case when it comes to community building:
In one way, a culture of grinding builds “bonding social capital,” which community theorist Robert Putnam summarizes as the stuff that brings already-connected people closer. When a culture of grinding at a dance lowers the barriers to grinding among dancers, it allows those with a former connection and level of comfort to connect further; i.e. it allows you an opportunity to non-awkwardly connect physically with those whom you feel comfortable. Overall: in grinding with someone…you bond. Thus, a culture of grinding allows for such interaction, which strengthens relationships between people.** Strong(er) and full(er) relationships are good for community. Therefore, from this perspective, grinding is a good community builder.
**[note: I completely acknowledge the point that physical connections can be solely shallow and I acknowledge the completely legitimacy of the argument that shallow, physical bonds (like grinding) can weaken relationships. However, I won’t delve into that seperate debate here. For this entry, I will assume that two mutually-grinding individuals are brought closer by their grinding.]
However, grinding runs into problems when it is viewed through the lens of “bridging social capital,” which Putnam summarizes as the stuff that brings previously non-connected, different people together. A dance does indeed go a long way to bridge barriers. Anyone who has seen Footloose (or unfortunately High School Musical) knows the power of dance to bridge across barriers of race, belief, class, status and much more. The zanier atmosphere of a dance lowers social barriers and allows interactions among those who had previously felt too uncomfortable to interact. These interactions translate into relationships.
Unfortunately, an atmosphere of sexual dancing adds new social barriers. Sexual dancing is much less universal than non-sexual dancing…i.e. the set of people that one will dance with non-sexually is larger than the set of people that one will dance with sexually. Picture Jane, John and Bob. In a dance with a non-sexual culture, Jane will have the opportunity to dance with John and Bob, creating two new bonds. However, in a dance with a sexual culture (grinding prominent), Jane will only dance with John, becuase she does not feel comfortable dancing sexually with Bob
. Though John and Jane’s relationship will be bonded even more than it would have at a non-sexual dance, we sacrifice the opportunity for Jane and Bob to connect. Some bridging social capital is sacrificed for bonding social capital.
Dances with a culture of grinding offer less of an opportunity for bridging social capital because there is a barrier between those who do not feel comfortable dancing sexually with each other. This is because sexual dances illuminate differences in sexual attractiveness. Because of the delicate nature of sexuality, those who could connect normally in other situations (non-sexual dances) suddenly become “awkward,” or worse, “creepers” when they connect at dances. However, in truth, most are not “creepers”—they are doing the same thing that others are doing…they just happen to be less attractive. Thus, sexually-charged dance functions allow for bonding social capital among those who pass sexual comfort/prowess/attractiveness tests and prevent bridging social capital among those who don’t.
Is this a bad thing? I am not arguing that its good or bad- I feel that grinding is unquestionably fine at private and privately-funded events. Rather, I am simply saying that community (as opposed to just rights) should be considered when balancing cases of free expression and school events. Though we could ask boys to try to be more sexually attractive, or girls to be more comfortable, should we have to do that? On the other hand, perhaps the schools are doing a service by providing for bonding social capital among those who feel comfortable grinding.
Then again, do we want a function that divides across lines that are uncontrollable (physical attractiveness)? Do we want publicly-funded functions under the guise of community-building that systematically exclude those who do not possess a certain skill set? True, we do have other things that do this already. They’re called sports teams: they bridge across everything but “skill at baseball” and provide a lot of bonding social capital. Though they exclude those who are not athletic enough, most people are fine with the concept of a sport’s team. Then again, with a sport’s team, someone’s not called a “creeper” when they don’t make the cut.
I’d love some comments/critiques/thoughts. Any thoughts?
