I am, I'm appalled at the material I see for young children at competitions, don't care if they beat my groups or not!
Poker Face is not an appropriate song for 11 year olds to dance to and I've seen it this year..!!!

YES, YES, and YES!!! I am sooo tired of seeing this at competition!!! I have taken littke girls to comp with real dance moves only to have them place 2nd to a group who did alot of booty shaking and no real dancing!!! Not cool!!!

YES, YES, and YES!!! I am sooo tired of seeing this at competition!!! I have taken littke girls to comp with real dance moves only to have them place 2nd to a group who did alot of booty shaking and no real dancing!!! Not cool!!!

Definitely

I would sign, but you also have to think about it in a way.
Now for 5 year olds? ALL FOR IT! i hate it! But when I was a soph. in high school I believe I had a dance with 8 other girls the youngest being 13 and it was to aye carumba. so we had belly tops but more salsa looking kinds with fishnet tights. and for this dance we had to act silly sexy i call it. a LOT of shimmies and booty shaking, some did pelvic thrusts on the beats and we had to have that latin sexy flair. i don't think it was bad at all. but the 10 year olds doing a dance to leave your hat on and future sex love sounds, yes. most definately.

I signed on another website. I hope something finally happens.

I just did.

Absolutely. In my non-dance field I deal with victims of sexual abuse and exploitation every day - it's sickening that things children would be removed from homes if their parents asked them to do in the living room are encouraged and REWARDED on stage in front of an audience.

You know that I have signed as so has my family and some friends and colleagues who I told. Make sure, if you sign, that you also ask everyone you know and keep reminding them!

I signed it! I also passed it along to everyone that I know WILL sign it!

Signed, posted it on my facebook and passed it on to family, colleagues and dance parents.

I agree! I am amazed at many of the things I see at dance competitions! I have seen many hip hop dances with girls as young as 6 to songs like "Oh Hot Damn..." I wonder if they go around singing that song after rehearsing to it a million times. Thats terrible!

I do have to say however that for the older ages (maybe 13+) it can get hard to judge appropriateness of a dance. Saying absolutely no hip thrusts of any kind- I can see how some dances may have moves that could qualify as a hip thrust, but are in no way vulgar or inappropriate to the age group.

But yes, I totally agree something needs to be done!

I have passed this around to literally 1,000 people, yet there are only 278 signatures. So many said they signed but I do not see it.

Signed and passing it on!

Ok, this petition is a bit fishy.
There are 304 signatures now and looking at the number of people that JLL alone has passed this onto there should be three times the amount of names there.
I checked back for my own signature and found that it wasn't there, so I'm not sure if it's really worth the time !

I signed, and a lot of people I spread the word to signed also. And I didn't have to make a donation. Not sure why it's not showing others.

I signed it, but I am not seeing my signature also. It may take a couple of days to update.

I haven't signed, but will. I think the biggest gripe I have is making latin dance look "sexy" and hip thrusting. Growing up overseas, if I would've danced the way young girls perform the latin flair onstage, i would've been locked up until i turned 30.
Sorry, a little explosion there...And to the person who asked if the kids sing the innapropriate songs, yes they do, because i have heard them. I know of a teacher who will not used the cleaned up versions because the kids will ding the not so clean version...

As a competition judge, I see many things that make me uncomfortable judging them, especially for the age. The problem is: Hip-Hop currently holds a negative connotation that it is all booty shaking. As a certified Hip-Hop instructor, I personally get offended on so many levels. (1) Most competition judges dont know anything about hip-hop & realize that there is technique involved in hip-hop just like any other style of dance. (2) Because they dont know & are somewhat ignorant to hip-hop all together, they judge the "Booty shaking" highly thinking its close to what they saw on tv. (3) That correlates to high scores & a trend that this is the only way to win with a hip-hop routine..... Absolutely sickens me.....
mzoutlaw.com

That is a big issue with me. I DO know what real hip hop looks like. My hi hop teachers trained with Rennie Harris and others who are similar and to see booty shaking, pirouettes and leaps, jazz style, and other garbage, I will give them a low score and tell them that this is NOT hip hop.

I signed it too. some of the dances out there are just way to over. some one needs to finally do something about it.

The signatures from our studio are coming up immediately. I forwarded it my sister just now, and her signature popped right up. Maybe your cookies are not disabled so the signature is not uploading properly? If you write a lot, your comments are masked on the signature page, but the signature should appear immediately.

I find that the people not involved in competition are more inclined to sign if you include a youtube link to one of the award-winning 8 and under jazz routines. Since they don't see this stuff on a regular basis they are not jaded and desensitized the people who attend competition on a regular basis.

You should also receive an email confirmation from i-petitions verifying that your signature made it through. If you don't, then your signature probably did not load correctly. I would try again if your signature is not appearing.

I signed. I saw a 8-12 year old group do a hip hop routine to "buttons" by PCD. 8-12 year olds shouldn't even understand this song, and definitely shouldn't be loosening up their buttons.