This Strictly Come Dancing thing - are the judges a bit racist?

[Wuldric]

So for the first time in my life, I have been exposed to this Strictly stuff. Fairly predictably it was utter crap. Brucie almost remembered all of his lines, which was good.

Then I started looking at the scores.

You tell me why this performance - Susanna Reid & Kevin dance the Paso Doble to 'Los Toreadors' - - where the non-professional swished her skirts a few times

got the same marks as this performance.
Natalie Gumede & Artem dance the Charleston to 'Bang Bang'- Where the non-professional played a blinder. That girl could seriously but seriously dance.

And then tell me that racism isn't institutional.

The judges could have voted out a black contestant on a previous occasion

Thats true. Patrick and Anya didn't deserve to be in the dance-off but were saved unanimously.

You assume that the marks on Strictly are meant to be for quality of dance only.

That assumption is wrong I think.

So your conclusion is not valid.

Patrick is amazing - 50 years old. I wish I had his energy.

I wonder if they still only had 2 different dances per show whether the OP would have started this thread? Especially if Sophie and Abbey had both danced the charleston as well. Sophie would have danced her off the floor and I think I might have preferred Abbey's as well. It would definitely show how overmarked that 39 was.

OP, you make the mistake of thinking Strictly is a straight dancing competition. It isn't. It is a light entertainment reality TV show first and foremost. The BBC are completely upfront about this. Viewers are invited to vote for "their favourite" NOT the "best dancer".

As all such shows are, it is subject to producer manipulation via such things as the running order, the music choices (not left entirely up to the pros as some might think) and the judges' scoring. The producers want drama, they want the programme to beat X Factor in the ratings, they want headlines. There is no drama in one dancer - this year, it happens to be Natalie - being so technically superior to the rest of the field that there is no suspense as to who might win, who might challenge her to the glitterball, and they fear the audience would switch off. They have to create some element of unpredictability and so the overmarking of other dancers takes place from time to time, tied scores on the leaderboard happen as they encourage a "shock" bottom two (as happened to Abbey, who dropped from joint second, a few weeks ago)

As it happens, last series' equivalent of Natalie was Denise van Outen - white - who was the most technically proficient celebrity there had been up to that point, who was beaten in the final by Louis Smith - mixed race.

Having said all that, we must also remember that the judges are watching the dances live and feeling the atmosphere they create, and we are not. Again, they are upfront about scoring on performance as well as technique and it is entirely possible that Susanna's Paso had a more "electric" feel to it while being danced live than Natalie's Charleston.

Op - the questions I asked you were a) once Susanna (who danced first) was given perfect marks by 3 of hte 4 judges, once someone else came along who did a better dance (in your opinion, I don't actually think technically it was better, although more entertaining to watch and set to better music), what should they have done? The best they could do was mark her the same, unless they went back and revised down the scores for Susanna, she would have to get the same mark as Natalie from 3 of the 4 judges as 10 is as high as they can go. Do you think they should change it so they don't announce marks until all the dancers have performed so they can rank them against each other rather than judging that performance of that dance?

and b) if the fact she didn't get the highest mark is a sign of racism, how do you explain the fact that either she or the other black non-professional contender have been at the top of the leaderboard (either on their own or joint top scores with another pair) 7 of the 9 programmes in this series?

I bet the OP wont come back now she has been presented with the facts.

Ha, ha, just reading through this howling away. It is clearly a wind-up.

OP claims to be a dance expert - but hasn't watched strictly.
OP claims to be black and then refers repeatedly to a mixed race 29 year old woman as the 'black kid'.
OP says the 'black kid' is being marked down, but in fact she usually comes top.
OP says that after Susanna got 39, the judges should have found some 11s and 12s for Natalie. This has been explained to her but OP refuses to understand the explanation - almost like she's saying black is white (excuse the pun).

You know, I should have actually responded with my very first

Well let's see if the OP watches X Factor next week and judges that as racist too.

I'm with Noseynoonoo

And the previous poster who described this thread as bonkers.

It's just too funny

bloody hell, I'm going to have to hide this thread, it made my blood boil so much.

OP seems to be a member of the Perpetually Offended. Considering the number of responses she's had to her questions, which she seems determined to not see, she is being deliberately obtuse

The determination to see this decision as racist No Matter What made my blood boil, Badgerwife.

haven't read through the thread so sorry if someone else has said this, but as you pointed out this was your first time watching, so a few points you should think about

1. They were doing different dances the 'skirt-swishing' which you apparanetly didn't think was very good is actually the style of the dance and actually if she hadn't swished it would have been rubbish, the swishing is partially what made it so good
2. If you had watched the seroes from the beginning you would see how much susannah has improved and how much she deserved that score where as natalie had dance traing till she was 19 which kind of defeats the purpose of the programme therefore I'm not sure were racism comes in but actualy considering she's a trained dancer natalies dance was actually nothing special...

also the top mark they can get is 40 (10 from each judge) so 1 judge didn't think both were perfect which means even if natalies dance was better (not saying it was) she couldn't have got a better score then susannah unless it was perfect which it apparently wasn't. They both did good dances that deserved good scores and it just happened that they got the same score, nothing to do with who they are, or what colour they are!

oh and having read through the thread yes actually susannah did dance better, if you go on youtube and look at other charlestons done on strictly you will see that actually natalies charleston wasn't anything special, it was a good dance and nice to watch but not amazing, look at other female celebs doing paso and susannah did an amazing job!

I know nothing about the technicalities of dance, but Susannah did dance better than Natalie this week.

Susannah dances every dance from the heart, with joy in her eyes and this week she matched that with (according to the expert judges) good technique. I couldn't look away whilst she was dancing. Whereas, though Natalie is usually better technically, she lacks something of that passion and warmth and this week was way off her best.

SHE WAS JOINT TOP MARK. OP you can argue that Susannah was over marked but until they start allowing the judges to give 11 out of 10 you cannot claim Natalie was undermarked. She was the best - joint best. Get over yourself OP.

OP the dancers aren't compared with each other. They're scored according to how well they perform their dance. Susannah was scored highly because she executed her dance well and with passion. It has no bearing on how Natalie was marked.

I actually think that a lot of the amateur dancers are improving significantly week-on-week whereas Natalie started off from being possibly the best dancer and hasn't made anywhere near the same journey of improvement.

It's not really fair anyway to judge someone who has a background in dance with those who haven't! And Natalie does whereas people like Ben, Patrick, Abbie and Susannah haven't!

Willem - I think that's actually a really good point. I was much more impressed by some of Natalie's earlier dances than I was by this one. And yet some of the others have just got better and better.

OP - I am trained in dancing.

Susannah's Paso performance was better than Natalie's Charlston IMO.

You may, of course, have a different opinion. Each to their own.

But to try and call the markings as an example of Racism is, quite frankly, insane.

Patrick (black) was top of the leader board last week. Quite right too.

The fact that YOU think Natalie was the better dancer does not make it Racist. I suspect YOU are the Racist here.

You simply have to look at last year's final to show OP's point for the nonsense it is. Denise van Outen (white) was clearly the best dancer, but was beaten by Louis Smith (black). Was that due to racism, do you suppose?

nennypops, I do hope that you are not presenting facts which interfere with the OP's enjoyment of his/her sense of persecution?

No comment from OP on last night's programme, I see. You know, the one where Natalie got the highest marks.