Pole dancing exercise classes

[BadgerBumBag]

A friend is organising a group pole dancing class as a fun night out. I have reservations. I won't lie, most of my reluctance is due to being rather larger and less fit than the others, but I can't help feeling uncomfortable with the whole idea.

Am I being daft or does gyrating round a pole as exercise seem ok to you?

Personally, I wouldn't do it in the first place, because I do see it as a male sexual entertainment thing and it will be forever tainted like that in my mind.
If you do go ahead though, you know it's time to head off when the instructor start referring to you as "girls" and talks about being sexy for your husband.

Roller Derby is a good woman-orientated sport, in that it is not a blokes sport adapted for women. The women started if off.

You know how at the top of AIBU there's an AIBU is not fight club disclaimer?

It would be ace to get a "feminism is not the same as a choice, any choice, made by a woman" disclaimer.

Chops, there are some amazing athletes on your link. Bloody hell.

so what do you think OP? we need to know, will you or won't you

generally speaking it is good to try new things without worrying about them too much (hopefully I will never be introduced to crystal meth while I still hold this attitude to life) so I'm sort of hoping you do, and you can tell us what it was like and whether it was all grim 'ladies/girls, we all want to be sexy' stuff or actually a fun thing to do with your friends

Too right, TDOW

Ok, I am a serious pole fitness enthusiast. I go to a proper studio and treat it as a work out and a hard core one at that. However, I imagine a fun girls night out pole class is going to be the exact class I would hate, she will teach you how to bump and grind against the pole, and all the stuff I personally hate about pole.

I'm not going to get into the pros and cons of pole, it just isn't worth it on this board as its like swimming against the tide.

So yeah, go along by all means but the chances are this pole class will not be a typical pole fitness class :)

I didn't say "men do it too so it's OK" - that's not my point at all. What I'm saying is in itself, pole dancing can be separated from its lapdancing connotations. It can be done by men, it can be done by women in a way that is not for men, it can be simply exercise or dance.

So it isn't like, say, a lapdancing class where you learn to gyrate and pout and pick fivers up with your flaps, and there's really no other point in doing those things except as a sleazy entertainment. I'm drawing that distinction.

Whenthered said:
"When men make up a significant portion of the participants; when women stop doing the exercise in make-up, bikinis and high heels (arf at how wearing high heels makes it a better work-out); and when watching women pole dancing stops being primarily a male sexual activity; then I might be persuaded that pole dancing could be a feminist exercise."

I agree with this, but then you can't get to that point unless we start behaving in those ways. So as a feminist, in a way that I realise might be seen as perverse, I applaud Emeli Sande woman, and anyone else like her, who brings pole dancing away from the sleaze and makes it into something else - that can be about exercise and dance in an equal, non-dodgy way.

I'm thinking aloud and still deciding what I think on this thread, but I am NOT just saying "men can do it so it's OK". The point is a man could do it in the same way as Emeli Sande woman did it, in the same terms, for the same reasons, and in that sense she is putting it in the sphere of equality.

Also, I don't think feminism is about choice, as I've said many times, like a stuck record. It's not feminist to say any choice a woman makes is OK, just because she's a woman. (If that were the case what do we say about woman who take part in FGM or promote being a surrendered wife? They think they are doing the right thing.)

EyeOf, my post was in response to sleepdodger.

I see that, gymnastically, there's not a huge difference between, say, pommel horse and pole dancing, but that doesn't divorce it from the cultural context. I see the idea of trying to promote the gymnastic angle to minimise the cultural context but I don't think it's as likely to be successful as not doing it at all!

OP, you've not been invited to join a class for fitness though have you, it's a one-off under the guise of exercise.

I wouldn't go either. I've no desire to play at strippers.

I agree TheLeast - it will not be a true picture of a pole fitness class at all...it will be hideous.

Some wish to pay women for poledancing. Others wish to make women pay to be able to poledance.

I actually considered the fitness aspect of it until people started to talk about wearing high heels for better leg training...haha. It is too connected to it's origin, which is still going strong, you can't completely seperate it.

I have never ever been to a class that required heels........

but actually some of the dancers do wear heels if they are doing a routine, not for leg training (who ever heard of such a thing) but because for some moves where say you need to grab a foot, it's easier to reach for the heel for the less flexible.

Still, I have poled for 4 years and always in bear feet, never in heels.

prancing around in heels is probably not much worse for you physically than going en pointe though

The more people do it in fitness classes, with zero bump and grind for the tangible fitness and strength benefits the easier it becomes to discard the stigma of man-pleasing sexual performance origins. If a million women are doing it and none of them are doing it for paying men then it is a different and legitimate exercise or dance choice and there is only a historical interest in its origins, much like other dances (Argentine tango, charleston etc) that were seen as sleazy and sexually flaunting/immoral at first).

I consider myself a pole dancing feminist. It is the most brutal workout I have ever done. In one of the classes I attend there is a member of the national women's rugby squad and the director of the women's crisis shelter who is a martial arts instructor. I would not call them 'man-pleasing girls' - they are strong, fit, determined women who pole dance (in bare feet mostly) because it is fun and because there is nothing like it for building upper body strength.

I have 2 teachers: one is a Latin dance champ who moved into pole, hoop and silks as well and the other an ex contemporary dancer trained in Pilates.

Probably not but I just know that if I was to prance round in high heels, I would trip over and have to prance on over to A and E :)

If all stripclubs were closed, no longer in demand or banned like Iceland have, then pole dancing might perhaps start to lose the connection to them after a couple of/many decades.

I do find it ironic that it's sold back to women as fun exercise.

If men were paying to watch women in pole classes or expecting pole students to perform for them it would follow that it was a man-entertainment thing. But men don't get to watch the classes and unless students buy poles to use at home, there is v little chance of any man seeing any pole action at all; women are doing for themselves without a male gaze involved, no?

I did one of these classes after Ds1 (managed to fit it in before finding ds2 was on the way).

I loved it, it was alot of fun, it was amazing to see the strength I had & it wasnt sexy, it was a hardcore workout.
I have a hell of a lot of respect for anyone who does it professionally or competitively as it requires amazing strength!

my class we didnt wear heels-eh hello warm up!!
and as a beginner we wore leggings not shorts as no climbing.

I have been thinking about why I find pole classes make me feel powerful (I can see why if you haven't been to obe the idea of pole dancing can be seen as objectifying, sleazy and disempowering but the reality for me feels very different).

One of the things I used to love about ballet and contemporary dance (which I did a lot, in my 20s) was the lifts: working with a partner, holding a beautiful pose/balance in space, soaring up or spinning - like flying.

We were short on men/women strong and skilled enough to do lifts with.

With a pole, I can lift myself. I can defy gravity, fly, hold a beautiful powerful extended line in space, spin and rise and fall, hang or spin upside down. I can make shapes that I would struggle to produce even with a strong and skilful partner. I don't need a man to fly.

That, and the camaraderie of a class of women cheering each other on to do things that are often painful, exhausting and frightening and bruising at first - is intoxicating.

The incredible strength poses that champion pole dancers do take years of training and brute strength to perfect. They are not necessary to part a punter from his tip - yet they were developed by dancers anyway. For the sheer joy and exhilarating excitement of it, I think. By dancers, for dancers. Not for punters at all. Anyone can swing a bit and shake their ass in heels: this is something different. It's brutal and bruising and yes, empowering. There is nothing like it in the dance world or sport world that I've ever found. I guess you have to be there.

I can see why developing strength and agility would feel powerful - this is very different from the sexifying-empowerfulising nonsense that comes along with playing at strippers. I remember when pole dancing first started being something that women did who were not strippers. AFAIR the Primrose Hill set started going to classes that actually were for strippers and it was all sexy-fun / manpleasing bedroom tricks. As others have said, I think pole dancing currently is mostly still in that place (with some exceptions). It looks incredibly difficult to do and I've no doubt it's a good workout but it's not dance and, come on, who goes for a fun night out to work out with their friends? Also, who invites friends to watch them working out? Or wears heels or bumps and grinds?

It is dance .

who goes for a fun night out to work out with their friends? Also, who invites friends to watch them working out? Or wears heels or bumps and grinds?

Well, if I was invited to a fun night out trying flamenco/hip-hop/ charleston/jitterbug/ belly dancing/ can/can dancing with my friends and advised heels/pumps/ trainers/shorts whatever were advised I'd go. Sampling a new type of dance with friends would indeed be a fun night out for me. Maybe not for you but why be sneering about it when you've not even tried it?

Not dancing there's music and movement to that music..... o...k.

As for the comments stating that we must all be man pleasers, considering that no man has ever seem me pole dance, since its a hobbie I enjoy for myself and no one else (and i'm sure that is the case for many participants) exactly how does that equate to being a man teaser?

Also not a strip club user, but rather someone who has been once (on a hen night.)