I know you all have heard of the “Harlem Shake” and at least has seen one or two videos of the dancing phenomena.. After what i am about to share with you i hope you have not made any yourself O.o.. According to Hayley Tsukayama of the Washington Post, 100 students around the United States have been suspended because they posted their own version of the Harlem Shake video on YouTube or other Social entities online. In her article, Harlem Shake’ videos lead to school suspensions, these 100 students were suspended because some school districts believed that these videos showed inappropriate dancing. The National Coalition against Censorship (NCAC) found these suspensions ridiculous because these videos are just made for self-expression. Joan Bertin, NCAC Director, says “It seems a rather disproportionate response by educators to something that, at most, I would characterize as teenage hijinks.” In Eli Pariser’s book, Filter Bubble, this would be categorized as post-materialism at its best. As post-materialist we feel the urge to satisfy our self-image by expressing who we are through different behaviors and actions. Bertin also says “With more forms of expression, there are more reasons to engage in censorship if the people in charge are uncomfortable with forms of expression that younger generations are using,” which i find to be very true because the things that posted online are outrageous.
- Do you think the Harlem Shake video is really that bad?
- How do you feel about higher authority taking action against online content that people post?
I do not think that the original ‘Harlem Shake’ video is not bad. I have seen several people who have made their own videos, some are funnier than others. The thing is when people recreate that video everyone adds something that was not in the original. I have not been able to find the videos of the students who were suspended. I am going to assume that drugs or paraphernalia and/or alcohol were present in their videos in which case they would be justified for suspending them.
I have noticed that the larger the group of people the more rowdy and obnoxious they become, the only difference between myself and kids these days is that I was almost never videotaped or photographed. Also even when I was there was no Youtube or Instagram to broadcast the things we did.
I’ve seen plenty of these videos online and don’t think they are inappropiate. I think they’re a sense of self-expression and kids having fun with dancing. I don’t think schools should be able to suspend studetns for what they do out of school, let alone, for reenacting a dance online. The music videos allowed on Television these days have shaped the acceptance of what is, and what is not appropiate dancing and these kids do not know what the limit is anymore due to the videos allowed for public broadcasting. Kids will be kids, they will always want to try to do something that othr people are having fun doing. The schools sould consider a public announcement warning the students before taking harsh actions.
This post reminds me of a debate that my classmates and I had in one of my other classes. The topic of the debate was whether we thought Hip Hop had a negative influence on society. One of the arguments was that artists should have the freedom to express themselves as they please, and I think the same idea applies with the Harlem Shake Videos……as long as they arent too inappropriate (I’ve seen a couple of really disgusting Harlem Shake videos.