By: Graham Smith

Sentry Staff Reporter

I am all about not corrupting the minds of the youngsters, but sometimes censorship falls under a gray area. School is arguably one of the most reasonable places to regulate behavior because it is a melting pot of people of different cultures and interests. However, sometimes it comes down to censoring behavior for the good of only a couple, or often zero, people.

One of the easiest places to see this is at pep rallies, and in particular, the football team dance. The football players have consistently put on hilarious and entertaining shows for the past four years, since the start of the team dance tradition, but the administration has held strict regulations throughout. A highly debated topic, it is argued that the football dance should be held to the same standards that exist day to day in school. In essence, this makes sense, but what is wrong with a three minute routine where a bunch of dudes let loose and pelvic thrust in their homemade jean shorts?

The predicament arose last year when the football team was given the go ahead by the administration to perform their dance at the homecoming pep rally. Instead of performing exactly what was allowed, they changed several aspects and performed it anyway in front of the entire school. They emerged from under the bleachers with glorious self-cut jean shorts and proceeded to do a male version of something you would expect from a cheerleading or dance team. There was butt shaking, pelvic thrusting, more butt shaking, and even more pelvic thrusting topped off with some impressive moonwalking. Just as much as it brightened students’ day, it dampened the administration’s. They do not want students pelvic thrusting their way down the hallway, and apparently they do not want it at the pep rally either.

Is it really necessary to enforce the pelvic thrusting rule, something that likely is never strictly stated in the rules of Yorktown, during every single minute of every single day? Is three minutes of pelvic thrusting per year really corrupting the minds of the younger generation? I believe that exceptions can be made in some cases and the pep rally is certainly one. The implied rules against these actions are simply to avoid offending anyone, but who could possibly be offended by these dances? They are hilarious and even more appropriate than what you would see on the front page of youtube.

Out of all the possibilities of corruption in this world, pelvic thrusting peers falls near the bottom of the list in my books. Most children, in fact, watch R rated movies regularly and have watched PG-13 movies without parental guidance since the less-than-ripe age of 11 or 12. Miley Cyrus’s new music video, “Wrecking Ball,” depicts Cyrus riding a wrecking ball in the nude and licking a hammer seductively. It has gotten 230,000,000 views in about a month, and chances are high that one of those views was a child you know. The point is that the standard for what is inappropriate in a school environment should be a little more lax because nearly every student sees far worse on a regular basis, off campus.

For those still unconvinced, my advice would be to simply not allow your child to see the pelvic thrusting, or better yet, divert your attention to the more serious problems in our school, like the stairways that will not fit two slightly overweight children side by side. I would rather see people complain about the fact that the temperature seems to always reflect exactly the temperature that nobody wants. It is always either above 90 degrees or below 45, somehow never in between. You will notice that prime pelvic thrusting temperature does not fall in those ranges. Coincidence? I think not.