The kids are all right

Are we still complaining about the millennials? I'm pretty sure they're all grown up these days, having kids and jobs, or eating avocado toast and growing weird mustaches. Depends on where they live? Or maybe different people just do different things? Even when they're born around the same time?

Have we moved on to complaining about Gen Z? These kids! With their insistence that grown-ups should address climate change or look into the question of whether fewer of them might be murdered with AR-15s! Am I right?

Today, in CaitlinDance, the workshop was East Coast swing and the participants were teenaged attendees of the NC Thespian Festival. I attended this event as a high school student, and I remember the intensity and the enthusiasm, even if I couldn't tell you much about the sessions. I remember the friendships and the excitements and the vividness. I saw all those things today, and it made me feel pale. Translucent. I'm 48, solidly Gen X. Plus, I survived 13 years in higher ed - a long enough stint in academia to yell two generations of students off the lawn abutting my ivory tower. But honestly, being around young people never fails to humble and surprise me.

I got back into swing a couple of months ago with Centre Social Dance. This group is absolutely fabulous and their approach to partnering is deliberate and inclusive. Men and women role switch and dance with same gender partners all the time. Some dancers identify as leads and some as follows, but most are at least interested in learning and experiencing both parts. It's fun and pretty damn woke. These are the millennials, all grown up. They are running terrific events and creating an environment that is nurturing, safe, and positive.

And the Gen Zs? They take what CSD crafts so protectively and toss it on without blinking.

Today, I had 28 dancers in the room. I explained that we would have leaders and followers, and they could choose which role they wanted. And they just did. No conversation or consideration of the traditional role that gender would play. No poking or shoving. No giggles, jokes, or false starts. Some girls stepped up to lead, and some boys did too. A few boys chose to follow, and many girls joined them. When the follows picked partners, the couples could not have been crafted any more carefully to represent diversity. Two pairs of boys, one evenly matched for height, the other comically mis-matched with the shorter partner leading. Three mixed gender couples with girls in charge. Some traditional mixed pairs and a handful of girls leading girls. And in a room full of drama students, there was not a single iota of drama. Then it got even cooler.

I had decided to model the class on the format used by the Penn State Social Dance Club, which involves constant partner switching. Every three minutes or so, the teacher says "high five and rotate," and each leader moves to the next follower in the circle. During my hour-long session, every lead danced with every follow. Not a single moment of awkwardness to be seen. Every boy held hands with another boy. Every girl danced with another girl. And I was the only one in the room that even seemed to notice.

I don't know when this happened, folks, and I'm not really sure how. I am aware that this isn't a representative sample (I mean, after all... DRAMA KIDS!!!), but they are southern teenagers, and not particularly cosmopolitan. So here's my takeaway: This group has a comfort level with gender non-conformity that is so total that it borders on obliviousness. And while that is something, the greater point is the rapidity with which culture has shifted. So quickly, in fact, that in two generations what is obvious and true has completely flipped. It is now Obvious that gender doesn't matter in dance, and it is True that a person can opt take a role that matches their preference not their gender.

As for me, what can I say? Only this...

O wonder! How many goodly creatures are there here! How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world That has such people in't!

Pax.