I went to Zumba class this morning, and, not for the first time, I found myself puzzled by the lopsided numbers in the class. Out of forty people (approximately), only two are men and only a handful are from visible minority groups, the rest are all white women between 18-65. The previous teacher, who quit back in September, was a young man from Mexico, and his replacement is a tall, gangly, white guy, who doesn’t look like a Zumba teacher, in the stereotypical sense. I had my doubts about him, therefore, (sorry, but it’s true!) but he turned out to be engaging and enthusiastic, and it’s hard not to like someone who reminds me so much of Gumby. He’s good at it, but he doesn’t have the moves our previous teacher had, despite his almost elastic body. In spite of that, the new guy is very popular and the class has grown since he arrived.
So, despite women outnumbering men 38-2, the class is taught by a man and the previous teacher was a man. (There’s a woman who teaches Zumba, too, but I’ve only attended her class a couple of times because her time slot doesn’t work for me very often.) My question is, if women are so into this form of exercise, why aren’t ALL the Zumba teachers women? I’m not saying the Y is being sexist, because I have no idea how many people of either sex applied for the job, but, it does seem weird that both teachers for this class have turned out to be men, and nobody seems to be bothered by it but me. For all I know, the male teachers could simply be very popular with the ladies and the Y has responded to that.
There is a wonderful dancer in the class who is always in the front row, and she knows the moves so well, I’m sure she could teach the class. She’s actually dancing, not just moving her arms and legs in a prescribed way in order to get her exercise. If she had applied to teach the class, surely she would have gotten the gig. She teaches another class, also to do with dance, I think, so this wouldn’t be a stretch for her. So, why…?? I don’t know the details, but it makes me wonder.
Anyway, I’m not sure what I’m trying to say about all this, I’m just observing. I’m primarily bothered by the fact that the teacher is a man, in a class of interest mainly to women, obviously not the first context where this has been the case. I’m not objecting to being taught by a man, per se, I’m just wondering why there aren’t such a large number of women lined up to teach it that the odds would be slim of ever having a male teacher. I like Gumby, I really do, but it still bothers me. I’ll give the Y the benefit of the doubt and assume that wasn’t the case.
The other thing that bothers me is the lack of diversity, not only in the Zumba class, but also in my Groove class, which is taught by an awesome black woman, Nadine. The class is a majority of middle-aged white women, who are pretty uptight, as much as we’re fighting against it by attending Groove. She’s always asking, are we okay? after each song, and a couple of people go, “yeah!”, almost under their breath. Every time I think, should we be shouting back something joyful? I feel joyful in her class, but I can’t express it the way I think she’d like. I think we must be letting her down, but she doesn’t mention it. She is such a wonderful presence in that class and communicates her love of dance and of the music so well, we can’t help but respond by dancing our hearts out, if nothing else. We’re in a tiny studio (not like the big gym where Zumba takes place) and we’re usually packed in like sardines, or more appropriately, like dancers at a popular nightclub on a Friday night. I hope she realizes that the outlet she provides every week is priceless to us. So, diverse it’s not, but why, I don’t know. It’s not that there aren’t lots of POC at the Y, but most of them haven’t yet discovered the joy of Groove, or maybe the lack of diversity in the class is a turn-off. That wouldn’t be surprising. Or it might be a mixture of factors.
I’ve been thinking a lot about diversity these days because of a conversation making the rounds on the knitting subset of Instagram. People of colour have been talking about not feeling included, welcome, safe or understood, even in the knitting community, It has made me rethink my attitude, which, without having examined it very closely, was one of, well, I’m not doing any harm. Newsflash, that’s not enough. It’s not that I ever consciously avoided it, but I wasn’t going out of my way to add POC to the list of people I follow, or checking out their knitting designs, or supporting their blogs or vlogs, etc. Sure, if I happened upon something that interested me, but otherwise no. Benign neglect, but it’s still neglect and it doesn’t help foster relationships.
In my larger world, there is also work to be done. I want to figure out ways to make my actions more suit my general attitude, which is: I believe people are equal. I believe people deserve to be treated equally. I don’t believe it’s right that black parents have to have a talk to their sons about what to do when they’re pulled over by the cops. That, right there, makes you stop and think. It makes you really feel your white privilege. We all worry about our children, but I can’t imagine adding that (to mention only one) to my list of worries. We need to do better. If this sounds naive, it’s because it is. I’ve known forever that all this exists and that it’s all wrong, but I guess I felt (and still feel) powerless to change anything. However, if I can do small things on a day-to-day basis to improve at least my own understanding of another person’s reality, I will do that. On Instagram, I will get to know designers or other knitters who happen to be POC, and I will buy their designs, I’m sure, because there will be beautiful things I might not otherwise have found. I will go out of my way to read books by people who aren’t dead white men. Maybe I’ll start with Zadie Smith, (click the link for an interesting interview with her) whose book, White Teeth, is sitting on my bookshelf right now.
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