Thread: Dealing with dancers who sabotage others performance - advice needed

I can not go into the full story here or you will be reading a mini series. But this individual has a history of sabotaging other dancers performances, to include one of mine, and just did it again to a dear friend of mine.

How and why she did it?

How - she brought a large group of new dancers she teaches to a performance of a dear friend of mine, proceeded to laugh and carry on a full conversation, it had the rest of the audience wondering what was going on and watching them.

Why - I know this dancer/instructor to well. She lost her regular show at the restuarant because it went out of business. She is lashing out at other dancers/instructors who have had regular events.

Never would I see such an act in a much bigger professional dance communitee. Everyone would of told them to be quiet or someone would of asked them to leave. But this is a much smaller communitee.

It may be easy to say you should tell this dancer/instructor (who is a nobody dancer) she is no longer allowed to attend events if she is to carry on this way. But it suffers a big blow back.

Big Blow Back - psychology of group dynamics here. This dancer/instructor will spend hours on the phone and hold private meetings to twist the truth of what was actually said causing more problems. Believe me, I know, because my son has been best friends with one of her followers sons and I heard personal stories from what he witnessed, plus all the other personal stories that leaked out.

This is unfortunate, but this is what happens in a baby dance communitee that knows no better.

In all reality, it will take years before many dancers move beyond their instructor and venture outwards. Until then, they place much misguided trust in a dancer/instructors that is a nobody that passes themself off as the Queen as Bellydance, offers free lessons, and influences others to not attend workshops because they will learn the best from her.

Seriously, there is a semi-famous dancer in a neighboring city 2 hours away. None of this dancers group will attend a workshop or show she host. They also boycotted a workshop my friend held with a semi-famous dancer. This dancer lived in Egypt for 4 years. This was embarrasing to the communitee. The dancer of the workshop was aware of the boycott and offered her condolences to the communitee.

So how do you deal with a dancer/instructor that holds so much control in sabotaging your performance and the communitee?

What is your advice knowing this story? I will pass it on.

Strychnine.

It's a tricky one, but if this individual is as vile as you say, time will tell and people will get fed up with her. A person who plays gossip and manipulation games is going to do it to her own dancers too. She won't be able to help herself. In the meantime, the rest of you be gracious and graceful about it, dance well, continue to send invitations to workshops and that's all you can do.

If it's a matter of a disruptive thing happening in a performance situation, I would say GO OVER THERE. Go over and take your performance right into the middle of her conversation. Restaurant-dance the group to death. Invite her to dance with you. Get all her girls up dancing with you. And if they don't, you can always play your zills in her ears.

BTW, if you are wondering why this dancer/instructor was laughing at my dear friends performance and carrying on in the manner to distract the entire audience to wonder what was so funny - she was told by this dancer/instructor - it was because your hair tosses looked like (famous dancer on many DVD's) and we laughed at you because she is a crappy dancer. This from a dancer/instructor that boycotts semi-famous dancers show and workshops, who is not on any video or has posted a video of her performance on the internet, but makes fun of famous dancers calling them crap, while she attempts to pass herself off as the Queen of Bellydance to new students.

This is so wrong for her to do this to my dear sister in dance and pull this crap on a new dance communitee trying to learn this art. Truely misguiding.

Hmmm. Sorry if this sounds like a dumb idea as really I can't see the full picture of what is happening in your community.

But would it help to be really, really Nice to this teacher and especially to her students? Without acting like you are trying to steal them away of course. But if everyone is consistently nice to them then maybe they will figure out for themselves that their teacher is a wee bit Toxic?

And if the students hear about the great time that other students are having at guest teacher workshops etc then maybe they'll be encouraged to try them for themselves rather than just follow the lead of the toxic teacher?

Maybe they will realise that they will not be shunned if they keep taking classes with Toxic teacher and feel more confident about trying other classes or workshops?

Surely the whole table of students cannot be comfortable sitting at a table where someone is blatantly disrespectful at another dancer's performance ... surely at least one of them is thinking "this is not right ..."

Not a quick fix and again maybe I'm not understanding the full situation?

Yeah and I'm with Zum, (if I may call you that )

If she is disrupting a performance, dance right on over and show the rest of the audience what an ass she is being.

if you are in a restaurant setting, perhaps a waiter/manager/bartender could ask them to please hold it down. that way it is official and does not reflect on you.

warn the staff ahead of time and plan it out so the "shhhhh" comes from management and perhaps will embarrasses the woman into more polite behavior

Here's what I would do.
I would talk to that obviously disturbed individual, personally. Meet her for coffee and tell her exactly what you think, and that you know exactly what's going on, and let the chips fall where they may.

The truth always comes out in the end.

I wouldn't put up with that kind of crap. I just wouldn't.

You wrote: Big Blow Back - psychology of group dynamics here. This dancer/instructor will spend hours on the phone and hold private meetings to twist the truth of what was actually said causing more problems. Believe me, I know, because my son has been best friends with one of her followers sons and I heard personal stories from what he witnessed, plus all the other personal stories that leaked out.

You need NOT TO CARE about her bad-mouthing, sick behavior. Once emotion is taken out of it, miraculously, the problems stop.

Because you guys care what this individual says, and care about the stories she passes around, she has POWER over you.

I have been there, I know. When I first started bellydancing in town, I had lots of problems, badmouthing of me, etc. etc. Why? Because I got lots of jobs fast, and got lots of students fast, etc. etc.

I used to care that these certain dancers were doing these things.

I finally sent out a mass email, saying something to the effect, "I will no longer defend myself nor care what is said"

Guess what, they moved on to someone else.

And here I am 10 years later - and where are some of those women? who knows and who cares.

It is stories like this that really make me want to hang up my bedlahs.

Why is it this art form attracts all kinds of dysfunction. I have a theory, but who knows. I know all art does, and maybe because I'm heavily involved in bellydance, but - boy oh boy......it gets OLD.

I hope this helps you guys out. It's a situation that is awful all around.

These are some great ideas. Yes at the time of the sabotage you are caught of guard. Maybe the best way to deal with this is reverse psychology by taking your performance to them, since they are attempting to distract everyone from watching. Then they will have everyones attention on them.

I can't imagine how heartbreaking/confidence busting this was for your friend while it was happening. But I think Jilyan is right: in every group she gathers, there are one or two women--or more--who are hiding their appreciation for the dancer so as not to start conflict with the "queen bee", but who will later leave because they realize how toxic she is.

I feel sorry for these women, whose first experience with bellydance might convince them it's a toxic, catty, middle-school clique.

I always try to remind myself: "Life isn't fair, but there is justice in the universe." This moment may stink, but these bullies always eventually get what's coming to them. **sigh**I just wish we could always be there to see it happen!

Originally Posted by zumarrad

Strychnine.


If it's a matter of a disruptive thing happening in a performance situation, I would say GO OVER THERE. Go over and take your performance right into the middle of her conversation. Restaurant-dance the group to death. Invite her to dance with you. Get all her girls up dancing with you. And if they don't, you can always play your zills in her ears.

I second the motion for this course of action -- both of them (action responses), actually! (But I guess we can save the strychnine as the very last resort:))

"How - she brought a large group of new dancers she teaches to a performance of a dear friend of mine, proceeded to laugh and carry on a full conversation, it had the rest of the audience wondering what was going on and watching them."

I don't have any advice, but my former teacher does this.

Azeeza

Originally Posted by zumarrad

Strychnine.


If it's a matter of a disruptive thing happening in a performance situation, I would say GO OVER THERE. Go over and take your performance right into the middle of her conversation. Restaurant-dance the group to death. Invite her to dance with you. Get all her girls up dancing with you. And if they don't, you can always play your zills in her ears.

Perfect...thats the first and best answer (and of course the one I was going to give.....l;, ) Kill em with kindness and see if they can withstand the scrutiny of all the other patrons watching them as they make disruptive fools of themselves.