DANCING IS LASCIVIOUSNESS
I. INTRODUCTION:
1. If one is honest with himself or herself, the conclusion
reached is that dancing is popular because it arouses and
produces unlawful, lustful, sexual desires.
2. If you think this is not so, then announce you are going to
have a dance, but only boys are invited; or, only girls are
invited, or, the boys will dance in one room, while the girls
will dance in another room.
How many would attend? You know the answer!
So, do not let us deceive ourselves into thinking that
dancing does not produce sexual desires among those who
participate.
II. WHAT OTHERS HAVE SAID. Do not think that these statements are
made by old, out-dated, moss-backed preachers, and that we
preachers are the only ones who draw such conclusions.
1. J. Edgar Hoover, former head of the FBI, said: "Most juvenile
crime has its inception in the dance hall, either public or
private."
2. Dr. Phelps, of the New York City Police Dept., said, "It is
estimated that in New York City, 4,000 women are living the
life of infamy, and that three-forths of these are started on
their life of infamy through the dance."
3. Chicago Vice Commission, asked 300 prostitute girls the
following question: "What led you to do wrong...what led you
to become what you are today, a scarlet woman?" Eighty-five
percent of them answered, "My first step wrong was caused by
the modern dance."
4. Dr. E. E. Sonners, M.D., a nerve specialist of Chicago: "I
attack the modern dance as a reversion toward savagery. As a
medical man, I flatly charge that modern dancing is
fundamentally sinful and evil. I charge that dancing charm is
based entirely on sex appeal. I charge that dancing is the
most advanced and most insidious maneuvering preliminary to
sex betrayal. It is nothing more than damnable, diabolical,
animal, physical dissipation.
"Do brother and sister dance like that" Father and Mother?
Mother and Son?.....
"I tell you the basic spell of the dance is the spell of
illicit physical contact.....
"Under what other shield can a man or woman, a youth or
maiden, so promiscuously fondle so many of the opposite sex in
a single night, or a lifetime?....
"I tell you frankly, it is not safe to subject even the
strongest men and women to the subtle temptations of the
dance....
"We doctors know --- a trail of broken homes proves it..."
5. Dr. Thomas C. Whitfield said: "The modern dance is condemned
precisely at this point. It is not wrong solely because it
might lead one to the physical act of fornication, but it is
sinful to the degree that it arouses unrestrained desires that
cannot be fulfilled under present relations and condition.
When such desires are aroused, the dancing is within itself
sinful because it is then a lascivious act."
6. Dr. A. C. Dixon: "The modern dance is the fine art of covering
with music, indelicate, immodest and ofttimes indecent
attitudes and postures between man and women. It is too bad
for reformation., Its only remedy is extermination."
7. Professor W. C. Wilkerson of Chicago University, concludes:
"Dancing is a system of means, contrived with more than human
ingenuity, to excite the instinct of sex action."
8. Dr. Lita Hollingsworth, Professor of Education at Columbia,
(defending the dance)": "Dancing is an exciting and
pleasurable recreation as it affords a partial satisfaction to
the sex impulse."
9. Professor J. Louis Guyon, owner and operator of one of
Chicago's largest dance halls, speaking before the World's
Purity Congress, said: "We know the natural desires of youth.
We know that sex is the strongest impulse implanted in the
human race. You can picture the effect on a boy or girl of 18
or 20, when this hunger is keenest, when knowledge and
experience are lacking in formation of judgment, in one of
these dances which call for close abdominal contact and
frequently bring the cheeks together and intertwine the limbs.
Yet we find thousands and thousands of boys and girls dancing
this way every day who do not realize they are doing anything
out of the way and whose fool parents look on complacently.
This form of dancing is a menace to the future of our nation.
I will say, if it were impossible to conduct dancing without
sanctioning this form, then we should abolish all dancing.
Tell your investigators not to watch the heads and feet of the
dancers, but to keep their eyes on their abdomens. They will
find partners bending backward, their heads far apart, but
their pelvic regions glued tightly together and limbs
intertwined. There is left then, but one reason for its
popularity. That reason is sex appeal. I hasten to assure you
I do not believe the dancers always are conscious this is the
reason they enjoy this position and the steps that go with it.
But this lack of consciousness is merely an added factor of
danger.
"When you are told that youth of both sexes can....survive
this experience without mental, moral and physical pollution,
you know the teller lies....if you believe youth is the same
after this experience as before, then God help your child or
your charge, for you are not mentally fit for your
responsibility.....If you do not believe I have correctly
described the modern dances and their effect, you either have
not seen them performed or you are willfully blind to their
true character."
10. These testimonies could be multiplied over and over again by
Doctors, Professions, Law Enforcement officers, Fashion
Designers, Dancing Experts, those who are responsible for
"Homes for Un-Wed mothers," and on and on we could go.
To the honest mind, we should need go no further in
showing that DANCING IS LASCIVIOUSNESS, thus SIN.
III. THINGS WRONG WITH THE DANCE:
1. The fruits of the dance are evil: Evil companions (1 Cor. 15:33)(who
comprise the most of those who attend the dances); drinking
accompanies it more often than not; the places where
conducted.
2. Dancing destroys morals:
(1) At a home for fallen girls in Los Angeles, seven-tenths
said they had fallen through the dance and its influence.
(2) Another such home reported: "Fully 90% of our girls
testify their downfall began in some dance hall."
3. Dancing destroys spirituality: The more one dances the more
you will see their spirituality disappear. Their attendance
wanes. Their prayers are no longer uttered.
4. Dancing is a Work of the Flesh: Take a piece of paper, draw a
line down the middle. On one side write the WORKS OF THE FLESH
and on the other side write FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT. On which wide
would you put "Dancing"?
5. Dancing will destroy your influence as a Christian. Even those
in the world will not think as highly of you.
IV. DANCING IS LASCIVIOUSNESS!!! Thus, since lasciviousness is Sin,
DANCING IS SIN!!!
UNSPOTTED: The story is told of a young girl going of a tour
of a coal mine who came dressed in a spotless white dress. Her
companions rebuked her but she maintained it would be all right.
"As long as I don't actually mine the coal," she said, "I will
not soil my dress." Then she asked the miner that was to guide
them if she could wear a white dress into the mine. He said,
"There is nothing to keep you from wearing a white dress into the
mine, but there are several things that will keep you from
wearing one out."
(1) Remember Thayer's definition of Lasciviousness: "indecent
bodily movements, unchaste handling of males and females."
(2) Gal. 5:19-21 -- "revellings and such like....."
Return to Index
Home