By asking a man as a partner on Dance with the stars, Bilal Hassani helped move the lines. In dance, a duet is not necessarily made up of a man and a woman. You just need a leader and a follower. So there can be, two men, two women or non-gendered people. This is the idea defended by Julien Poli, dance teacher within the LGBT association Let us dance in Paris. “With ‘same sex’ dance, there is no longer any question of traditional roles, male or female. There is the one who leads the dance and the one who follows”, he explains on France Inter.
In his classes, Julien Poli – world champion of “same sex” dance at the Gay Games in 2018 – encourages his students to dance with men and women, regularly alternating duets, so that those who come as a couple do not necessarily always dance with the same person.
“This sport remains very codified”, regrets a dance teacher
If he tries at his level to make things happen, Julien Poli still regrets that “this sport remains very codified”. “In competition, it is always a boy who leads and the girl who is led. (…) It is well specified.”
In Dance with the stars, Bilal Hassani, who combats gender stereotypes on a daily basis, conveys a message of openness and tolerance, which has prompted more and more men and women, homosexuals and heterosexuals, to turn to dance lessons. ‘ same sex ‘like those offered by the association Let us dance.
Moreover, even before the singer’s participation, Dance with the stars had already started to break the codes, whether with the trio dances, or even on the tour DALS, where Christophe Licata and Baptiste Giabiconi had shared a duet a few years ago.
Article written in collaboration with 6Medias