April 6, 201214 yr This, frankly, is just unbelievable! Malaysia had never been slow to ban artists whose performance or dress might be considered provocative in the Islamic nation. Now, someone in the government has banned the Singapore Dance Theatre who were about to give performances of excerpts from such standard classical ballets as Tchaikovsky's "The Nutcracker". And the reason for the ban? The costumes are regarded as indecent! Indecent? Indecent? That is so ridiculously idiotic one wonders what the Malaysian government regards as decent! As, Bilqis Hijjas, president of local Malaysian umbrella organisation MyDance Alliance, said - "Ballet dancers in Baghdad are allowed to wear ballet costumes on stage. Are we to understand that the Malaysian public is less cosmopolitan, less morally resilient and less broad-minded than the citizens of a Middle Eastern country that has been ripped to shreds by war and violence?" According to Hijjas: "All of the costumes for women had long skirts, except for The Nutcracker, which was to be performed in a short classical tutu and tights, the kind that has been worn by ballet dancers since they performed before the Russian tsars in the 1870s." http://www.guardian....denied-malaysia Having now been exposed to ridicule, the government is trying to backtrack. It alleges that the permit application was not received in time! Given that the company has appeared several times before in Malaysia, that appears to me to be utter rubbish! I really hope heads will roll - but of course they won't. Idiots have a habit of keeping their government sinecures!
April 7, 201214 yr Read about this in the Bangkok post yesterday. The ballet outfits being "indecent?!?" One almost has to be a real pervert to accept that notion. The only redeeming factor of this ruling is that it hopefully makes the advocates look like the fools they are.
April 7, 201214 yr Religious zealots never recognise that they appear as fools. Thankfully, they (e.g., Jim & Tammi Bakker, Jim Jones, Oral Roberts, David Koresh, Westboro Baptist Church, etc., etc.) usually have this wonderful propensity to ultimately prove to most people that that's exactly what they are. Another example in my view of what happens when you combine any religion with any government.
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