Many of you by now have seen the very peculiar video released by Planned Parenthood in response to the Obama administration’s new ruling that health insurance companies must now provide birth control for free to anyone who requests it.
What makes the video peculiar is that it contains no words, no speeches, no graphics — nothing but a Bollywood dance routine featuring an oversize container of birth control pills:
After watching it, I realized that this was a landmark event in American history: the return of the victory dance!
Victory dances are now almost unheard of, especially in the political arena, but they were once commonplace. These days we mostly associate the concept with the former practice of Native American tribes who would often hold ritualized “victory dances” whenever they defeated an enemy in battle. But the practice was not limited to Native Americans; most tribal societies held victory dances when they were victorious in some endeavor. And even “civilized” folks sometimes held unofficial victory dances after winning wars, well into the 20th century.
But the practice had essentially died out — until now, that is. Planned Parenthood has revived the concept, staging a public victory dance via YouTube for the world to see.
At least I thought Planned Parenthood was the first to bring it back. Yet after a bit of research, I discovered that they were not the only ones, nor the first.
Turns out the Tea Party released their own victory dance video on November 3, 2010, to celebrate their overwhelming victory in the midterm Congressional elections. But in all the hubbub, the video got lost in the shuffle, and was not widely seen or discussed at the time.
And so to set history straight, and to establish priority for the Tea Party’s claim to have been the first to bring back this grand tradition, I hereby present the amazing (though little-seen) 2010 Tea Party Victory Dance video:
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