Strictly dance pairings based on sexuality make no sense | Verity Lush

I keep hearing about the plans and possibilities of having same-sex couples on a variety of TV shows.  This is a great move for inclusivity and something fresh and new, so long as the reasoning behind it isn’t based on sexual preference.
Ann Widdecombe and Anton du Beke at Blackpool's Tower Ballroom for Strictly Come Dancing. Picture credit should read: Peter Byrne/PA Photos.Ann Widdecombe and Anton du Beke at Blackpool's Tower Ballroom for Strictly Come Dancing. Picture credit should read: Peter Byrne/PA Photos.
Ann Widdecombe and Anton du Beke at Blackpool's Tower Ballroom for Strictly Come Dancing. Picture credit should read: Peter Byrne/PA Photos.

My thinking is that surely you don’t have to be paired up with someone based purely on your sexual preference?

You don’t have to have the possibility of fancying the pants off your partner – whether dancing or whatever – in order to be paired up with them.

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Part of the reason that men and women have been partnered together for millennia is because of the comparison, the contradiction, and the ensuing silhouettes created by having two different, opposing physiques working with one another.

I hardly think that when Ann Widdecombe got paired with good old Anton-Du-Duff-Partners – excluding this year’s – that the folk at the BBC did that because they thought there was a jolly good chance of them wanting to leap into bed together.

Nobody thought that Kristina Rihanoff was canoodling with John Sergeant the second the curtains fell. 

To be put together with a person of the same gender as yourself therefore purely because you’re gay, seems nuts to me.

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Why does it matter if you’d sleep with the other person? We’re not judging that – please God no – we’re judging your samba.

Hell, if you want to dance with a woman just because you want to dance with a woman, then go for it – whatever your sexual preference. But dancing with someone based purely on that preference makes no sense whatsoever.

The Beeb went brave and finally had a same sex couple dancing this year for one of the professional dances, when Graziano Di Prima and Johannes Radebe took to the floor – right after Anneka Rice tweeted that she felt weak and a bit overcome with the beauty of the pairing.

Anneka’s tweet was deleted, probably for the best, because in this day and age making comments like that if you’re a bloke about two women dancing together, would have you hung, drawn and quartered.

Meghan should take a leaf out of Jen’s book on celebrity

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Jennifer Aniston was on Graham Norton’s show last week and was refreshingly humble about the celebrity experience.

She told about how she and the cast of Friends, before it was aired, were flown at studio expense to Las Vegas.

They were given a couple of hundred dollars each and told to go have a wild time – because it would be the last time they’d be able to go anywhere unrecognized.

She and Julie Andrews then went on to say that yes, celebrity is surreal, but that it’s also wonderful.

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This was incredibly refreshing in comparison to the whinges of Meghan Markle.

I suspect if she were getting positive press she’d be singing a different tune.

Managing money is such a minefield for teens now

My eldest daughter now has a bank card, yikes. This is a rite of passage! 

The hands that are now slightly longer-fingered than my own, but that used to be ensconced in mine like tiny starfish, are now clasping plastic.

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It’s a different world to my own first banking experience – Natwest pigs and cheque books – and comes complete with a banking app.

Spending, resisting credit cards and awful loans, or, worse still, the world of gambling and unscrupulous companies, is a minefield these days. 

There is so much more to be wary of these days.

It’s a worrying world into which we introduce our children.