Dancing Etiquette for Married Women

I got a multi-tiered question that in order to respond fully requires a post in itself.

The question was what was the proper etiquette for married women who want to dance but their husbands don't want to.

In general, albeit dancing is ensconced in a very general environment that would lead towards dating, dancing itself is not an action of flirting or romance. In other words it can be totally platonic and just a fun activity no different than playing volleyball. Of course it certainly has the potential to lead towards some kind of romance, but if Joe Schmoe asks Jane Schmoe at bar x to dance (ballroom) then yeah, they guy might have an interest, but he isn't proposing marriage.

This is arguably one of the largest complaints men have when women are sitting on the edge of their seats, bouncing up and down to a great salsa or swing band at the edge of the dance floor and then when somebody comes up and asks them to dance, they giggle and laugh and point at their friends and tell them "no, you dance with him!" "No! *giggle, giggle* YOU dance with him!"

It isn't a proposal of marriage.

It isn't a sexual proposition.

It isn't even asking if he could buy you a drink because that would cost money.

He's asking for a dance, so married or not, it's pretty safe.

Now that being said, I cannot think of a more adroit and classy way to meet a girl besides dancing. So naturally most men will approach dancing as primarily a means to have fun, but a close second to meet a girl.

This is where the married women have to do one simple thing;

Wear your wedding ring.

A slightly skilled dancer will even have the savvy to feel that large hunk of rock on your left hand, saving you the embarrassment of asking you out. So as long as you're married and have that ring, you're not going to run into any trouble, at least on the ballroom scene.

Now where married women run into trouble is when THEY TAKE OFF THE RING or play a game some female friends of mine called "Testing Our Market Value."

To simplify things (a lot) women want attention, men want sex. And whereas it's socially poo-pooed to go out and just ask for sex, to get attention is perfectly acceptable. This creates a conundrum, especially for married women who are not getting enough love or attention back at home. They some how feel the need to go out and doll themselves up and "test their market value" and get attention, ie- sit at a bar and see how many men buy them drinks as they're all dolled up and *oops* did they happen to "forget" to wear their wedding ring?

No doubt there are enough veteran males in my readership who could regale you with tales of going to a club/bar/party, meeting a really nice gal WITHOUT A RING and only after spending 4 hours getting to know this one girl, finding out she was married. This is not only deceitful, but it's disrespectful as the woman has not only led the guy on, but wasted his time which he might as otherwise used to meet an available (and might I add, more secure) woman.

This happens more often than you might think and to a severity of more than you might imagine.

The Captain had one experience where a drop dead gorgeous woman was dancing with him with long sleeve gloves (couldn't tell if she was married). I asked her if there was a ring under the gloves and she said yes - ergo "thanks for the dance, no harm done."

On the other extreme was the drop dead gorgeous redheaded economist he met in his dance class and dated for about 2 months. As you can imagine after two months, several dates, her having red hair AND being an economist, the young Captain was smitten. That was of course until we were salsa dancing late one night and whilst on the dance floor the poor ole Captain's hand got lacerated by huge chunk of diamond he hadn't noticed her wearing before. After changing his dance grip he had the shocking realization that she was married this entire time and just forgot to take her ring off.

Regardless the whole point is whether it's an hour or two months, don't be a tease. If you want to dance, go out and dance and wear your wedding ring. I find nothing wrong with dressing up a little fancy. But if you're going to slut yourself up and take off the ring and "test your market value" and lead a guy on so you can get your fill of attention-jollies at his expense, that's where women start to earn a bad reputation and make men long for the likes of Sophia Loren or Audrey Hepburn, or at least join the marriage strike.