Why is This More Offensive Than the Rest of The Performances?

It wouldn’t be the Olympics without a figure skating controversy. But this one doesn’t involve crooked Russian judges. It involves the costume for the Russian pair, Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabilin. For the second of three dances, the original dance, the theme was folk dances. Teams were asked to perform a traditional dance from a world culture, not necessarily their own.

Some teams performed something from their own country, like the Israeli team (the brother and sister duo of Roman and Alexandra Zaretsky who performed to “Hava Nagila.”

Others paid tribute to different cultures like Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto’s Moldovian folk dance.



But Domnina and Shabilin did an Australian aboriginal dance complete with face paint and leaves. And they were criticized for culture theft. The pair researched aboriginal culture and what they came up with seems no different than the portrayal of aboriginees in other outlets I’ve seen. It also seemed no more hokey and contrived than any of the other dances.

On a side note, Domnina is a Poop favorite though possibly unbeknownst to most of you. The Oksana Domnina nipslip picture I linked to years ago has been a great source of hits for this blog. In the weeks leading up to and including the Olympics I’d say at least 100 hits per day are directly related to her nipple. Imagine if I got a Tanith Belbin nip slip!