♪ (ragtime music) ♪
- First, you wanna start with placing your hands on your hips.
Feet apart. Good.
Bend your knees. Good.
You wanna take your thumbs and press--
- Wait a minute. I'll try that.
- Press on your back so your hips can go forward first. Okay?
So you're gonna go: press, press, press, press.
- Oh, It's twerking, isn't it?
Is it twerking? It's twerking, baby!
Twerk me!
- Oh yeah, that's it all right.
Beyonce and all the girls. Miley Cyrus.
- When you actually do it, it's faster. It's not as slow.
This isn't something you're supposed to do in public, I take it.
- She looks like she's riding a horse.
- Yes, I see the interest now.
- (laughing and clapping) Shake that booty!
♪ (J. Dash, "Wop") ♪
- A little bit booty there, huh?
- Good gravy!
- Of course it looks good on young people.
I don't know about the older set.
- Oh, no.
- Oh, they need a doorway for this, a wall.
- (laughing)
- Oh dear!
- (laughing)
- Oh my god.
- I think chicks are born with this already.
- Oh ho ho ho ho! I'm in love.
- Oh, that's Miley in that funny rabbit suit or whatever it is.
- Ain't got no shame, honey.
- Oh, I'm sure their parents are so proud.
- OH! GOLLY!!
- That's a little bit different from the stuff I used to do.
- Wow.
- I could watch it over and over. (laughs)
- I don't think that's gonna make it in a retirement home.
(movie reel clicks)
- (Finebros) So how would you describe that dance?
- Crazy.
- Very sexy.
- Purely sexual.
- I wouldn't like my daughter doing it.
- Old-fashioned butt shaking.
- (Finebros) Can you do the dance for us?
- Oh, absolutely not!
- Oh, I couldn't do that!
- I can't move like that, bro.
- My bottom just doesn't go that way! (laughing)
- It's too sexy.
You guys aren't prepared for me.
- Of course!
♪ (J. Dash, "Wop") ♪
- ♪ (vocalizing along) ♪
Hey, hey!
- Oh god! Well, I think I better forget about that.
- (Finebros) What would you call this dance?
- Booty bounce.
- The booty rump.
- Butts for sale.
- Sexy let's get it on.
- Oh, how to upset your mom? I don't know. (laughing)
- Tweaking twerking twarking... trekking... something like that.
-(Finebros) They call it twerking.
- Oh honey... is that to go along with tweeting?
- Oh, I've heard of twerking!
- Oh, that's the twerking thing I heard about.
Some kids got in trouble for that. And I can understand.
- (Finebros) So do you like the dance?
- No.
- Not particularly.
- Oh yeah. I loved it.
It's very sexy! I'm a guy!
- Yeah, I like the dance. I like rhythm, you know.
And I like girls.
- I guess if I was, you know,
finishing off a pitcher of beer in a strip club,
it'd look pretty good.
- I like the fact that it emphasizes that big bottoms--
which I have one too-- are not to be hidden
or ashamed of.
- Oh. Who could not like that?
As guys, we can look at an ankle or a wrist
and get excited, let alone a booty
upside-down, shaking in tune with music.
Hello! I mean, we explode.
(ka-boom!)
- (Finebros) There are people--
and some of them are younger teenagers-- that are twerking
and then posting it for the public to see, on the internet.
What do you think about that?
- Just don't leave your name and address and telephone number.
- I guess it's not as bad as posting straight pornography.
- I think when they go to have a job,
and someone goes online, they could be in BIG trouble.
- When I was in high school and college,
I was a dancing fool.
- But we didn't have it where, like, you upload it somewhere,
and then it's there for posterity.
- They can put this up on YouTube
and get the whole world looking at them,
and it makes them feel important. I suspect though
that down deep, there's something more important missing.
- We saw these kinds of dances.
These gals did these very exotic sexual dances.
And that was in feature films back in the '30s, '40s, and '50s.
So has it really changed?
- (Finebros) What was dancing like when you were younger?
- It was Arthur Murray!
It was very elegant.
- We did, like the jitterbug.
- Jitterbug, or swing.
- We usually asked the band,
"Hey, can you play something we can dance to?"
And that's like SLOW AND OLD FOGEY!
- Did you know, the twist came out when I was in middle school,
and my parents didn't really approve.
- Oh, it was much different from that!
Ed Sullivan had to show Elvis from the waist up!
Because he just gyrated a little bit of love.
These girls are giving it away to the lowest bidder!
- (Finebros) Back when you were a teenager,
if some girl suddenly started twerking at a school dance,
what would the administration have done to that student?
Oh they'd be facing counseling with the principal
and their parents and all that immediately.
- When I was a kid, if someone did that,
nobody would've known what the hell to do.
- Oh, I bet that kid would have been dragged out by his ear!
- They paddled them.
And you know what, I think we should go back to that.
These parents spare the rod and spoil the child.
We've got a lot of spoilage running around.
- (Finebros) Well, some schools have suspended students
for twerking and posting the videos. - Good for them!
But their parents are probably going in and saying,
"How dare you do that to my child?
My child has the right to twerk!"
- (Finebros) When you see things like this,
what does it make you think about what it would be like
if you were a young person today?
- Oh, I wouldn't want to be one.
It's too complicated now.
- If I had to raise a young person, I mean, I'd be pretty, like--
It's a daunting task.
- I actually think it's kind of sad.
There's such pressure on you to dress a certain way
and dance a certain way.
- My hats off to you, younger generation,
'cause you're getting 50 times the information that we got.
- (Finebros) What advice would you give to parents out there
of how to talk to their kids about twerking?
- Oh, parents don't like to talk to their children.
- Parents that would allow their kids to do this?
I'm not sure advice is of any value to them.
- You can't say, "You can't do this,"
because that just makes it more difficult.
- They would do it behind your back.
- I would let the kid know that you're advertising sex.
So be very careful.
- Try to reach their conscience.
Do they understand the movements and what they mean?
- And ask them if this is really
how they want to be presenting themselves.
Of course, they'd probably say, "Sure, yeah."
- (Finebros) So finally, should people out there twerk?
- No, I don't think so.
- It all depends on the age.
- I say go for it!
- Should they? We're not gonna legislate on twerking, are we?
They can go whatever they want
as long as they're not hurting anyone other than themselves.
And you might be hurting yourself by doing that.
You might strain a hip!
- Not in public.
If you're waving your private parts in people's faces,
you've exposed yourself in a way that is indecent.
You've gotta have some dignity.
- Thank you so much for watching another episode of Elders React.
- We'll be back soon, so please subscribe.
- Let us know what kind of videos we should watch next.
- Twerk your hearts out, people! I still love you.
- Sayonara, au revoir, uh, auf Wiedersehen, and that's about it.
Thank you.
♪ (ragtime music) ♪