Members of a country line dance team said they were booted from a competition because their American flag-themed shirts made some people in the audience feel “triggered and unsafe.”
Last weekend, the Borderline Dance squad was set to perform at the Emerald City Hoedown in Seattle, Washington. The dance group said they had been invited to dance at the competition for the past three years, but the pandemic prevented them from performing.
The Borderline Dance troupe stated in a Facebook post, “Dance teams work their boots off preparing for performances like these. Extra practices, babysitters, ferry rides, hours upon hours of practice and commute time and time away from their families. We all were very excited to perform for this event.”
However, the country line dance squad said they were not welcome because of concerns over their American flag-themed uniforms.
“Unfortunately, what our team was met with upon arrival was that our flag tops were offensive to some of the convention goers,” the group stated.
The Borderline Dance squad said there was a small group that felt “triggered and unsafe.”‘
The dance team said the reason why people could be offended by uniforms inspired by the American flag is because of the pro-Palestine opinions regarding the Israel-Hamas war and because of the transgender agenda.
The dance squad claimed that they were threatened with an “ultimatum” to “remove the flag tops and perform in either street clothes (which most didn’t bring as they traveled there in their uniforms) or they would supply us with ECH shirts from years past” or not be given the opportunity to perform at all.
The Borderline Dance team said all of the members decided against dancing at all at the competition. They noted that another dance squad refused to perform in solidarity with them.
“Our friends, West Coast Country Heat, who were also scheduled to dance for the convention that evening also did not perform as they too proudly don the colors of our country in the same spirit of patriotism that we do,” the Facebook post read.
The dance team stated, “Because although we may not always agree with the current state of things, we recognize that being an American means true FREEDOM. We all understood and accepted this and walked out with class and dignity despite the discrimination we had experienced.”
The Borderline Dance squad said they received “amazing” support from a majority of the community and Emerald City Hoedown organizers.
However, they also said that they were “disappointed” that country dance competition was “overshadowed by the political opinions of a small percentage.”
The team’s co-captain, Lindsay Stamp, told “The Jason Rantz Show,” “My team doesn’t take a political stance. We came to dance. We’re a patriotic group. We support our military, our veterans, our first responders. We’re a group of patriots.”
Ziadee Cambier, the president of the Rain Country Dance Association, said in a Facebook comment that no team was asked to leave.
“We will be in continued communication with the captains of the dance teams that were slated to perform Saturday,” Cambier wrote. “To clarify, as this was not a competition, no one was disqualified and no one was asked to leave. While we are mending our relationships directly with the dance teams we will be disabling comments on this post. We will be sharing more information later this week, to hopefully clear up any misunderstandings.”
However, Stamp disagreed with Cambier’s statement.
“It’s pretty clear to me, there’s always room for error in any situation, but I don’t believe so,” Stamp told Rantz.
“I would just love to see more conversations opened about people accepting one another,” she continued. “About being wholly inclusive. You know, every group of person talks about being inclusive and accepting. And I think that we need to work on being inclusive and accepting of people outside of our immediate comfort zones. I would love to see that.”
The Rain Country Dance Association did not respond to a request for comment from Fox News.
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