The Olympic Break(danc)ing Edition

On Raygun, headspins, and hostile takeovers.

Calvin Son (CS) is a copy director and casual b-boy based in Philadelphia. 

Calvin here. This past weekend, break(danc)ing made its Olympic debut in Paris.  

One dancer was ridiculed and reduced to a meme. Olympic breaking champions were crowned for the first (and maybe the last) time. And an Internet-sized spotlight took aim at a dance that has perplexed audiences since it first went mainstream in the 1980s. 

Why is this interesting?

Breaking is a messy, misunderstood dance that required a hasty makeover to become Olympics-ready. 

For starters: Most people call it the wrong name. The term “breakdancing” is a remnant of shaky reporting from the 1980s, which also helped cement other common misconceptions, including that…

• Breaking is the same as “pop-locking.” (Popping, locking, and breaking are all actually distinct dances with their own histories and traditions.)

• Breakers are exclusively Black or Hispanic. (Breaking was born from Black culture as an element of hip-hop, and today’s top breakers span the globe.)

• New York is the world’s epicenter of breaking. (It’s true that breaking was born in the Bronx — but other scenes have grown dominant over the past 50 years.)

• Breakers spin on their heads. (Okay, this one’s sometimes true.) 

Those stereotypes, along with some top-tier acting, have contributed to a pattern of breaking becoming a perpetual punch line. In most parts of the world, to be a breaker is to accept being seen as a weirdo. 

But even putting public perceptions aside, breaking has long resisted becoming sterilized or standardized for easier viewing. It’s a complicated dance to understand, with a huge system of esoteric moves, traditions, and hand signals. (Two fingers up means “You did that move twice.” Tapping the floor means “You messed up and hit the ground.” And so on.)

In a culture where battling is glorified, there have been decades-long debates about the best judging methods. Or the merits of “style” versus “power.” Or whether the dance even belongs in the Olympics, since it’s an art, not a sport. 

That’s not even scratching the surface of all the rules that would seem absurd in any other Olympic event.

For instance, you have to improvise to whatever song the DJ plays. You need to be facing your opponent any time you stop moving. You can’t use a move more than once — for the duration of the entire competition. You’re allowed to mock your opponent and their moves while they’re dancing. But then your opponent might mock the size of your manhood. You might do more “impressive” moves than your opponent — but still lose. 

You might even see a world-champion breaker defeat a lower-ranked college professor, who then gets absolutely demolished by the collective Internet.

The process that brought Raygun to the Olympics — as well as the breaking competitions’ rules and judging criteria — was overseen by the World DanceSport Federation. As breaking’s Olympic governing body, the WDSF created a qualification system that made it much easier to qualify in some areas than in others.

To some breakers, that’s the cost of quickly building infrastructure in a relatively young, unstandardized artform. To other breakers, it’s evidence of a hostile takeover. 

The WDSF’s roots are in promoting ballroom dance — maybe breaking’s most distant, least hip-hop cousin. The organization’s secret goal, critics argue, is to use breaking as a Trojan horse to sneak ballroom dance into the limelight — leaving breaking misrepresented and neglected.

Regardless of the WDSF’s intentions, breaking’s future in the Games is stalled indefinitely. Even before the dance made its official Olympic debut, breaking was excluded from the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles. That leaves the dance in an interesting place. Coasting along after a rapid, jagged media ascent. No set path forward. And watched by an audience that seems set on seeing breaking as mere meme content, despite beautiful, exciting moments of human achievement.

Luckily, breaking is filled with weirdos who’ve built a tolerance for this kind of thing. Along with the calluses on their hands, and the headspin bald spots on their heads, they’ve developed a thick skin for tough breaks. Breaking may or may not return to the Olympics. But there will always be breakers like Raygun on the floor, improvising to whatever song plays next. (CS)

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Thanks for reading,

Noah (NRB) & Colin (CJN) & Calvin (CS)

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Why is this interesting? is a daily email from Noah Brier & Colin Nagy (and friends!) with editing help from Louis Cheslaw about interesting things. If you’ve enjoyed this edition, please consider forwarding it to a friend. If you’re reading it for the first time, consider subscribing.