Vladikavkaz dance instructor faces harassment for appearing in ‘revealing’ clothes

Diana Pogorelova, a dance instructor from Vladikavkaz, North Ossetia, has faced a wave of criticism and insults for her ‘revealing’ dance costumes on social media after publishing videos of her training sessions and advertising her classes.

Public attention to Pogorelova’s dance school began with a post in a local online community, where users criticised her appearance as well as her Latin American dancing. After that, other users and channels joined the discussion, and the backlash spread beyond North Ossetia.

More than 300,000 users follow Pogorelova’s personal page, including audiences from abroad. Her dance school’s page has over 80,000 subscribers.

Local social media users have compared Pogorelova and her students to sex workers and appealed to public officials to take notice of the situation, arguing that ‘girls in Ossetia should not behave this way’.

In response to the comments, Pogorelova published a statement saying she did not intend to engage with insults but warned that she might contact law enforcement. She said that she would file complaints of incitement to hatred, harassment, or humiliation based on appearance or nationality against the commentators.

‘I am writing this only to warn everyone who calls for hatred, harassment, or humiliation against me based on nationality or appearance: I will file a complaint against every single one of you’, her statement reads.

Ossetian blogger Zaur Farniev wrote on his Telegram channel that he does not know Pogorelova and is not speaking in her defence, but drew attention to the overall tone of the discussion.

‘What kind of beautiful Ossetia of the future are you planning to build if all that concerns you is the desire to imitate “neighbours” in their aspiration to match an image of the past? Why do you not understand that progress is impossible without freedom — even the kind you may not like? I cannot imagine a top programmer or scientist being triggered by a girl in a swimsuit dancing rumba […] You are choosing for yourselves a place in an ethnographic museum. No one is forcing you there. Instead of development, you choose archaism and consider it common sense’, Farniev wrote.

After that, another blogger, Fred-As Betanti, recorded a video address in which he criticised Pogorelova and those who, in his words, do not conform to moral norms.

‘Why, with such a rich cultural heritage of our ancestors, do our girls not revive and develop their own culture and present our beauty and traditions to the world, but instead copy Western fashion and seek recognition there? And bring to us, to the Caucasus, a fashion that discredits our culture? Although even in Europe there is decent fashion that could serve as an example. And instead of listening to remarks and apologising to the people, they dare to insult the people, saying “I do not care, you are backwards”, and so on. It is you who are backward, who do not understand such basic things, who were not properly raised and now represent our people with such behaviour and “fashion”. Did your mothers and grandmothers behave like this? What do you think you are allowing yourselves?’, Betanti said.

Pogorelova has refused to provide comments to OC Media.