White-owned twerk dance studio rejects black instructor, calls her style “basic”

Kelechi Okafor is a personal trainer and has been teaching twerk workshops around the United Kingdom for some time. But when she approached a white-owned local pole studio about possibly helping out with a twerking workshop, she was told her style was too “basic.”

When Okafor approached them about their class, which was taught once a week for thirty minutes, she received this response: “Our twerking is a very different style to yours. We get the knee pads on and throw it down..! I’m sorry but I don’t enjoy your style it is too basic for my students but thank you for the offer.”

Okafor posted about the experience and then took to Twitter to share a video of the advanced twerking class in question, questioning how her style could be called basic compared to what they were teaching. She also posted a video of her own twerking class.

The video Okafor posted of the studio’s class then began to receive negative comments, and the studio reached out to Okafor and accused her of inciting a “gang of haters,” even contacting one of her coworkers to ask, “How well do you know this girl and who is her boss?”

The studio owner then took to Facebook to complain about being targeted by “racist” bullies.

Okafor said of the whole experience, “The way this woman behaved when I contacted her about collaborating just goes to further prove how much the mainstream love to commodity blackness whilst simultaneously despising black people.”

Check out her full Twitter account and videos of her style versus what the studio teaches below.

So I'm currently planning to spread my twerk workshops around the UK. I wrote to a pole studio in Machester called Bodybarre. — machine gun Kele (@kelechnekoff) January 12, 2016

They have a twerk class that's 30 minutes ONCE a week. So I figure they can't cover that much in that time but it could work. — machine gun Kele (@kelechnekoff) January 12, 2016

https://twitter.com/kelechnekoff/status/686854151570087936/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

I touched a nerve with them and I don't quite know how or why??? 🤔 — machine gun Kele (@kelechnekoff) January 12, 2016

This is what she called basic… pic.twitter.com/NtfK4Elsep — machine gun Kele (@kelechnekoff) January 12, 2016

This is what happens when black women try to be present in a genre that they created. — machine gun Kele (@kelechnekoff) January 12, 2016