This video has been shooting around the internet like a Wanted bullet (you’ve got to curve the video), and it’s not like I don’t understand why. The rare but beautiful moments when someone drops their guard and lives their life in front of a camera are what the internet is all about. Because those are the people we make fun of. Look at this “ridiculous” woman! She is slightly older than the average YouTube commenter! She doesn’t seem to be ashamed of her body or her dancing like I am! In the middle of her vacation, she entered a dancing competition that normally you would expect only 22-year-old oversexed alcoholics-in-training to participate in! “Fuck this lady!” What does she think, she can just live her life and try to enjoy the little time she has on this Earth and there won’t be humiliating, misguided, and cruel repercussions?

We can do better, internet.

I’m not saying that I wouldn’t be right there in the front row at the Senor Frogs Dance Battle 2009 using my overpriced plastic cup of mango daiquiri to hide my face, which would be frozen in a rictus of disbelieving laughter at this woman’s seeming complete lack of self-awareness on the Hawaiian Tropic Bikini Breakdown 2009 dancestage, but the laughter would actually be at my own discomfort created by a culture that emphasizes mocking people who actually know how to live their lives without the constant societal pressure of worrying that a bunch of genuine morons might think you look silly. The day we hand over the judgment calls on what’s what to the hive mind of a Spring Break Bikini Bash 2009 is the day Skynet takes over. And you know how that turns out. (Via BuzzFeed.)