You can take it as feel good story of someone who is trying their best.

You can also take it as someone disrespecting an entire culture on a global stage. Breaking was already met with skepticism when it was announced that it would be apart of the Olympics. Most people were asking themselves is this really a sport? But with it being added to the Olympics came the chance of actually solidifying the public stance that this is a skill that requires nificant effort and athletic capabilities. Vast majority of regular people still think dance is just a silly thing that requires nothing but a bit of practice. This could’ve been a gateway to establishing breaking and all other dance styles require the same amount of effort, skill, time, physical capability of other sports and should be treated as such. But instead of praising the bboys for showcasing impressive athletic ability and introducing more people to the culture or helping the other bgirls show to world that this shouldn’t be a male dominated field, she just helped proved that breaking was just something France wanted to be quirky with.

“Everybody is talking about breaking because of Raygun!” No everyone is making fun of it and diminishing the achievements of the winners of the competition. The focus is solely on the joke of a performance she gave rather than giving any acknowledgment to the other competitors who have sunk almost their entire lives to developing and honing their skills and elevating the culture.

If an Olympic swimmer ended with a time almost double the time of the next placer and was doggy paddling the whole, then said “well I’m here for the experience” we wouldn’t be praising her for being courageous and trying no we would be saying we can’t believe she beat someone else out only to perform like this. The other swimmers might appreciate an easier win but also disrespects the time and effort put in to get to this place. If you spent years of training to compete in one of the largest stages in the world only to win by essentially default, would you feel like this was medal well earned?

Or take Hiro10 who even despite knowing he was going to lose decided he would put his all into his last set and gave us a phenomenal final set should be on the same stage as her? I was truly emotional watching him leave the competition because you can tell his heart and soul was into his style, that there were years practice and experimentation that finally earned him a way to this place. And Raygun is supposed to be someone that can compare.

For someone who supposedly studied and respects the culture, she’s genuinely done a disservice to breaking. It was long shot that breaking or any other dance form may stay long term in the Olympics but Raygun guarantees we won’t see it again. This was an actual chance for people to what depth breaking has and go beyond what is in movies.

This is a meaningless rant but as someone who made this their life actively for 7 years and passively for 4 I’m disappointed that this is how the culture gets shown to the world.