I was never the cool kid in high school, but I could usually figure out what fad was in and did my best to follow suit. That is, until I got to college and realized that you can still get with girls and not be a complete tool. Nevertheless, fads continue to come and go. Right now, synchronized dancing seems as popular as the days when John Travolta wasn’t an overweight B-list actor, but a sex icon who could get his groove on.

As if I ever needed more reason to hate France, the youth there have decided to start dancing in the streets like a bunch of coked-out idiots. If you haven’t heard about this new dance, which the Frenchies termed the “tektonic,” YouTube has enough painfully bad video footage to keep your eyes bleeding all night long. If you think back to Napoleon Dynamite’s famous dance scene, speed it up a bit, and replace the disco he grooves to with new wave, techno trash – then you have tektonic.

As ridiculous as it sounds, this tektonic crap has literally swept all of France. From what I’ve read and heard from friends I know studying there, walking through the streets has become a nightmare. As one friend put it best: It’s as if he were living through one of those trashy dance movies like “Step Up.” But instead of sexy girls dancing provocatively, it’s annoying French dudes flailing their arms about like a bunch of retards. Kids can routinely be seen challenging one another to dance-offs in the street, as they try to build street cred. I was never one to order Freedom Fries or throw away my mustard after 9/11, but that will never stop me from highlighting French idiocy.

Meanwhile, back here in Isla Vista, another dance craze is taking over the scene. Equally annoying, it’s called the “Souljah Boy” dance. You know, the one drunken guys and girls do to make asses of themselves every time Souljah Boy’s hit song “Crank That” comes on the stereo. This dance involves some fancy foot movement and a lot of finger snapping. It too is on YouTube for your enjoyment. The Souljah Boy dance always reminds me of a boxer hopping around in a ring, avoiding his opponent. Only, there is no opponent, it’s just a douchebag dancing alone, taking up too much space and smelling bad. The part of the dance that everyone knows comes along each time Souljah Boy sings “Superman.” At this point in the song, you’re supposed to fling your chest into the air in a flying motion, like Superman. It’s pretty much the only audible line of the song, so you shouldn’t screw it up if you are giving it a go.

Trying to compare this dance with the tektonic is difficult. Souljah Boy’s song sounds so terrible, I wouldn’t be entirely surprised to find out it was recorded in the bathroom of a Chevron station. At least the nauseating house music the French dance to actually sounds produced. Also, by proxy I don’t have to see the French people dancing every weekend, so I’ll deem theirs the lesser of the two evils – for now.

More often than not, if you’re trying to match a dance to a song, you’ll probably end up looking like a jackass. Yet, there’s always room for some fun, which brings me to my last topic: the Thriller dance. Everyone should know this one. Even if you’ve never seen Michael Jackson’s music video, you’ve probably seen it on TV or at some stupid high school event. It’s the one where a bunch of zombies dance around while a guy tries to get his girlfriend to safety. Trust me, you know it. Anyway, just when it felt like this dance had become totally overdone, a thousand plus Filipino inmates decided to spice things up and do their own rendition. Needless to say, it’s become a smash hit on YouTube, garnering over seven million views. Leave it to inmates to do something entertaining and fun. Touché Philippines. Touché.