JonBenet Ramsey was a 6-year-old child beauty pageant princess who was found strangled at her home in Boulder, Colorado, in 1996.
The television show "Dance Moms: A New Era" is facing backlash after one of the young dancers was assigned a performance dressed as JonBenet Ramsey and was instructed to pretend she was being strangled.
Ramsey was a 6-year-old child beauty pageant princess who was found strangled at her home in Boulder, Colorado, in 1996. No one has ever been arrested and the murder has remained unsolved.
An episode of "Dance Moms: A New Era," a reboot of the 2011 show "Dance Moms," features 11-year-old Ashlan Scheide, receiving an unusual assignment for an upcoming competition.
"You're going to be a glitz pageant girl. That's who JonBenet was, but then she got kidnapped and murdered," Ashlan's mother, Lisa, tells her daughter on the show.
Ashlan seemed alarmed to learn the details of Ramsey's death nearly three decades ago.
"This is really not for me, but I'll do anything for the win," Ashlan said in the episode.
Ashlan rehearsed the number with instructor Gloria Hampton and performed the piece at a competition.
Viewers of the show, which started streaming on Hulu, are flooding social media with outrage.
Viewer Evie Nagy says she was appalled.
"I was like, 'I'm sorry what,'" Nagy tells Inside Edition. "I was like, 'That's ridiculous.'"
Dance instructor Hampton recently spoke with Inside Edition to promote her show.
"I've been doing this for years," Hampton said. "Last season we took 450 dances to a dance competition for five weeks and then at nationals. So I'm used to doing costuming for thousands of children and 450 dances. Music, I am really inspired by music. I think it leads me to what I want to do. I hear something and I get inspired by that and I have a vision. It is interesting. I really have a vision in my head when I hear something that I like."
Inside Edition reached out to "Dance Moms: A New Era" for comment about the episode featuring the JonBenet Ramsey routine but did not hear back.
