Strip Clubs in Relationships

[Blue Room]

Oh, I agree, I dont think its a huge deal. But if it bothers the other party in the relationship I just dont think its worth it.

 

[lauren430]

agreed

 

[yolland]

Go to the strip club and you will inevitably compare your girlfriend to the stripper at some level.

Go to work at the office, and you'll inevitably compare her to the women you work with 'at some level' too. And you'll likewise be aware 'at some level' of them comparing you to their partners. The awareness of others as sexual beings like ourselves is a basic, inevitable aspect of all our social relationships, including those with people of the same sex.

I think part of the fun of going to strip clubs is being in a situation where you get to enjoy assessing the opposite sex without the usual pressures of feeling assessed yourself at the same time. Yes, of COURSE it's an unrealistic fantasy--the performer is there to make money, after all, not because s/he gives a shit what all these losers think about his/her body. So what?? Getting drunk won't solve life's problems either, but that doesn't mean occasionally hitting the bars with your friends reflects a terminal inability to cope.

Realize that in most situations where a person says "I have no problem with this" - it sounds as if it is a mutual thing between the two parties.

Here, it is clear that your girlfriend has a problem with this.

On this point, I agree with you. Although I find nothing intrinsically wrong with strip clubs, there's nothing in them anyone needs--it's just entertainment, after all; certainly not worth losing all the benefits of a good relationship over.

Unfortunately, a lot of women perceive their partner's willingness to visit a strip club as a comment on their inadequacy to satisy him sexually (and perhaps otherwise), not realizing it has nothing to do with feeling dissatisfied. There are men who feel this way about their partners going, but it's a lot less common--probably because men generally have a more diversified sense of where their worth as a human being lies. Sad but true.

 

[Keocmb]

Considering that the primary reason for going to a strip club is to lust over another woman, what do you think it says to your girlfriend?

I'm not okay with my boyfriend going. Especially since we've got some... infidelity issues.

And I would rather chew my own leg off than see a strange, sweaty man strip.

Unless it was Bono.

Or, like... George Clooney.

 

[Mrs. Edge]

I just don't find male strippers attractive at ALL. I would KILL any girlfriend of mine who hired one for a bachelorette party!


I wouldn't have a big problem with my boyfriend or husband going to a strip club (preferably as part of a group outing), as long as it didn't become his favourite passtime, and I began to be unfavourably compared with the strippers.

Actually, I always thought it might be kind of fun to be a stripper, (an easy job), but a man I know who frequents such establishments informed me that I would be a terrible stripper. Supposedly that was a compliment, but I have my doubts and it was hard on my ego.

 

[Bonochick]

If my boyfriend would go, I wouldn't care. My friend and her hubby go to them together.

 

[Moonlit_Angel]

I must agree wholeheartedly with yolland's post .

I can see where this'd bother some people. But at the same time, if girls go see male strippers from time to time, I don't see why guys can't. And if someone's constantly worrying about whether or not their significant other is going to cheat on them with someone at a strip club or whatever...that says a lot, in my opinion, about how much trust they have in them, and it kinda makes me wonder why they're with them if they don't fully trust them. And of course, it also shows the insecurities that person has of themselves, which is sad. I mean, we all have insecurities, that's for sure, but if someone's constantly thinking that the person they're with is too good for them and that that person is going to realize that and leave them eventually, even if that is far from being true...yeah, it's just very sad.

Angela

 

[MissVelvetDress_75]

this looks like fun:

[q][ The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: 1/21/04 ]

Cheetah offers catwalk classes for women

By RICHARD L. ELDREDGE
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

JOEY IVANSCO / AJC

Victoria, a dancer at the Cheetah, demonstrates a move from the club's new "Catwalk" stripping class.


Inside the seductively lit Cheetah Lounge in Midtown, house music thumps hypnotically and ecstatic screams echo through the air. Dozens of women on two glowing red runway stages smile provocatively as music videos flash on two large screens behind them. They strut, exuding sexiness in black platform shoes with 6-inch heels. Finally, some shuck their tops along with their inhibitions.

A typical Saturday afternoon at the veteran Atlanta gentlemen's club? Hardly. These are the customers.

For $25 a pop, the 36 women, including four girlfriends from Acworth, an Atlanta real estate attorney and two Buckhead socialites, are students in the club's inaugural "Catwalk: How to Move Like a Cheetah Girl" class. The women range in age from 20s to late 40s and all body types are well-represented. The session's instructors -- Cody, Holly, Vanessa, Victoria, Callie, Logan and Brandi -- are Cheetah performers.

Welcome to the latest Oprah-approved exercise routine/pop culture trend that may or may not be destined for the hall closet as a future source of embarrassment for your children a la the Disco Trimmer, leg warmers and the Thighmaster.

The budding Brandis attending today's class are hoping to learn standard moves like the booty shake, the hair swing and naturally, how to perform a lap dance.

"Walking in was the hardest part," admits class attendee Tonya King, 32. "It was disturbingly hard. At home, I tried on about 45 outfits before I decided on something sexy I wouldn't look ridiculous in. Once the class started, I was fine, though!"

The creation of "Catwalk" came from the requests of female customers, who have started populating the club in the past year, many enticed into the formerly bastioned boys club by inventive promotions like "Ladies Night" and "Wine, Women and Thong."

"We're seeing women who are letting go of the idea that there's something wrong with this," said class instructor Cody, using her stage name. "When you're up there onstage, it's all about curvaceousness. It's not necessarily about doing it for your husband or your boyfriend. The women in the class today were looking for self-empowerment. It made them look and feel good. Guaranteed, when they're out in the clubs tonight, they're going to be holding their heads a little higher."

"It's like you've got this fun little secret you're carrying around with you," says King, the single real estate attorney in the class. "I mean, it's like taking a cooking class. Now, I've learned how to cook and strip. Who wouldn't want to date me!"

Marietta "Catwalk" student Lotus Vizuete, 28, got no argument from her husband when she informed him she'd like to take the class.

"I didn't mind at all," said Vini Vizuete, 28. "It's a fun thing for her and her friends to do. Besides, I knew there was the strong possibility that she would come home and dance for me. How could that be a bad thing?"

Along with learning the moves, stripper poles, the occupation's main tool of the trade, have begun cropping up in residential homes. (The Cheetah, however, doesn't utilize poles. Explains Cody: "They're tacky.") Web sites like stripperzone.com sell the poles to online shoppers. The popular red model will set you back $279. The solid chrome version runs a little higher.On the site's demonstration video, a bored, leggy woman orders a pole online that is then rush-delivered to her door. After installing it herself, she brings her equally bored, goateed boyfriend into the living room, throws him on the couch and proceeds to demonstrate her new piece of workout equipment.

OutKast member Big Boi has a stripper pole in the entertainment room of his Fayetteville home. "The West Wing" actor Richard Schiff, meanwhile, has one in his Los Angeles office. Technically, it belongs to his wife, former "L.A. Law" actress Sheila Kelley, who became an instant celebrity when she appeared on "Oprah" in November to promote her upcoming book, "The S Factor: Strip Workouts for Every Woman." The tome on toning up hit stores this month.

While other modern-day feminists like Martha Burk fight for the right to swing a golf club at Augusta National, Kelley gets in touch with her radical side in another way.

"When I'm swinging on that pole, it's the closest thing to flying I've ever experienced," says Kelley from her S Factor exercise studio in Los Angeles. "You're a goddess and a kid all at the same time. As far as I'm concerned, pole-dancing should be an Olympic event."

Kelley's business employs seven full-time instructors who teach strip workouts to clients, including Schiff's "West Wing" co-worker Allison Janney, who has provided a glowing blurb for Kelley's book.

"Stripping is the final frontier of feminism," says Kelley. "Let's face it, in the 1970s, women turned right instead of left. We forgot we're beautiful, sensuous creatures. It's about owning your sexuality. It's about saying 'I can be a powerful female and also be damn sexy.' "

Next month, Kelley will embark on a book tour that will bring her to Bally's Total Fitness Center at 6780 Roswell Road on Feb. 10 to teach an exercise class. Her Web site averages sales of five to 10 poles each day, thanks in part to exposure on "Oprah." While Californians purchase the most stripping supplies from Kelley's site, S Factor office manager Cindye Friedman says poles ship everywhere in the country, including a customer in Sharpsburg.

And if Kelley's husband, Schiff, who plays frequently frazzled White House communications director Toby Ziegler on "West Wing" at work, is "very, very good" he receives a private strip session from his wife at home at night.

Marketing ways for wily wives to please their spouses via sultry dances didn't originate with Internet stripper poles and "The S Factor" workout. In the early 1960s, Roulette Records was issuing LPs with titles like "How to Strip for Your Husband: Music to Make Marriage Merrier" and "How to Belly-Dance for Your Husband" featuring music by Sonny Lester, his orchestra and chorus.

While some health clubs like Crunch have added cardio-striptease and belly-dance workouts to their regimens, Leo Smith, the general manager of the L.A. Fitness in Vinings, says the trend is not currently on his "to do" list. "We're gonna stick to the tried-and-true exercise workouts," he says. "Cardio-striptease workouts tend to get folks in the door but they're not necessarily folks interested in working out, if you know what I mean."

Back in a cushy booth at the Cheetah, class instructor Cody says the response to the inaugural session of "Catwalk" has caught her and the other women by surprise. "We're going to have to have a meeting and regroup while we figure out how we're going to accommodate everyone next month."

The scheduled date for the second "Catwalk" class? The afternoon of St. Valentine's Day.[/q]

 

[sallycinnamon78]

thoughts? ya don't tell her, and then if she finds out after the fact, ya tell her "eh i'm sorry... that wasn't what we set out to do but after a few cocktails the guys wanted to go. i wasn't gonna hang around a strange city by myself, so i tagged along. the whole time i was thinking of you though, i sware."




no i haven't used that before


honestly

No female I know would be gullible or fundamentally stupid enough to believe that old chestnut!

When I was much younger, and very insecure, I wasn't particularly enamoured with the idea of my boyfriends visiting strip joints.

I'm much older and wiser now, am much happier with myself and who I am, and therefore, would not give a flying fig if my fiance went to a strip joint with some friends for a laugh. Why not?

By the same standards - if it's acceptable for men tio do this, then it ought to be for women as well - double standards suck.

 

[sallycinnamon78]

I could truly care less if my boyfriend went to a strip club, and he could care less if I went to one. What matters most is where his is. Hell, I'd go to one with him. There's no shame in my game.

Well said!

 

[diamond]

once i stumbled into a strip club looking for directions

db9

 

[-macphisto-]

It's morally wrong, nobody should go to strip clubs, there all garbage, it just makes the woman or man out to be a sex object other then its true potential. My opinon, its a waste of time and bad for the mind and heart.

 

[sallycinnamon78]

It's morally wrong, nobody should go to strip clubs, there all garbage, it just makes the woman or man out to be a sex object other then its true potential. My opinon, its a waste of time and bad for the mind and heart.

As many others have said: if it becomes some sort of excuse for demeaning the opposite sex, then a problem exists. Otherwise, from my point of view, I don't see it's a big deal.

 

[sallycinnamon78]

O if it bothers the other party in the relationship I just dont think its worth it.

 

[DaveC]

Perhaps they are morally wrong according to your standards, but what about someone who doesn't share your morals and thinks they are okay? Should they be barred from entering because of your morality?

 

[sallycinnamon78]

As a Floyd fan with no sense of humour, you're bound to think that!

I was just kidding- couldn't agree with you more really, and I'm just as Floydian as you . Just thought this thread nedded a few pointless comments.

 

[DaveC]

As a Floyd fan with no sense of humour, you're bound to think that!

I was just kidding- couldn't agree with you more really, and I'm just as Floydian as you . Just thought this thread nedded a few pointless comments.

the offer of yesterday is still on the table.

 

[Doozer61]

Thought about going back to Olympic Garden in Vegas but didn't get a chance. Its funny because last October was actually my first time in a strip club and Caron went with me. And we talked about this thread on our drive this weekend.

I don't know that I would want to go without her, but our circumstances are different. Last time, I got the lap dance and this time she wanted one and I said NO.

I know. total double standard.

 

[-macphisto-]

Perhaps they are morally wrong according to your standards, but what about someone who doesn't share your morals and thinks they are okay? Should they be barred from entering because of your morality?

No they should not be barred from entering a strip joint due to my moral standards. It is there choice, that is why in my post I only shared my opinion, I would never take somebody's free agency away from them, but I do like to express my opinons about such things!

 

[discothequeLP]

for some reason thinking about my girlfriend in a strip club getting a lap dance is just

 

[starsgoblue]

Last time I went to a strip club I got thrown out....

 

[MissVelvetDress_75]

did you touch a dancer?

 

[starsgoblue]

MVD...you know I'm a girl myself, right?

 

[MissVelvetDress_75]

nope. now I do.

so what did you do to get thrown out of a club?

 

[discothequeLP]

yeah stars, how did you get thrown out? did you climb onto the stage and get wild? did you beat up one of the chicks who worked there?






did you touch a dancer

 

[pax]

No man of mine is going to have a strip club habit. I don't go out and get lap dances from strange men.

It's as simple as that.

 

[DrTeeth]

once i stumbled into a strip club looking for directions

db9

I don't think they give those kind of directions there Diamond. Have you tried the Kamasutra?

 

[Moonlit_Angel]

it just makes the woman or man out to be a sex object other then its true potential.

But if the man or the woman chose to get into that line of work, I fail to see how that'd demean them or lower them to nothing more than sex objects...if they enjoy their work, hey, more power to them.

I am glad to see, though, that you acknowledged that both genders could demean themselves...for the longest time I've been running into people who seem to think it's only demeaning work if a woman does it, if a guy does it, there's no problems...and that's always bugged me. If it's that way for women, why isn't it that way for men?

Angela

 

[nbcrusader]

But if the man or the woman chose to get into that line of work, I fail to see how that'd demean them or lower them to nothing more than sex objects...if they enjoy their work, hey, more power to them.

They may be happy, but they may still be viewed in a lessor light because of their work.

 

[cydewaze]

I've never been to a strip club before, so I'm prolly not the best one to ask. Not sure what Jessica would think of it if I did though.