Fashion Show in the Champagne Room

[Amelia G]

Yes - I was referring to the group of people who have paid to sit and watch the show. They're not the customers of the dancer, and similarly some of the people at the bar aren't there to see the show. "Punters" is in that sense a valid collective noun. I don't care if one of them is a circuit judge or a fellow performer - they're watching, therefore they're a punter. Taken on average, the typical members of that group have a well-known demographic - that doesn't stop Albert Einstein being there (apart from the death thing). I like the occasional bit of RnB, but I'm not black. It's entirely valid to say that the vast majority of RnB fans are black - and saying that doesn't make me change color.

To me, a 'stripper' is someone who removes their clothing as part of an act. That's how the dictionary defines it, and what it's always meant, and I don't see it as anything derogatory in the slightest. A 'dancer' is a different term entirely - Margot Fonteyn was a dancer, and so are the people we're talking about on this thread, but you can be one without being the other - you don't need to dance in order to strip, even though it vaguely helps. It's like looking at Obama and thinking "should we call him a black candidate, or a democratic candidate? Which is correct?" - asking the question is the problem, not answering it.



So what do you think about the myriads of adult websites and CPs who also attend, but don't consider for a moment that they're members of the Press? What does a site have to have (or not have) that makes it fit on the exhibitors list?

What is a CP and name three conventions you think fit as sex industry conventions with myriads of adult websites and CPs (whatever those are) at them?

Perhaps we just have a difference of semantics.

If dancers at strip clubs generally prefer to be called dancers, I think it is rude to insist on stripper as the term, except in specific situations where it is preferred by the dancers i.e. quoting someone from Portland. I don't think it is my place or yours to tell Rachel what she can call herself, but I do think it is my place to advise readers that they are probably better off using the term dancer in most situations.

I still kinda think we can quibble about various uses of the term punters, but I'm still pretty sure you used it in a derogatory way.

I never understood how someone with one black parent and one white parent equals black, but I'm fuzzy on the whole racial divisions thing anyway, so I doubt I'll ever put much effort into following the logic on that. And that's a whole nother topic anyway.

[Amelia G]

I feel bad because it's pretty much entirely my fault for hijacking this thread. However, I think some of these issues are things that should be discussed by people, certainly by people on BB if they are so inclined, which they seem to be.

But, I'm going to shift gears here, because I want to and that's what I do , and i'm glad that you brought that up because I was actually thinking about that and some of the ideas that I think you originally wanted to bring up in this thread.

So...I think that we talked about this before, but I couldn't find it in a search...Aren't there some clubs in the pac-NW that are owned and operated by the performers, almost like a trade union establishment? that could be a big reason for the different atmosphere, in fact, I'm going to go so far as to say probably a huge reason. I think that kind of approach is totally the right way to go, I know there are others on here that think so too, and I think that would also relieve most of the problems that are associated with other such establishments.

No.

People love the fantasy of the talent-owned, talent-run, co-op style strip club or related establishment. But the reality is that (1) it takes a lot of effort to look really fantastic naked and it takes a lot of effort to run a business and (2) while someone is the right age to make bank as a dancer, it is waaaaaaaay easier to get paid for dancing than running a business where they have to figure out taxes and all that stuff and (3) a lot of dancers are very competitive with one another, partly maybe because women in our society are conditioned wrong and partly because sometimes a regular customer will switch who he comes to see and that other dancer might be genuinely in competition for the same dollar.

The one semi-exception to the rule in the United States is the Lusty Lady in San Francisco. Many of the hotties featured on BlueBlood.com have danced there at one time or another. The dancers there are unionized and, as with any union, this prevents certain abuses by management and facilitates certain abuses by labor.

I think a lot of people assume that nobody would strip, except as a desperate last resort, after a life of horror. Truthfully, stripping can be fun and lucrative. Stripping can be big money, big tax-free money, big tax-free fast money. A dancer gets paid the night she dances. Not two weeks or a month later, like at most jobs. A lot of dancers enjoy performing and a lot of dancers enjoy lap dances and such too. Stripping can permit someone in a relationship to get a little outside excitement in a safe environment, where things can't go too far. Rather than being forced, dancers usually pay to be able to dance at a club.

This is not to say that some customers won't be insufferable jerks or that some days a dancers does not lose money showing up at work. But every job sometimes has people one would rather not deal with and every job has bad days. Sex work of any kind comes with its own special problems, but there are problems peculiar to any line of work.

[Mindgames]

What is a CP and name three conventions you think fit as sex industry conventions with myriads of adult websites and CPs (whatever those are) at them?

Content Providers, and so I'll say AVN's expo, Adultcon, EroticaLA, etc... all of which have online operators as exhibitors and no doubt hundreds of them on the attendees list. If you read Adultcon's media application it specifically points out that website operators aren't members of the press, and I'd use exactly the same definitions as they do when laying out T+Cs for a music show.

I still kinda think we can quibble about various uses of the term punters, but I'm still pretty sure you used it in a derogatory way.

Trust me; if I was being derogatory you'd certainly know about it. Every word I type is chosen carefully.

[One Eyed Cat]

Amelia beat me to the punch on the Lusty Lady. I'll have to research this a bit.I do favor co-ops in a number of other areas. News searches pull up some interesting articles from Calcutta, India amongst other places. It is indeed a hard gig to operate. On a side note: I favor the legalization of dungeons (also face arbitrary prosecution). Hard to reconcile liebility issues there.

[Morning Glory]

No.

People love the fantasy of the talent-owned, talent-run, co-op style strip club or related establishment.

No to what?

who are these people that love it? apparently it's not the people whom it would actually apply to. You seem to be saying that strippers are dumb, lazy and greedy. I'm really getting mixed signals here.

maybe it's the exception that makes the rule, but there are intelligent sexy businesswomen. Ask our fellow Blue Blood members, I think they will be able to name one immediately.

I don't really think solidarity among strippers is a fantasy that is so appealing- that is that people want to believe in the idea more than the means of putting it into practice. The kind of people who are interested in that thing are feminists, and people who want social and labor reform. I think the average joe doesn't give a shit either way.

[Bikerpunk]

who are these people that love it? apparently it's not the people whom it would actually apply to. You seem to be saying that strippers are dumb, lazy and greedy. I'm really getting mixed signals here.

No, what she's talking about is specialisation. You could technically be good at stripping/dancing and at running a business, but most do one or the other better. I write software code, I can do testing. What I excel at is seeing a larger picture and organising and refactoring code that's out there, and building in customer value in a forest of geek types who see technology for its own sake. I can, to a much lesser degree handle HR issues and scheduling, but I'd rather not.

Same with the whole dancing/stripping issue. Running a business, especially one that serves booze, is a royal pain in the shitter, which is why I don't do it. Keeping records, filing taxes, making sure the permits are in place, chiselling the dried come off the bathroom walls, etc.

And I think she's actually paying the girls who have made it a career to do the stripping thing a compliment, suggesting it's enough of a vocation to be something that would occupy one's full attention. There's paying attention to diet and exercise, working out how to move gracefully to whatever background music gets selected, waxing various areas and coming up with interesting things to wear (I don't believe uniforms are provided). I mean anyone can stand there in a biker bar in Carlsbad Springs, Ontario languidly shedding clothes to a bored audience between lines of meth in the scabby back room - but she's talking about people with an A game - and seeing Voltraire do that backbend/pole slide thing with the musculature of her legs etc....(I really am NOT singling out VB here, that's just a move I saw her do I didn't see anyone else get close to... and it was stunning) I mean that's not something you go out and do, you work at that, even with the talent.

She wasn't implying that someone wakes up at noon and goes "fuck, I need rent money. Hey, time to go down the bar, get naked, and collect the dollar bills..." she was saying that if your life's work is as an entertainer, then specialise in that, and simply have someone else hand you the cash for doing it.

There's also the attendant HASSLE with being handed tax-free money. No W-2 means you either have to keep meticulous records and pay the taxman yourself, etc.... but it also means when you go to rent a place or try to buy a home, "can we see your W-2s and statements and verify your income" ugh.

Seattle has an establishment called the Lusty Lady. It creeped me out to step in there, people standing in booths (like rows of toilet stalls) with kleenex dispensers on the walls outside.

[Morning Glory]

ugh... on one hour of sleep that was impossible to follow after the first line.

yeah, OK, maybe. But the two things aren't mutually exclusive. I just don't buy it. Lots of people want to run their own businesses because they don't like having someone else hand them their paycheck. People want to be their own boss and do things there own way, I can't believe that there aren't any strippers out there that don't want to do it, and to say that they can't do it, well that sounds like a put down to me.

[Amelia G]

Content Providers, and so I'll say AVN's expo, Adultcon, EroticaLA, etc... all of which have online operators as exhibitors and no doubt hundreds of them on the attendees list. If you read Adultcon's media application it specifically points out that website operators aren't members of the press, and I'd use exactly the same definitions as they do when laying out T+Cs for a music show.



Trust me; if I was being derogatory you'd certainly know about it. Every word I type is chosen carefully.

I've never been to AdultCon although one friend of mine who is both a camgirl and a video pornstar has mentioned it to me. I believe it to be primarily a venue for pornstars to sign autographs and sell personal items. I can't see how I would go there as anything but press, if I were to go, but I've never thought it sounded interesting enough to look into it, so it might not be a good fit for me to attend even as press.

Incidentally, as a journalist, I have been working in professional print venues since I was a young teen. I still like print better than web, but anyone who wants serious coverage needs to learn how to evaluate which web sites can provide real press coverage and which can not. Same as one does not hand a press pass to every single person who would like to try submitting to a magazine they have never written for. I would bet a lot that AdultCon has press passes for web sites they want coverage on.

Whether or not a convention might be too non-web savvy to issue passes to a journalist who was going to be published online does not change what the role of a journalist there would be.

Every single AVN and Erotica LA I have been to, I have gone on a press pass. Every single one. Very few web sites exhibit at those shows. I'm not about to give free consulting on the intricacies of such show exhibition, except to say that Erotica LA has a lot of businesses which exhibit which I would not categorize as sex industry. I think it is debatable whether porn videos are necessarily sex work, but someone who makes funny-shaped beds or lingerie is definitely not doing sex work.

[Amelia G]

No to what?

who are these people that love it? apparently it's not the people whom it would actually apply to. You seem to be saying that strippers are dumb, lazy and greedy. I'm really getting mixed signals here.

maybe it's the exception that makes the rule, but there are intelligent sexy businesswomen. Ask our fellow Blue Blood members, I think they will be able to name one immediately.

I don't really think solidarity among strippers is a fantasy that is so appealing- that is that people want to believe in the idea more than the means of putting it into practice. The kind of people who are interested in that thing are feminists, and people who want social and labor reform. I think the average joe doesn't give a shit either way.

Thanks for the compliment

I was saying that, no, there are not performer-owned clubs in the US. Only sorta exception is the Lusty Lady (and yes, BP, the Lusty Lady has peep booths for jacking off.)

And I think she's actually paying the girls who have made it a career to do the stripping thing a compliment, suggesting it's enough of a vocation to be something that would occupy one's full attention. There's paying attention to diet and exercise, working out how to move gracefully to whatever background music gets selected, waxing various areas and coming up with interesting things to wear (I don't believe uniforms are provided). I mean anyone can stand there in a biker bar in Carlsbad Springs, Ontario languidly shedding clothes to a bored audience between lines of meth in the scabby back room - but she's talking about people with an A game

Yes, exactly. This is not to say that someone could not dance occasionally while working in some other area of the strip club business, but it just probably does not make fiscal sense for most anyone to try to seriously do both. Dancers and management are human beings and human beings need to sleep some time.

Many dancers graduate to a sort of liaison job where they bring management concerns to dancers and dancer concerns to management. But this is usually a job someone eases into as they get too old to dance (either physically not able to or emotionally too sick of it), not one they would do simultaneously with dancing for very long. In general, even that fairly common job would be very difficult to do if someone was viewed as having competitive interests of their own at the same time i.e. if they were still dancing.

[Bikerpunk]

I was saying that, no, there are not performer-owned clubs in the US. Only sorta exception is the Lusty Lady (and yes, BP, the Lusty Lady has peep booths for jacking off.)

er, how does that work, exactly?

Not that I'm the kind of fella who'd whip out his knob and start coaxing out the manchowder in a girl's presence (unless she really wants me to, and we're on non-professional terms) but I'm always curious about the etiquette of non-traditional forms of interaction.

You just walk in, (I presume you pay them first) and then box the Jesuit?

[OrganizedKhaos]

What interesting terms of expression. HAHAHA

[Morning Glory]

you go into the booth, and put some money in the slot. the window opens up and there's a nekkid girl dancing in front of you. you take out your willy and start slappin palms. after a few minutes the window closes and you put in more money. then two Irish guys come out and shoot you.

[Bikerpunk]

Do you have to pay extra for the Irish guys shooting you?

[Morning Glory]

only if you're ron jeremy.

[OrganizedKhaos]

Hahaha

[Dishuman]

I love the girl with the Multi-Colored Mohawk... The camera is really friendly to her.

[Amelia G]

I love the girl with the Multi-Colored Mohawk... The camera is really friendly to her.

That would be Rachel

[jonny.illuminati]

Do you have to pay extra for the Irish guys shooting you?

irish guys shoot people for free (something to do with a dreamy epiphany and righting the wrongs in the world) ... i only charge a small (refundable...if you ask nicely due to unsatisfactory results) nominal fee... starbucks and sushi is expensive now

[Dishuman]

That would be Rachel

Thank YOU!
Yeah she's great =)