Article about strip clubs in the Guardian

[SaskiaRembrandtVampireHunter]

Never read such a load of twaddle in my life:

www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/oct/19/strip-clubs-new-normal

"Is it good or bad that for young men, going to a strip club is the new normal? I'd venture that it's a good thing. It's a place where they can step outside the anxiety-fraught dating scene and talk to a woman who, as long as he keeps tipping, will give him the time of day. It's a world where women parade around nude or nearly so in which doing so doesn't get anybody arrested or elicit gasps. It's a private room wherein a lap dance is on the table and a man expressing his sexuality isn't going to be met with a sexual harassment lawsuit."

Oh yes, because thanks to the feminazis it's now illegal to talk to women

Sorry, clickable link here www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/oct/19/strip-clubs-new-normal

I thought this article was rather simplistic. While I'm not completely against stripping for money, the Guardian has previously reported on women who work in strip clubs being treated dreadfully by the club owners. I don't think those issues have gone away, so it seems rather strange to be making a strip club out to be some kind of sexually liberated Utopia.

Makes me want to sigh and give up.
Maybe it's designed to annoy, this article?
But of course it's great we're all so liberated now, next thing we'll hear that lapdancing is empowering women.

What on earth is this writer thinking by writing this? (And the Guardian by publishing it).
It completely objectifies the women working in these lap-dancing clubs by describing them only as the means to which young men can explore their sexuality! What about the health (mental and physical) and sexuality of these young women?
This article for starters www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/jun/18/lap-dancer-nadine-quashie-stringfellows Come on Guardian!

TeaAndHugs I found it simplistic too.

Also this: "That these young men are able to explore their sexuality safely and consensually is progress, not the downfall of the 21st century male."

I would argue that actually strip clubs are a backward step. To me, they seem akin to 19th century attitudes that compartmentalise women into the good (who are chaste and untouchable) and the bad (who only exist for the benefit of men).

Very depressing :(

Totally bizarre article which doesn't think the women who are employed there even deserve a mention.

It's like Daily Mail-style reader baiting.

I think it might be reader baiting, although, the writer has a blog covering the same subject so I'm guessing she is expressing genuinely held views. Very sad that she feels like though. And the Guardian really should have more integrity than to publish such tripe.

Utter fuckery.

How is paying someone to strip in front of you "exploring your sexuality". What a limiting, tepid view of sexuality that must be.

Also, I must have completely missed the colossal societal shifts that have taken place that mean that male desires and catering for the male gaze aren't privileged and catered to at every turn.

Agree about reader baiting. The Guardian seems to be going the same way as the Mail's Liz Jones columns -- gleaning clicks by provoking viral irritation. It has the standard journo-device of claiming some new trend ("the new normal") without substantiating it at all, so that the article is just "stuff I as the writer happen to have spotted, or at least I think I might have spotted it and I need an angle for my blog so what the hell ..."

I heard the other day that the Guardian might be dropping its print edition and I fear this will mean even more of this kind of interactivity-seeking pretend journalism.

Gosh, really OatyBeatie? I would have thought the print edition with its adverts was the only thing keeping them going. It's clear though that they are going to have to do something to stem the tide of massive annual losses.

That's what I heard but I'm probably muddled!

I worry that the longer, more difficult analytical articles are not what people tend to read most readily online, and that the only reason that they continue to be available on the website is that they are written primarily for the print edition.

Once online journalism is no longer anchored in print journalism, what will it be like?

There seems to be a felt need among the producers of the paper to generate as much interactivity as possible, as if that was evidence of having really engaged readers. But there are lots of silent non-interactive readers who just want to read stuff that is perhaps too difficult for them to want to comment publicly on, rather than to participate in a mass online grump-session about some provocative thrown-together piece on the social media topic du jour.

I mean, if that woman had thought about it for ONE SECOND she would have known that inviting men who use strip joints to talk about the fact that the use strip joints and getting a whole 31 emails is hardly the basis for defining the new normal. And the person who commissioned it must have known that too. Guardia's new motto: "Comment is freely available, but facts are too expensive."

When I read that article this morning there was a vote function voting on whether you agreed with the writer or not. I wonder what happened to it?. I was pleasantly surprised that all of the people who had voted (about 10 at the time) all disagreed with her.

Oaty I think a telegraph writer was spreading a scurrilous rumour re the guardian print edition...

Oh really? Oh well good (though surely they've got to do something drastic soon?). I must start buying the thing to keep the Graun afloat. I wish they'd bloody charge for the online edition. I'd rather pay for something good than get something worse for free.

...and talk to a woman who, as long as he keeps tipping, will give him the time of day.

There is so much cringeworthy and wrong with this, I hardly know where to begin.

I mean, God knows the women would not want to have a bar of them if they weren't being paid to be 'nice'. But apparently that doesn't matter? Or are the men in these situations such oafs that they think the women genuinely like them, and that the tips are just a little pretence?!

I mean, seriously - what kind of social situation exists in the real world where people are only 'nice' to other people because they're paid to be so? And what sort of unaware, inept buffoon would be OK with that, and not see if for the fabrication that it is, and just be a bit embarrassed for themselves?

I know this is a bit of a leap, but ... There is clearly a type of person out there who is able to compartmentalise 'other' people in just this way. The man at the strip club who is able to detatch enough not to notice or care that the only reason a woman is engaging with him is because she's being paid to do so. Not for a minute because she actually wants to.

Here's the leap: men who knowingly have sex with women who don't want sex. Men who have to coerce themselves onto unwilling participants and ultimately force themselves onto women who do not want to have sex with them. What is going through their head? Surely they can see that the other person isn't willing, and not enjoying it - even actively upset - and yet... What? They don't care? How can they enjoy themselves when their partner is so unhappy and unwilling? What sort of mental mind games (if any) do they have to play that the other person's distress is irrelevant?

I honestly feel that these two situations are simply different points on a continuum.

...and talk to a woman who, as long as he keeps tipping, will give him the time of day.

From my experience this is not true at all. I have never been to a club where you have to pay to chat. You only pay if you are invited for a dance, which is effectively paying to watch a live performance. There is no obligation for this either. You can go to the club just for quiet drinks and nothing more. For people who have grown out of nightclubs like myself it's a good safe alternative for some late night drinks and no more expensive than a lot of the bars.

I mean, seriously - what kind of social situation exists in the real world where people are only 'nice' to other people because they're paid to be so?

I'd say pretty much the whole service industry, from entertainers, to hairdressers, to waiters, bar workers etc. But with all of these if you make the effort and be nice to people then over time you can make genuine friends. Yeah lap dancers primary objective is to sell dances but it doesn't mean you cant have fun or get a bit of rapport going.

I keep thinking about the 'for' arguments for lap dancing and cannot for the life of me find one I agree with, I also cannot stomach the posters who say it's not so bad or defend the whole thing.

Daddancer the old service industry exchange annoys the hell out of me and is such a cop out. The lap dancer is about selling dances, ffs, she's about selling the idea of sex, commodity, her body. She's not waltzing is she? A bar worker, haridresser etc provide a service (a tangible service) and part of that is being pleasant, it is not the same.

I don't agree with a word of the quotes from the article above but the Guardian's 'Comment is Free' area of their website is for people who are not Guardian writers to write opinion pieces putting forward their point of view. It is not subject to Guardian editorial standpoint.

I thought everybody knew that? I guess they haven't made it clear enough on that part of their site...

I keep thinking about the 'for' arguments for lap dancing and cannot for the life of me find one I agree with

How about:

-Lap dancers are consenting adults. It's their bodies so their choice right?

-Lap dancers can make in one night what a shelf stacker would take a month to make

-If you don't like lap clubs noone if forcing you to go visit one.

-Lap dancers are human like anyone else, this is just their job.

Frans. Like I said not one I agree with.

-Lap dancers are consenting adults. It's their bodies so their choice right? Actually no. One choice is a silly word and two it has far reaching consequence for the whole of society, not in the least sexual crime rises in the proximity and that the guys that oggle women in the club are more likely to oggle all women, the objectification spreads.

-Lap dancers can make in one night what a shelf stacker would take a month to make

That is part of 'choice' that makes it a non choice.

-If you don't like lap clubs noone if forcing you to go visit one.

No, but the hideousness spreads and has an impact on a wider society, it becomes normal.

-Lap dancers are human like anyone else, this is just their job.

Actually they become less than human they are objectified.

But it is still choice even if it's not a choice you would dream of. Isn't feminism supposed to be about choice? Would it be better if we lived in Victorian era Britain? (they would never have allowed strip clubs but look at how they treated women).

If society gives women choice then it's inevitable some women will make choices other women don't like. It seems hypocritical to want freedom for women then pick and choose which freedoms.

Is there any evidence sexual crimes rise in the proximity of strip clubs?

Fawcett society and Lilith project.

Perhaps you're missing the point about choice, Frans. Soon sex work can be advertised at your local job centre and if you don't work you may lose your benefits, do you still think it's a choice?