To be annoyed my DH had a naked private dance

[maybunny]

OK my DH wasnt naked, but the stripper in the stripclub in Los Angeles was :-(
He went to LA on business (PR - so mostly socialising rather than what I consider 'work'!) last month, and he has only just told me that a colleague paid for him to have a private dance after they all went to a strip club. I was most annoyed because he had kept it a secret from me for a few weeks, and that he had put 'saving dace' in front of colleagues before my feelings.
He said he thought I would be a bit annoyed about it which was why he hadnt told me about it at the time (esp as I was having huge sleep problems with DD - ie surviving on 2 hours a night!)
I am so upset about this and apart from apologising (which he has done now he knows how I feel) I dont know wht he can do to make me feel better. I am realy struggling to forgive him.
:-(

[fastweb]

These places would be out of business in a month without corporate accoutns.

So if these sorts of places were labeled with a special code alongside the business name for tax\payment purposes, and that code meant the expenses connected to these sorts of places were non deductible for the company, many of the clubs would go bust ?

Sounds like a plan.

[Xenia]

Make sure you go on the next business trip (always work full time when you have babies - makes relationships much better) and that he is up evry 2 hours in the night with the baby.

[Malificence]

It's not difficult at all for men with a backbone and principles to say no to this lind of crap, I should know, My DH said no a few times when he was entertaining prospective clients on behalf of the Engineering company he worked for a few years ago.
He would take them out for a meal/drinks and if they asked to go to a LDC he would say he wouldn't be going along or putting it on his company credit card , if they pushed it, which only happened once, he told them that he had a wife and daughter at home and he wouldn't be seen dead in a place like that.
He got a lot of stick from his boss over his refusals, but then the man wouldn't sack one of the programmers when DH found out that he would use his co. credit card at massage parlours when he worked away, that was the straw that broke the camels back as far as DH was concerned and he left soon afterwards.

Who wants a man so weak and cowardly that he can't say no to peer pressure?

[MoreBeta]

chandellina - I don't disagree with you and in a perfect world bad things would not happen and men would not take clients in these places. Some clients demand/expect it though and if you won't do it then the saleman, PR man at the next firm will.

The last post by Malificence is very interesting in this respect and clearly her DH would not go along with it, got heavily criticised and left the firm. Not everyone with a big mortgage, DCs in private school, credit card bills, car loan, certain lifstyle has the option. You might not like it but you hold your nose and you do it to keep the salary coming in and the bonus at year end.

I think the post by diotima way back up the thread hit the nail on the head. Jobs in PR, sales, brokerage, advertising or indeed any job that requires you to influence/induce someone else in another firm/agency to give you something of value is one that requires close brushes with the boundary of ethical behaviour. If the OP feels very strongly about this and visiting these places is an inevitable part of the role her DH has then I suggest she and her DH make a plan for him to change career or roles. Much as Malificence's DH did.

[diotima]

misty0, you wrote:

"Girls go in a group with friends (and their old mums in some cases!) for a laugh."

Isn't it the case that most men go with a group of friends (or work colleagues) - maybe even with their old dads in some cases - and say they go for a laugh?

"Not working themselves and each other up into going off to masturbate in front of a naked 18 year old guy."

I don't think that's allowed in strip clubs.

"With a bit more chucked in for a bit of cash."

I don't think soliciting is allowed either. I understand that the clubs and dancers make a great deal of money doing what they do and would lose their license and therefore their business if they allowed soliciting. I don't think the dancers are prostitutes - it's okay to disapprove, but saying they also have sex with clients is not right if it's not the case.

"I can be fairly insecure sometimes, given to feeling not attractive enough for my OH (hes never done anything to make me feel this - its just me)"

You should take this seriously and do something about it for both your sakes. You must feel dreadful and he must feel the same because if he really fancies you but you don't believe him, no matter how understanding he tries to be, it's very invalidating and is going to hurt.

chandellina is absolutely right that requiring women execs to 'entertain' clients in lap dancing clubs is outrageous. The same applies to male execs because some men do strongly disapprove as a perfectly legitimate matter principle.

[giveitago]

The corporate thing is important. A good friend of main said she was required to attend clubs for work and this was in russia and this was before 2001 and that's ages ago. It must be well established.

[giveitago]

Main? Main? I meant mine.

[Georgimama]

Lots of things happen in Russia. Doesn't mean it's OK for them to happen here, or in LA. Cultures do not change unless challenged. If people power can topple communism I'm sure it can give the corporate jolly to a titty bar the old heave-ho FFS.

[NormanTebbit]

There was a thread a while back about a 'corporate orgy' held for salesmen who had earned enough to pay for the private education for their teenage aramintas and arabellas and a nice lifestyle. They also got to fuck a few prostitutes around the same age as their dds, although the best looking (youngest?)or less vanilla types were reserved for top brass.

What about female colleagues- how do they do entertainment?

[weedle]

OP I don't think it matters how other people feel about this, what matters is how you move on from here. The key questions for me would be whether he knew you'd be upset at the time. In your post you say that he said he'd not told you because he thought you'd be 'a bit annoyed' you sound more than a bit annoyed. Did he know how hurt you'd be? And the obvious one of is this the only confession he has?

I can honestly say I wouldn't mind, I've had a dance bought for me by friends in a strip club. Can't say I found it particularly seedy or sexy for that matter! But that's just me, I'd be more upset had my DH been secretly texting someone. To me that's more intimate, which shows how these things are very relationship specific.

[outthere]

I haven't had time to read all the posts so sorry if this has already been said but I wonder how your DH would feel about you taking all your clothes off and dancing privately for another man?

I'm pretty sure my DH would be outraged at the thought of me doing that (I hope) so why should it be any different to be on the receiving end of it?

If you came home from a hen night and told your DH that the girls had dared you to take a man into a private room, strip naked and dance in an overtly sexy fashion with the intention of arousing him, would he forgive you?

[mauricetinkler]

A thing for OP to consider, already alluded to earlier, is that when you get a group of blokes together with loadsa booze and women, things happen.
I went on a stag-do in Amsterdam recently. Of 18 blokes, all but one were married or in a relationship. All but 2 (as I recall) either had a private dance at a strip club; or used a massage parlour and had 'extras'. There were a couple who I would never have guessed in a million years would have done this kind of thing. It was quite an eclectic bunch of lads - all backgrounds, professions etc. So, you see OP, it's just the way most blokes are...women don't know the half of it.

[TheFarSideOfFuck]

most blokes, maurice ?

or just the blokes you know ?

[jasminder1]

I think you need to give your DH some credit (OK a very very small bit) for at least being honest and telling you about it ! - it's probably through guilt but to me that says something about your relationship, alot of guys I know who go to Vegas/LA get up to much much worse and it's like one big secret society between them and their partners know nothing.

[TheFarSideOfFuck]

I think OP is long-gone

[mauricetinkler]

TheFarSideOfFuck - well, clearly, most blokes I know...I've seen this kind of thing on numerous stag dos, lads holidays etc over the years though, hence the conclusion I've drawn.

[TheFarSideOfFuck]

nice company you keep then, maurice

[Malificence]

Well there you go, men are pathetic, cock-led creatures with no self control once they get together .
Funnily enough, I don't know any men like the ones maurice assures us that most men are like.
Monkey generally sees as monkey does, if you socialise with the type of men who go on stag dos to Amsterdam, of course you are going to think it's the norm.
Grown up men who don't go on juvenile lad's holidays or stag dos, don't behave like pack animals.

[FreudianSlipper]

many of us do know how some men are but we also know that not every man is like this and we do not accept that well its just how men are crap

sadly many men use this excuse and some women accept it, all men are perfectly capable of not going along with the majority, are perfectly capable of turning down sexual offers jsut sadly too many choose not too

[TheFarSideOfFuck]

perhaps, maurice, when you grow up to be a big boy, you will find that you have a mind of your own

here's hoping, eh ?

[HerBeX]

Gosh Maurice you sound like one of those man-hating feminists.

Not all men are like you and your friends you know.

Some of them have integrity and are decent, honest men. Don't tar them all with the same brush.

[terby]

I dont think you are being unreasonable, but I do think you will have to just come to terms with it, however long it might take. I went to one of these places after a boyfriend told me he had gone on a drunken night out. I was horrified at how tawdry it was. Not sexy at all. The girls were ordinary and there was no mystery to it. I was actually disappointed. I guess I had built it up in my head to be a very erotic experience. It wasnt. Not for me or even I am sure, for most men. It sounds like HE didnt enjoy it much anyway, and I would let him off the hook.

[Takeresponsibility]

I find it ironic that we slate men for not having the balls to resist peer pressure and the ability to decide for themselves if they should or should not do something, and yet we come on AIBU to seek approbation or advice from total strangers regarding our responses.

[mauricetinkler]

Don't know why people are shooting the messenger here.
My point is that the guys I've seen up to monkey business over the years are often the kind who you just never have guessed would do that kind of thing. As cliched as it sounds, it is always the quiet, dedicated family man types.
Malificence
Funnily enough, I don't know any men like the ones maurice assures us that most men are like.
How do you know? It's not something blokes start bragging about when they get back home.
Monkey generally sees as monkey does, if you socialise with the type of men who go on stag dos to Amsterdam, of course you are going to think it's the norm.
Bit snobbish that methinks. In reality, a lot of the blokes on the Amsterdam do would have preferred something a bit more 'cultural' but the stag was insistent.
Grown up men who don't go on juvenile lad's holidays or stag dos, don't behave like pack animals.
Wtf is a grown up man? I've never heard such tosh.

[Malificence]

You don't know what constitutes a grown up man?

Not really much point in engaging with you then, is there?