Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

AIBU to think that burlesque is a bit crap?

148 replies

TiggyR · 25/01/2010 22:24

My friend phoned out of the blue last week and asked if DH and I would like to join them to see a burlesque show in the London. I said yes, because
a) I like going out and don't get to go out often enough,
b) there was talk of dinner after,
c)I didn''t have the heart/guts to say 'Good God woman, what on eath do you want to sit through that cheesy tripe for?'
d) I was caught unawares and panicked.

Now I am not a prude, at least not where a consenting couple and a a bedroom are concerned. I have been known to be a bit inventive/naughty on occasion, and I have had a passing aquaintance with bumsex, bondage etc, so NOT a nun or a repressed saddo, and do I realise that burlesque is not full-on pornography, but I just find the thought of all that cheesy old fashioned titillation caberet-stylee excruciatingly embarrassing and cringey. I don't find it sexy, I find it a bit seedy and sad. I won't know where to look. I can't bear to think I'll be in a room with two hundred bald fat middle aged men who are all pretending to enjoy the 'art' and the music, and the spectacle, when actually their eyes are glazed over and they've got a hard-on under their popcorn. ICK!
I can't bear the chippendales, stripograms, hen-nights or lap-dancing or anything that's designed to get people horny whilst in a room full of strangers. Its all so undignified and cringey and desperate!

I googles the 'artiste' I'm going to have to sit through, and watched a video of her stripping (artistically) whilst singing some crap caberet style song, and I felt a sickeing feeling of impending doom. I'll be fidgeting in my seat all night, for all the wrong reasons and looking through gaps in my fingers.

Am I wrong?

OP posts:
TiggyR · 26/01/2010 12:18

The thing is, even if it was a 'quality' show with a good mix of comedy and caberet, I still think I'd be a bit . I hate drag acts, for example. No problem with gay men, no problem with torch singers, no problem with gaudy sequinned frocks. But together they make me a bit queasy. I just don't get it. Not funny, not particularly entertaining.

OP posts:
Kaloki · 26/01/2010 12:24

Tiggy If you don't like drag acts, then no you probably wont like burlesque, they are very much in the same vein

Mumcentreplus · 26/01/2010 12:26

bruxeur Tue 26-Jan-10 12:11:31 'I'm not sure how someone crowd-surfing with her minge out is wholesome'.

CommonNortherner · 26/01/2010 12:46

What I am more interested in is why the OP feels the need to justify her adventurous sexual credentials to show she's not "repressed" before she feels she can state she is not happy with the idea of it?

Not a criticism of you OP! Just interesting about what this says.

mumbobumbo · 26/01/2010 12:54

Dear God Kaloki is that chav-thing meant to be funny? I invested 5 minutes of my life waiting for the amusing bit.... which never happened. Thanks!

Mumcentreplus · 26/01/2010 13:01

She's probably worried some other poster will throw repression into the mix if she doesn't state it first?

TiggyR · 26/01/2010 13:02

Well because the assumption might be that I was uncomfortable with burlesque because I was very prudish, and that the problem is with me generally, rather than with that particular art form! I would watch porn with my a partner, for example, and let him film me, but the difference is we are doing it consensually, together, as part of the love-making process, and most importantly, in private! I wouldn't say I am especially adventurous sexually, only that like most people I have experimented a bit, and am not a buttoned-up 'look at the ceiling and think of England' type. I'm generally very open-minded, but I feel decidedly icky about the thought of a third party being in the close physical presence of my DH (or god forbid, even me!) becoming, ahem, aroused by what we are seeing. Though I do think in my case, arousal is highly unlikely! I'm more likely to burst into a fit of embarrassed giggles.

OP posts:
expatinscotland · 26/01/2010 13:04

YANBU.

It's like this whole 'high-class call girl/escort'.

If you take money for sex, you're a whore.

TiggyR · 26/01/2010 13:04

MCP - x-post, but yes, thanks!

OP posts:
TiggyR · 26/01/2010 13:06

Well I agree with that expat, but I even I don't think we can put burlesque on the same level as prostitution! What about serious actresses who take their clothes off? Helen Mirren?

OP posts:
Mumcentreplus · 26/01/2010 13:06

hahaha..Oh dear@ expat

noddyholder · 26/01/2010 13:07

I have seen a few of the brighton offerings inc the 'best' ones and they are tragic.have also seen a top class one at a posh wedding and it was in a different league but she was from the US and not squeezed into a dusty old costume like the local ones!

expatinscotland · 26/01/2010 13:10

Burlesque is stripping. People who do it are strippers, and obviously a bit thick if they don't see that I wasn't comparing stripping to prostitution, although I suppose such connections could be made.

TiggyR · 26/01/2010 13:10

What a very bizarre thing to have at a wedding! I take it there were not many elderly aunts there!

OP posts:
Kaloki · 26/01/2010 13:14

Expat I don't know a single performer who denies burlesque involves stripping. Some of them are solely strippers, some of them aren't no one has ever contested that.

noddyholder · 26/01/2010 13:15

It was at the evening do and all ages were there(no kids) The ones I have seen locally were just over weight clumsy strippers the american one did a bit more of a turn but not my cup of tea.Interestingly none of the men looked that taken with it either and she was stunning

CommonNortherner · 26/01/2010 13:15

But why can't a person (woman?) dislike it because they are "prudish"? Surely that's a valid point of view?

expatinscotland · 26/01/2010 13:16

noddy, you are such a prude .

Mumcentreplus · 26/01/2010 13:18

Yes it is Common...I love a good prude me ..or is that prune?

GetOrfMoiLand · 26/01/2010 13:23

That's always the argument isn't it:

I hate going to Ann Summers parties

'ooh you're a prude'

No, I am a women with reasonable intelligence who doesn't want to parade round a room of shrieking drunk women with a plastic willy suspended between my legs on a bit of string as a misguided attempt at a 'fun' party game and then feel obligedto spend £50 on a crap blue vibrator with realistic foreskin action.

GetOrfMoiLand · 26/01/2010 13:25

I loathe porn and will not have it in the house

'ooh you're a prude and if you don't allow your DH to watch porn he will you know but hidden from you'

Err, no, I hate porn because of the unrealistci and hideously misogynistic portrayal of women/sex. That is not sex you are watching, it is the tip of a very nasty iceberg. And DP thinks it's shite as well, yes really.

TiggyR · 26/01/2010 13:27

Getorf - I could kiss you! That is it in a nutshell. Hit firmly on the head. Mixing me metaphors now, but thank you anyway!

OP posts:
Mumcentreplus · 26/01/2010 13:28

this thread is funny as hell..I didn't spend a thing..but i won a free bullet vibrator as a prize..quite handy when DH is unavailable..

but i agree AS parties are quite cringeworthy

TiggyR · 26/01/2010 13:28

Getorf, that last post was in response the the Ann Summers thing BTW...

OP posts:
expatinscotland · 26/01/2010 13:30

GetOrf is my sister. Our husbands/partners are brothers.

Yes, there are many men who don't view porn. Ever. They find it a turnoff.