Should I be cross if DH went to lap dancing club?

[ActingNormal]

...and spent £60 on private dances (we aren't poor and he doesn't spend money on much that is frivolous).

Other people seem to think I should be cross but I can't see it. Am I being a mug? Is it a sign of disrespect?

He got a bit of female attention outside the marriage. He was consenting. They were consenting. I knew he was going there. There doesn't seem like there is a risk of him forming a relationship with the women but if a woman behaved that way with him in a regular nightclub that seems more of a threat to me.

He came home horny as hell and seemed like he had a good break from the stress of his job.

"I guess that a society where women don't choose to work in these clubs would be better?"

What would be better still is a society where it didn't occur to men that it's something they believe they need to do.

I think if there was more balance to this whole thing I really wouldn't have so much of an issue with it. Although terms and conditions, and economic exploitation would still be something to be explored - plus as SGB pertinently noted, the buck doesn't stop there either (i.e. it's not like gender and class are the only bases of prejudicial and / or divisive inequality).

It's hard for me to get across where I am with all this. It's not necessarily objectification per se that troubles me, because I think this can be mutual and - well - bloody exciting. But when the objectification is one-sided I get twitchy. And please bear in mind that I'm talking about the macro level, not the individual level (where doubtless there are examples that pull against the dominant trends). Like, I don't have a problem with a gay or lesbian couple using gay or lesbian porn (SGB's points not withstanding). So, it's not exactly porn itself that gets me. Far from it, in fact. I don't want to piss on someone else's chips just because the prospect does nowt for me, and will be only to glad to let others get on with it if it makes them happy and doesn't hurt anyone else. Bloody well go for it!

But the way I see it at present is that there's one kind of sexuality constructed for men, and quite another for women. Not all men and women settle into the spaces carved out for them - thank god. But the available spaces are very limited, tightly prescribed and sometimes horrendously difficult to contest, and do manage to successfully contain most of those within them.

Liz - me too. I get twitchy on other forums when people I know post poctures of scantilly clad women. Though mostly it's the conversation they post alongside it which gets to me. I have reported such threads in the past. The response is often that women do it too (post pictures of the male form) but I don't think women do, do this as much TBH and so I do get your point of view completely.

"keep your to yourself please.
i asked a simple question and raised a simple point, no need for your

i shall leave this thread now"

We're at 800 posts on a thread about lap dancers and you wonder if someone's mentioned male dancers. Jeesh. I think I'm entitled to ONE "".

"SOmething that is quite interesting here is how utterly entrenched the anti-sex position is. I think the core of it does come from the Victorian attitude that sex is something men want and it is women's job to control and restrict their access to it (ie rationing it like doggy treats). Objections to women who either charge an agreed hourly rate for sexual services or are willing to have sex without insisting on 'commitment' often stem from the idea that women like this make 'decent' women's jobs harder ie if people's access to something is restricted and they find a way of getting it elsewhere, then whoever was restricting it, for whatever reason, is going to percieve a threat."

But was that really a Victorian attitude? Wouldn't the prevalent view then have been that women should not be allowed to control anything of importance, perhaps least of all access to sex. Hmmm - I dunno. I don't think I've followed your point very well.

Bravo Liz! However is it always possible to assume no harm is created?

SGB valid points again although I am sure my attitude towards sex is not the way you have described - I see it as the same mutual need between two individuals and therefore I admit my bias. Prostitution does not have the same mutual needs - one person's sexual needs is elevated above anothers, possibly confirming one idea that men want sex and women can provide it.

Dittany: you still haven;t ever come up with an answer to the question why it's so much worse for people to buy/sell sexual services than any other kind of personal services that people could easily provide for themselves or get from friends/family in exchange for other favours - or putting up with an exploitative relationship.

With regard to the Victorian attitudes towards sex, look up the social purity movements, the Angel In THe House syndrome etc. The idea that men want sex and women want love is a longstanding one that is always used to control and manipulate people's behaviour, whether it's about frightening women into staying at home or selling themselves to one man so he can protect them from others, or whether its about convincing everyone that the reason they are not getting either enough sex or enough love is that they are not spending enough money on stuff.

"However is it always possible to assume no harm is created?"

Soz, I'm a bit confuzzled. You mean with respect to my gay / lesbian point?

Oh, and by the way, if a person has a problem with the sex industry to the extent that they cannot/will not see sex workers' clients or viewers of porn as anything other than disgusting rapacious exploitative beasts, or sex workers as anything other than stupid, victimized or wicked, then that person does have a problem with sex.
Because that person has an extremely narrow, rigid view of what type of sexual desires and sexual behaviours are 'permissible' coupled with an urge to control, restrict and condemn any kind of sexual desire or behaviour that they themselves don't much fancy.

well said SGB!

sorry - my sense of humour is sometimes not appreciated, apologies.

"but no, you chose to be rude - nice "

That's rude where you come from, eh?

Interesting.

Way to leave the thread.

The sexes may be equally stimulated by the visual but maybe men feel a greater need for it because they are not as good as women at fantasizing by making up little stories in their heads or don't get as turned on by reading sexy literature. Have there been any studies on this?

"The sexes may be equally stimulated by the visual but maybe men feel a greater need for it because they are not as good as women at fantasizing by making up little stories in their heads or don't get as turned on by reading sexy literature. Have there been any studies on this?"

i have carried out a study over 22 years since i the age of 10, and i can confirm in my case this is true

fatbob, your occasional forays into this thread make me smile

Dittany, you seem to think women have to sell their sexual services if they need money ("Who cares about commitment? Seriously. I don't care if a woman has sex with different men all day long as long as it's because she wants to and not because she needs the cash that they pay her. Those are two completely different experiences."). Surely few women have to do that nowadays? If they weren't happy with selling their sexual services they could find some other work.

And I find the idea of pretending to be a prostitute with DH quite arousing! ("I'm sorry, what has selling sex got to do with women's sexual desires? You've never been able to reconcile that because selling sex has nothing to do with sexual desire (except in some very rare cases) it has to do with needing money.") Maybe I am a weirdo 'rare case'!

SGB, I can see how women making sex look so easily accessible could devalue sex when lots of women see it as a really special thing that they only want to give to a man when he has given something emotional to her first. Women who see sex as 'sacred' like this would be upset by their man thinking it was no big deal when she had sex with him.

I feel my opinion swaying, I really don't know what I think. I have let men use me for sex and I believed at the time that I was using them equally. However, I then felt upset and used and degraded afterwards when the men showed no interest in me as a person. (Does this prove that men want sex and women want love? Some women at least.) Anyway I find myself wishing that I had developed connections with men before letting them touch me because I want to be wanted for who I am, not just for my body. I feel I disrespected myself. If I split up with DH now, I hope I would make a new man wait until I felt he wanted me as a person before I had sex with him.

I don't know what I would do if I just wanted sex pure and simple though and nothing else. I'm not sure I would just want sex only though, ever. I am one of those women who wants love more than sex. I feel randy most of the time and desperate for it but I still want love more than sex or sex with love, not just sex.

What do other people on here think? Would you be happy, if you were single, going round shagging loads of men who you didn't have any emotional/intellectual connection with, just for the sex? Would you want the men who had sex with you to feel something for you? Would you be upset if they didn't?

Maybe if I just wanted pure sex I could pay a male prostitute then I wouldn't be expecting him to have feelings for me because I would know he was doing it for the money and this would have been agreed. Even if I met a man in a pub/nightclub and agreed to have no strings sex I think I would still deep down hope that he would feel something for me after the sex.

actingnormal-yes,you are probably right,i probably still have unresolved personal issues around this subject which prevents me from debating in a calm,informed,intelligent manner.

i aplologise to those i have insulted.

i shall avoid contributing to threads like this in the future untill i know i can do so without getting emotional.