What would you say if your dh went to a lap dancing club?

[crazy88]

This is a hypothetical question but dh is away this weekend and I just have a sneaking suspicion that he may have done this, mainly because of which friends he has gone with, one of whom I know has used prostitutes on more than one occasion.

I am not suggesting for a minute that he would do this, or be unfaithful, or actually pay for a lap dance (he would feel too embarrassed!) but he would go along if other people were going to a club.

From a feminist point of view, what would you say? I need something suitably withering and fact based as I am feeling frazzled and stressed from looking after our 3 ds's all weekend whilst trying to get house ready for guests this week

the doctrine if someone made some racist comments i would stop being friends with them - and tbh a lot of people on here dont either. you just have to read the political threads speak about UKIP where the majority of people posting have older relatives who do make racist comments and none of them stop being friends with their relatives...

sorry my post was meant to say i would not stop being friends with them.

Relatives are different - you can't choose your relatives (though you can avoid the offensive ones at family gatherings, I find!)

Like I said, your line is up to you.

Well I'm friends with these people because their positive traits far outweigh their negatives! Surely it's better to challenge their beliefs rather than just de-friend them - what does that solve? I also know a very racist guy (not a friend thankfully) and when I occasionally see him we get onto the subject - I'd much rather debate it with him and make him understand that his arguments are stupid rather than just not speak to him at all if that makes sense? Maybe each time I chip away at his beliefs just a little.

buffy im a believer in people being allowed to live how they want to live and believe in what they want to believe - no one should have to bow to someone elses standards/beliefs no matter what. As you say a lot of people have their own beliefs about various things but that doesnt mean they dont treat them courteously.

A male friend of mine went. When the women came over to their table to dance, the men had to sit on their own hands. Tell him this. Just this. And leave that statement hanging..,

"if you met them and didn't know they like lap dancing you'd think they were nice, kind and generous"

Hmm. Interesting. You see, what lots of men don't understand, is that women actually do have a sort of antenna for this sort of thing. We all smooth over social interactions and relationships and adopt a "hear no evil, see no evil" attitude to some of our friends, but deep down we know that some of them who formally we quite like and get on with, are actually at core, sexist creeps who we wouldn't tolerate in our lives if they weren't neighbours work colleagues or husbands of the female friends we do actually rate whose cognitive dissonance we know we have to bear with.

Don't kid yourself we respect you or like you or rate you in any way. We see through you. We'll never tell you we do because the net of social /professional relationships we have is too fragile to disrupt it by making a fuss about what a sexist shit you are in front of our other friends/ colleagues etc. and we resign ourselves to the fact that for the foreseeable future you are going to be in our lives so we have to have a constructive, friendly relationship with you and we may as well enjoy the nice bits of you, like the wit, the interesting conversations etc. So of course you assume that we think you're nice, kind, generous people, because we don't ever let on that that might not be quite the way we see you. But we do see you. And er, we despise you.

Just needed to get that off my chest.

I agree Basil. I wouldn't be friends with a man like this. And a man that goes to a lap dancing club will always betray his sexism. But when it comes to partners of women I really like, or colleagues or relatives, I will do the surface politeness, even when I think you are a shit.

Actually it depresses me how many lovely women I know, who I think are married to men who seem nice on the surface, but are really shits. There are exceptions, but depressingly few. Sometimes I want to say to them, I see who you are really.

askbasil - woman have a sort of antenna? we see through you? really... what a lot of nonsense.

I would put good money on the fact there are a lot of OHs who have been to clubs without telling their partners. And if you can kid yourself that you would detect the behaviour and sexism you may be fooling yourself. But hey I might be wrong. My DH is very for women's rights in general and can talk about lack of child care and other issues and I Know some of my friends believe him to be the perfect feminist supporter. I am not sure if he could fool me but know that certainly friends would not know that he/we have been to clubs.

My first reaction would be astonishment because of his values in life and his attitude to any exploitation or discrimination of any person.
My second would be to tell him to leave and not come back.
He is a blokey bloke in lots of ways- football, sport, night at the pub. But he is so not in lots of ways and never afraid to be himself and speak his mind. I can not think of a single occasion where I have seen him treat anyone rudely. without consideration.
However, for a man who is very sensitive and emotionally astute in so many ways, he has an amazing capacity to drive me mad with trivial things