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Sex & the City: Last Night I Went to a NY Strip Club
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Yes, I did. Now why would I want to watch naked women slide down poles for cash? Certainly not my first choice for a night out, I must say. But some visitors from India asked me to go, so after experiencing cupcakes at the Magnolia bakery how could I deny them the chance to see a strip club?
So I did some research to find a club and the next thing you know the bouncer was holding up the red rope for us to walk onto the red carpet and into the sight of breasts, booty and strobe lights. Now, these ‘visitors from India’ that I mentioned are not some horny guys who wanted to see naked American women. Actually, our encounter with strippers was a bit more mature and sociological than that. These visitors comprised of an amazing social entrepreneur from South India and her colleague. They have spent the last ten years fighting against sex trafficking of women and forced prostitution of women and children. I met them when I was recruiting social entrepreneurs for a professional development program in India this year (www.social-impact.org). They have a program that provides a safe place and rehabilitation services for women and children who have left or been rescued from being commodities in the sex trade.
Sex trafficking is estimated at a $12 billion trade globally and often fuels alternative black market industries such as drugs and weapons.
This social entrepreneur was in America for the first time on the special invitation of the US State Department’s leadership program. Although she seems to be a rather shy soft spoken woman, she wanted to go to the strip club because she often debates about the trade that functions on the exploitation of women but as a feminist knows that there is also power in the ability to choose one’s own profession and expression. Also, as a woman, going to a strip club in India is much more difficult for her to experience.
As we were sipping on some expensive alcohol, we interviewed Kimmie, who was one of the strippers. Kimmie was slender with blonde hair and high heels that were a transparent plastic. She and the other 50 women who work there make about $220 per night unless they get a private room rate of $500 per hour (cash payments are not taxed). She told us that she has a 7 year old child and she started stripping when she got divorced and decided her paralegal job was not paying her enough to live in New York City. She said that many of the strippers there were trying to pay their way through school.
Many of the New York strip clubs go much further than just stripping (I have heard stories of rooms for things like blow jobs and more)… and many of the strippers are there out of desperation, but many are there by choice.
What do you think? Is stripping just another form of exploitation and objectification of women or is it a healthy function of economic empowerment and freedom of expression?
Highlighted Resource: This week we also had training on photography in the field by famous photographer Susan Meiselas. She is Acumen's photographer, but also published a book in the 70’s about carnival strippers. Produced during the early years of the women’s movement, Carnival Strippers reflects the struggle for identity and self-esteem that characterized a complex era of change.
So I did some research to find a club and the next thing you know the bouncer was holding up the red rope for us to walk onto the red carpet and into the sight of breasts, booty and strobe lights. Now, these ‘visitors from India’ that I mentioned are not some horny guys who wanted to see naked American women. Actually, our encounter with strippers was a bit more mature and sociological than that. These visitors comprised of an amazing social entrepreneur from South India and her colleague. They have spent the last ten years fighting against sex trafficking of women and forced prostitution of women and children. I met them when I was recruiting social entrepreneurs for a professional development program in India this year (www.social-impact.org). They have a program that provides a safe place and rehabilitation services for women and children who have left or been rescued from being commodities in the sex trade.
Sex trafficking is estimated at a $12 billion trade globally and often fuels alternative black market industries such as drugs and weapons.
This social entrepreneur was in America for the first time on the special invitation of the US State Department’s leadership program. Although she seems to be a rather shy soft spoken woman, she wanted to go to the strip club because she often debates about the trade that functions on the exploitation of women but as a feminist knows that there is also power in the ability to choose one’s own profession and expression. Also, as a woman, going to a strip club in India is much more difficult for her to experience.
As we were sipping on some expensive alcohol, we interviewed Kimmie, who was one of the strippers. Kimmie was slender with blonde hair and high heels that were a transparent plastic. She and the other 50 women who work there make about $220 per night unless they get a private room rate of $500 per hour (cash payments are not taxed). She told us that she has a 7 year old child and she started stripping when she got divorced and decided her paralegal job was not paying her enough to live in New York City. She said that many of the strippers there were trying to pay their way through school.
Many of the New York strip clubs go much further than just stripping (I have heard stories of rooms for things like blow jobs and more)… and many of the strippers are there out of desperation, but many are there by choice.
What do you think? Is stripping just another form of exploitation and objectification of women or is it a healthy function of economic empowerment and freedom of expression?
Highlighted Resource: This week we also had training on photography in the field by famous photographer Susan Meiselas. She is Acumen's photographer, but also published a book in the 70’s about carnival strippers. Produced during the early years of the women’s movement, Carnival Strippers reflects the struggle for identity and self-esteem that characterized a complex era of change.
