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If you are a feminist who poles…
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Honestly, I'd just review my Gayle Rubin and Avedon Carol and out-feminist-theory anyone who wants to talk about pole as a symbol of oppression. (But I come from a fairly academic feminist background, and the schools I attended included a fairly strong tradition of sex-positive feminism so that's where I'm most comfortable often.) Are is way to fluid to be boxed in like it sounds your colleagues are doing there.
I've often posted videos of particularly athletic pole performances on Facebook, as well as Chinese pole and Indian pole gymnastics (typically performed by men) to showcase the athleticism in pole dance. I like both the sexy and artistics parts of the sport and the wonder I get from seeing someone do a particularly difficult pole trick (and the elation I get when I master one I couldn't do before!)
Thanks for the Polestory link, Layla, I think I'll spend a lot of time reading there now. 🙂
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As a feminist who wrote about interpellation in my master's thesis, I have heard the same arguments you've pointed out, Black Orchid. I tend to use this rebuttal:
1. If you're a feminist who believes women shouldn't wear make-up or dresses, then we don't need to discuss this any further. Confirmation bias is much too likely for both in this scenario.
2. If you're a feminist who wears dresses occasionally, you do know that dresses are also symbols of oppression and slavery, right? Today, when the average person sees someone wearing a dress, does he/she think, "Tut tut, she's wearing a symbol of oppression?" Doubtful.
3. Sexuality can and has been reclaimed by women in multiple ways. To say that women cannot own a certain form of sexuality isn't giving women a lot of credit for the strides we've made. Pole-dancing will not take us back to complete subjugation; rather, pole-dancing forces people to rethink the dance form and what it means. Perspective is everything.
A name is very powerful, and so are the associations that come along with it. With time and continued rational rebuttals to the assumptions that people make, pole fitness will have less and less of a stigma. I mean, it's already on "America's Got Talent." It's safe to say that pole-dancing is on its way into the mainstream.
***Also, I have no problem with stripping. I've done my fair share of dancing for money. ;)***
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I suppose I don't understand where all the labels for being a feminist come from. How you define being a feminist should come from what empowers YOU, and all the other people be damned. To actually say to you that using a pole is somehow subjugating you or is a sign of "pain and oppression to women" (really…I would think it would be a symbol of empty wallets for men lol) is idiotic. They may as well say you can only be a feminist if you shave your head, dress like a man, and do not embrace any attribute that makes you female. I do not, and have never, subscribed to the various social definitions, or by people who write college thesis papers, of what makes me or anyone else strong. If you want to pole dance, and that makes you feel strong, empowered, beautiful, sexual, and happy, then that's what you should do, and your friends can either deal with it or shut up about it. Just as a note of interest, there is a woman in England who recently taught pole dance to a Muslim woman who is very high on the social strata, I cannot recall her name. Her husband allowed it, encouraged it, because his wife had an interest. Know why? Because there is no social stigma for it. The only stigma for any exercise having to do with a pole is in the countries where stripping is prevalent. Anywhere else, its an incredible form of exercise and beautiful feats of strength. Sorry for the long rant, but I get so tired of uptight women trying to impose labels and boxes around other women. We are supposed to SUPPORT each other, not hinder each other.
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I love what Fever said, I think it sums up my views perfectly. I am definitely a feminist, and "feminism" is not a dirty word.
To me, feminism is about choice, and being empowered as a woman. I think this applies to so many things in life. I don't think you can be a feminist if you believe "women shouldn't do x, y and z" because that is imposing restrictions on someone based on their gender or sexuality.
I think poling fits in extremely well in this. Like willowbreath said, if pole dancing makes you feel strong and empowered then you should do it. If you get paid to do so, hey, more power to you (haha).
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Willowbreath, that’s the Camille Paglia view, one I’ve always been interested with: that it’s ridiculous to say strippers are exploited since all they do is remove their clothes and men bleed their bank accounts dry for them. It’s certainly possible to argue that the pole is a symbol of the exploitation of men because the whole club atmosphere is designed to take advantage of their instincts.
Now I don’t know if I totally agree with that argument as it still relies heavil on conventional gender norms, but it’s certainly an interesting way to turn it around. There are certainly men out there who have basically gone into financial ruin for their favorite woman at the club.
Either way, I think it’s important to acknowledge that if you’re asserting pole to be symbolic over women, you’re assigning more defining power to the pole than you are to the sexuality of the woman dancing on it. And I think that’s selling female sexuality short; it’s the dancer who defines the dance (and the apparatus), not the other way around.
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PDR, haha agree. If it was just the pole that sells the sexuality I'd be as intriguing as Felix or Jenyne (I definitely am not!) and we'd all be exactly the same.
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This is all really interesting for me to read because even though I feel it's wrong to judge, I'm still sorting out feelings of being averse to the whole stripper persona. They say to really get into a performance you should try to put yourself into the charachter that you're dancing as, and I find I feel gross and uncomfortable putting myself into a stripper charachter, but if I pretend I'm dancing for my husband (or actually am dancing for my husband) I find I can really let loose. I wonder if the judgement or viewing stripping as a negative is really based on just not being able to relate?
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Think of it this way: when you let loose dancing for your husband, you’re doing it for many different reasons. But a big reason is that you feel safe in the boundaries of that relationship to express your sexuality and really assert your sexiness to him. It’s healthy for people to want that connection.
That’s also why people go to strippers-to enjoy certain kinds of sexual experiences in the boundaries of a much different client-customer relationship. Women who dance, ideally, are there because they are comfortable and confident in the boundaries of that relationship, and like to be sexually “in command” of their clients, to control the encounter. Even if a dancer is fulfilling the fantasy of an “innocent girl” character for her client, she’s still in control because of the setting and the nature of their relationship.
When you imagine yourself in that role, it feels icky because you’re not comfortable with that scenario. But the women doing the dancing in real life don’t necessarily feel that way. Maybe try imagining yourself in the club, but the only person in the audience is your husband(or multiple customers, but they’re all your husband!). But see if you can picture being in that setting and feeling the same way about being on stage that you feel when your husband is the audience. When you dance for him, you’re definitely in a dominant position. The two aren’t really that far apart, it just involves very different kinds of relationships.
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Yeah, I can imagine that customer/client relationship. I'm still not sure I really want to get comfortable in that setting though. It just seems like there's still a high tendency of disrespect between dancer and customer, whether it's the dancer who is in control thinking "he's sucha putz for giving me so much money for this" or the customer feeling in control having the mindset of "she's such a slut to do this for $". Granted I've never actually been to a strip club, I've only read comments here and elsewhere from people who have worked them or been to them, and those types of mindsets seem fairly prevalent. It seems logical that it would be possible to have a mutually respectful dancer/client relationship though, so maybe that's what I need to focus on to understand the draw. It could also be my conservative upbringing making it difficult for me to understand sexual experiences as a commodity because for me they lose their value outside of a loving relationship. I can understand that that's not the case for everyone though.
And thanks for engaging with me, because I don't think I'd sort out my thoughts as well if you didn't.
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People have a tendency to oversimplify the relationship between a stripper and a client. A server in a restaurant is in the same basic position–the person sitting at the table has all the monetary control, and the server has (at least some) control over quality and the overall experience.
Can anyone honestly say that every relationship between a server and customer equals "This person is my servant" versus "Ugh, this stupid person is giving me money to bring out food he/she could have made at home for much cheaper."
No, that's the worse case scenario. Client and service providers have the gamut of feelings toward each other in any industry, whether involving food or sex. 🙂
Also, remember that all relationships are transactional. I give my fiance sex, and in return, he provides emotional stability and various other benefits (this goes both ways; I'm just using it on my side to illustrate a point). The client/stripper relationship is no different, but the transaction gets a bad rap because people tend to romanticize relationships rather than seeing that all relationships are transactional, but the pay scale (and type) of transaction varies widely.
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That's a good way to put it, I hadn't thought of relationships in a transactional context before. I think it may just be that I don't find the stripper/client relationship sexy.
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That is completely understandable! I think there's room for all types of sexuality under the umbrella of womanhood. Whether we pole with 8 inch heels or bare feet or sneakers, I think we mostly pole for the same overarching reason–it makes us feel good! 🙂
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I’ll say that as a female who has gone to strip clubs, there is definitely a possibility for a respectful relationship there. I’ve had dancers offer me dances because they can tell I’m there for fun and not to be sleazy; they enjoy the playful flirting with me, and to demonstrate to them that I respect them, I don’t try to touch them or push physical boundaries. I keep my hands at my sides and let them do what they want.
A lot of whether that relationship is respectful depends on the client. The fact that not every client is respectful is a huge factor in determining those of us who could do that line of work and those of us who couldn’t. Because once the client pushes that boundary, it’s up to the dancer to handle that emotionally or not. If you can look at that the same way a waitress would look at a bad tip “that’s shitty and not cool. Get the F out of here.” then it’s not much different. But if you’re the sort of person who would feel horribly violated from a customer’s lack of respect, then that person probably shouldn’t strip OR waitress haha.
I honestly believe that morally right/wrong is at least partly connected to whether it’s right or wrong specifically for the person doing the action. If you can be comfortable with stripping and it doesn’t damage you as a person to do it, and you aren’t knowingly doing anything unethical with clients, I can’t find anything wrong there.
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"Also, remember that all relationships are transactional. I give my fiance sex, and in return, he provides emotional stability and various other benefits (this goes both ways; I'm just using it on my side to illustrate a point). The client/stripper relationship is no different, but the transaction gets a bad rap because people tend to romanticize relationships rather than seeing that all relationships are transactional, but the pay scale (and type) of transaction varies widely."
I really tried to understand and relate to that and I can relate to all of it except for sex being transactional. For me and my husband, the different jobs we do to keep our household running are transactional (he works full time so while he's working I am the caretaker of our kids/ he deals with the upkeep of our vehicles, but I do most of the yardwork etc…) but our sexual relationship so far has been it's own currency. Sex for us is straight across mutual enjoyment. If it did transition to being a bargaining chip in other aspects of our relationship, it would end up being just that for me…a job, and would cease being sexy for me. And for it to still be enjoyable for my husband I'd probably have to pretend that it was enjoyable for me, because he's not the type that would enjoy it if he thought I wasn't enjoying it. And I have run into some guys who find the stripper culture, or overt sexuality in general to be mortifying and not sexy, so they're out there too.
I definitely think what Poledanceromance says is valid though. I can understand that there are people out there who work the strip-club scene and genuinely love their jobs. And I gotta say, I think it's an honest living. At a bar it doesn't distress me when guys rub up on me on the dance floor, or when drunk guys hit on me with their hands (for lack of a better way to describe it, haha), and from what I understand that wouldn't even be allowed in a strip club dancer/customer setting (so maybe I could hack it as a stripper), but as far as finding it sexy…..yeah, not so much. So it's no surprise that the stripper culture, stripper look, stripper shoes ect don't ring my bell either.
When I run into someone who favors the "artistic" side of pole dancing and doesn't get the "stripper" style, I don't take it as snobbery. I just know there's nothing weirder than watching something that you know the performer means to be sexy and not finding it sexy yourself. It's like the 'walking in on your parents' feeling…it's not that you're judging….you're just not into it.
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Whate an interesting topic for discussion. I have come across similar surprise and exasperation when faced with another person's negative or dogmatic opinion.
One thing I like to say to myself is "Those who havn't tried it shouldn't judge it" and that goes for many things and for everyone, including me. If someone has actually experienced being a stripper or a pole dancer and found it uncomfortable or demeaning, then they have a right to express their informed opinion. But it irritates me that many people feel entitled to voice their beliefs loudly and obnoxiously when they have no particular knowledge in that area. It would be like me stating something decisively about chemical engineering being against nature – I don't know anything about chemical engineering so who am I to dismiss or condemn it? I think trying something is an important part of forming an accurate judgment because often we have these preconceptions in our heads about how we would react in a certain situation or what's wrong and right, but then when it comes to living it in the moment, our instincts or our true selves astonish us.
So maybe you could say to these critics: "Why don't you try it and then tell me your informed opinion." ….? Or something along those lines 😉
I'd like to say also; I am a feminist, and I have been a stripper, and I am proud to be a pole dancer. If I was so worried about being sexually objectified that I couldn't enjoy my physicality and express my sensuality, THEN I would be repressed. Being comfortable in my body, exhibiting myself nude, enjoying my sensuality, enetertaining others with my body…. that is empowering to me. Just as being confident in my intelligence, exhibiting my knowledge, entertaining others with my wit is empowering. Being respected as a woman and being considered equal to man shouldn't mean denying a part of ourselves; our femine allure.
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