I'm glad that his strip club wasn't full of druggies, but I will counter his anecdote with mine... all the strippers I've known (and I've known many) have had drug problems. And when I went to amateur night for laughs once, all the professionals were high.

Depends on where the club was. I went to different places because I dated a guy in a band that played strip clubs a lot. The ones in metro areas, the girls were usually clean, but the girls in the boonies were usually coke addicts or worse. That was before meth hit the scene. They all told me they could make a really good living if their boyfriends would let them keep their money, too.... I was not long for that relationship.

Don't miss Grace Undressed!

"That we're complete suckers."

Hey, it's entertainment. I don't see it as any different, in principle, to paying to see a movie, dance theater, or paying to play a video game. Are you a "sucker" for paying money for entertainment? The customer gets something out of it. A sucker is someone who is conned out of their money and gets nothing. It doesn't make someone a "sucker" if they pay money in a mutually voluntary trade for some entertainment services; on the contrary, as with any mutually voluntary trade, BOTH SIDES are better off for having done the trade --- or they wouldn't do it. The fact that some men can throw large amounts of money at strippers just means they're rich. I extremely seldom went to strip clubs even when I was single but that's probably more because it quickly becomes very expensive than anything else; if I was rich, then sure why not.

He's lying. I used to work security for clubs in the DC metro area. There's plenty of prostitution and drug abuse. I do agree w/ the part about strippers not liking men though. That's largely true.

that they're all prostitutes, and that's not true at all. I would say a good 40 percent of them are no different from any of the other women walking around,

In other words, he's saying that 60 percent of them are prostitutes.

Sorry, I've been friends with plenty of strippers in my wild days, dated some owners (they were lebanese, and all mobbed up, and NOT people to cross) and hung out at plenty of clubs, and all the strippers I knew used. Maybe not at work, but after for sure. I won't say they were all addicts. And if a guy had drugs, it's a sure bet someone was going home with him. All the girls I knew would have for the right money and goodies. None of them had good lives. That's one of the things that has me against the sex industry in general now.

Not against it as in I think it should be outlawed, I am pretty much for legalizing hooking and keeping the rest legal. I just don't think much of people who use sad dregs of society for their personal sexual entertainment. Ne need for laws.

I've known quite a few strippers, too...my SIL was a stripper for a few years and she's one of my best friends. Yes, most strippers use drugs. But it's not that they use drugs because the dancing or the environment of the club or whatever drove them to it. Plenty are strippers because they use drugs, not the other way around. If they couldn't dance, they'd probably still use drugs. At worst, the fact that strip clubs exist may enable some women to use drugs longer, because they can have a good-paying job where showing up "on time" still means having time to sleep past noon to recover from last night's party, and where drinking at work is a-okay, etc. But, hell, you could say the same about work in any bar or club. How many club bartenders do you know that don't party with some illicit substances? The answer to that question is the same as the answer to the question of how many strippers use drugs---the ones who are seriously doing it to get through school or pay private school tuition for their kids, don't use, pretty much all the rest do at one point or another. Really, most college students I've ever known drink and do drugs here and there. So what? It's something that comes with being 18-28 in this culture. Most strippers are 18-28, I'm pretty sure...so why would it shock anyone that most of them do drugs?

And, yes, it does vary by location; that's common sense. A metro area is going to have a wider pool of women who want to be strippers, so a club in a major city will be able to turn away the worst and most obvious drug users, while a place in the boonies probably won't be able to be so picky.

What I observed when I lived in Ft. Lauderdale, where they had some clubs: The club owners tried hard to keep the drugs out of the club, because they knew the law would be down on them like a ton of bricks if they didn't. That didn't stop them from using outside the club. But some of the club owners went as far as to board the younger girls at the club, and both the club and the cops did regular inspections. Any girl who got arrested for drugs or prostitution was immediately fired. And since most of them weren't from there (many were runaways), the club owner would go bail them out and then put them on a bus for home. They didn't want that trouble. So at least at the club, they were clean.

And yeah, a lot of them have serious problems relating to men. The first time you go into a club, they might chat you up and you think they are hot. But after a few times, you start to notice that it's mostly canned patter. And they you hear them speak off the cuff once or twice when they think the patrons can't hear, and they start to get a lot less attractive. Yeah, there are some who are smart and level-headed and are doing it to make extra money or whatever, and those are a pleasure to be around. But for most of them it's a lifestyle; they are going to keep doing it until they get too old to work in the clubs anymore. And that's when the bottom falls out, because they aren't capable of doing any other kind of work.

Does anyone here have a vague idea of the scale of drug problems among musicians, actors, etc., or care to compile a list of all the clothed entertainers who've died of overdoses?

I spent a lot of time in strip clubs when I lived in Toronto, because I found that they offered consistently good value for my entertainment dollars, and because the women weren't just nice to look at, but engaging & pleasant to deal with. They stacked up very well against more respectable establishments, where I sometimes encountered such rudeness & incompetence that I wondered how the hell they stayed in business.

Drug problems among musicians... The last musician who didn't use drugs was Pat Boone, and that was probably because he couldn't find any. Point taken.

Martin, I agree that the clubs in Toronto were pretty pleasant establishments. My one gripe with them was that they all seemed to be filled with teensy skinny girls... not my type.

What's all this talk of drug use and prostitution?

I've conducted an extensive study, and it turns out that 100% of strippers polled are putting themselves through law school.

Strippers... "poled"... I get it!

You know momof4, Jenny, Amy if you ladies arent careful you'll wind up in a feminist reeucation camp, forced to watch Lifetime movies

I went to many strip/go-go clubs over the years -- both in the states and in Korea.

The U.S. clubs -- I have as yet to take a dancer home. I probably could have but didn't feel like spending the money. I also ran into a young stripper when I was taking college courses. Total babe, sweet, nice, etc. She was paying cash for college while living on her own. I think it was straight tips/pay.

Korea -- I went to the strip clubs and actually DJed in one of them. (Lookup Osan AB.) By the time I hit the second year -- when our unit would take someone out for a green/brown bean tour (pub crawl for arrivals/departures) -- I would actually sit with my back to the stage, I had seen it so much. I took more than one of the strippers home over time. But it was more for the mechanical pleasure rather than for the personal connection.

It is similar to the famous quote "I don't pay hookers for sex, I pay them to leave after." -- Charlie Sheen.

Some guys will be fascinated with it for life -- others grow up. It's been probably more than seven years since I hit a strip club. I don't mind looking -- but I can pay $10-15 for a DVD that shows more and I can use multiple times as opposed to $4-5 per beer, $5-10 for a juicee (you think the strippers are actually drinking?) plus a cover charge. I've grown up enough that I want to know whom I'm talking to and want the emotional connection.

But that is my opinion.

So - did any of you read Grace's blog, linked above?

This web site is often a walk-through for all of the info you desired about this as well as didn't know that to ask. Glimpse right here, and you'll definitely uncover it.

I've been in the stripping game for some time and you are so right