Ethic’s isn’t usually a subject you associate with strip
club. Yet, I found myself in an ethical dilemma a while ago. I’m going to be
really vague about a lot of specific details about this situation. I cannot
verify a lot of the major details, to avoid damaging somebody’s reputation
through innuendo I’m going be vague, but I can get my point across without them. You generally don't think about health issues when you go to a strip club, but sometimes you have to.
There are some diseases that aren’t curable but not fatal
either. Once you have it, you have it until you die. Most of the time the virus
lays dormant, but occasionally flairs up and causes problem. There diseases
usually require some sort of intimate contact or the exchange of bodily fluids
to contract. Not really an issue for a customer at a strip club.
Sometime ago a dancer (Stripper X) at my favorite club had
supposedly contracted one of these diseases. I didn’t find out about this until
after she had left. I’m not sure if she was fired, quit or just decided to not
show up any more. Dancers come and go at a club on a regular basis. I never really
talked to her, but I heard later about Stripper X’s condition from a couple of
different dancers I trust. Granted a lot of dancers are major league gossips, but
I trusted these dancers to be pretty down to earth and factual about their
stuff. However, I had no real confirmation, just trusted sources. Stripper X
also lead a life style that was at risk for this type of disease.
Stripper X disappeared and I quickly forgot about her. It
was a couple years later when I stopped by a different club to see a long time
favorite dancer when I saw Stripper X working there. She was still using the
same stage name, she even recognized me.
When my dancer friend sat down next to me Stripper X was the
topic of conversation. After a few minutes of catching up I realized my friend know
nothing of Stripper X's health risk. This left me with a little bit of a quandary. Do I tell my
friend? The easy thing to do would be gossip, “Did you hear that Stripper X had
gotten suspended for having...”. The problem with this is that I’m leveling a serious accusation
without any real proof.
There are consequences to my actions. Customers talk crap
all the time about dancers, but there is more to this allegation than the usual
“I think she does more outside the club" type of comments. There are legal implications
to this situation for the club. If a club knows that a contractor presents a potential
health risk to customers, the club could be sued. One of the riders on the contracts
I have to sign with trade show companies is an acknowledgement of health.
Basically I have to state that nobody working our booth knowingly has a
communicable disease. I’m not sure how much legal protection this really
provides, but if somebody works a trade show with the bubonic plague and makes somebody really sick, the trade show
company will basically say the company renting the booth space lied and they
are liable.
The parallels between a renting space at a trade show and a
dancer contracting are striking. I’ll blog about that later. Besides the
potential legal aspects I don’t think a club would want to be known as the
place a customer caught a serious disease from. This would be bad for business.
The upshot of all this is that there is a fairly decent chance a new dancer
could get fired over a rumor this. Getting somebody fired because you think that
something might be true is completely unethical to me. A lot of dancers tend to
live week to week financially. Getting fired at the end of the month could
result in them losing their place to live. Oops I’m sorry about getting you
fired and evicted, doesn’t really cut it if it’s a false claim.
Another really nasty thing about an allegation like that is
it’s almost impossible to prove a negative. Even if you don’t have the disease,
people may think it’s just in remission and you’re lying about it. The strip
club industry isn’t that big. Even if you walk around with a copy of the
results of your latest blood work, people can still think the document is fake
or,” that was last week, what about now?” You can’t put the genie back in the
bottle.
I was not going to mention the health issue to my friend initially. The
only way to spread this disease is by sharing bodily fluids and wouldn’t be
spread at a club under even normal conditions. Then my dancer friend, who is into alternate life styles. mentions that she is hanging out with Stripper X outside
the club. This presented a direct risk to my friend’s health. Sorry, I should
have told you about the land mines are not acceptable. I told her about Stripper X.
There is a broader issue of health when it comes to strip
clubs. at what point are you too sick to go into a strip club? It’s an ideal environment for spreading illness. Even if you don’t get
any dances, the dancer will usually sit right next to you, most of the time you
are drinking something too. You have the trifecta of possible vectors: physical
contact, airborne transmission, and ingestion.
Dancers are more at risk than the customers. I’ll probably
only meet and talk to one or two dancers during a visit. The dancer we’ll
probably meet a dozen or more people every shift. One thing I always hated
about working big trade shows like CES or Comdex (when Comdex was big) was you
were guaranteed to meet and shake hands at least one sick person. I’d say 30%
of the time I worked large trade shows I came home sick.
The dancer also has the added problem of not being able to
take sick time off. If she has to make rent she doesn’t have to a choice. She
has to load up on decongestants and cold medicines and fake a smile. That is
one of the most miserable part of sales Feeling like absolute shit, yet having
to paint on smile and pretend you like dealing with a customer. That is longest
conversation ever.
