How safe are clubs?

KPTV - FOX 12

I got asked about the recent shooting at the Mystic Strip club in the comment section of a previous post.  After doing a little research it appears that neither the victim nor suspects were customers. The club is just where the tragic incident occurred. There is nothing strip club specific about the incident. But it does raise the question, how safe do I feel at a strip club?

When I first start hanging out the club I was apprehensive. I had the same faulty thing most people have of strip clubs. That stripping is immoral, therefore immoral people (criminals) hand out there. Now I’m not even sure what I was thinking. This is definitely a case of my preconceptions being completely wrong.

The media will always trumpet report anything that happens at a strip club. They will always be sure to put “strip club” or “stripper” in the headline. Not because it’s particularly relevant, but it gets people attention and it will get better ratings. I’ve noticed that most news media now is more interested in ratings than reporting the facts. When you have a problem at strip club you automatically have sex indirectly involved. Sex sells news reports.

Get rid of the live entertainment and a strip club is just a bar. The safety of the club comes down to how its run and its location, just like any other bar. If a club takes security seriously will be very safe. If they have enough bouncers that are actively watching the crowd, you usually won’t run into problems. Bouncers are an active deterrent. Strip clubs tend to have more bouncers on staff than a typical bar.

I’ve noticed that strip club bouncers also tend to be more aggressive than typical bouncers. They have the added concerns of money and naked women. Dancers have to collect money from customers. I don’t care what business you are in, collecting money from customers can always be problematic. This usually doesn’t affect the honest customers as much since they are neither naked nor trying to collect money.

The serving practice’s of the bar also makes a big difference. The only time I’ve had real issues at a club has been with absolutely wasted people. Really hammered people do stupid things. A club that is willing to cut people off early won’t have as many problems as a place that lets patron get smashed. The fact that there are strippers doesn’t make a difference. It’s just simply they way the club is operated.

In my opinion the biggest factor in safety is what neighborhood the club is in. There are good neighborhoods and bad neighborhoods. You are far more likely to be victim of a crime in a neighborhood with a high crime rate. I’m more concerned with safety in the parking lot of the club in a bad neighborhood than when I am in the club itself. Again then it comes down to how the club is operated.

Strip clubs tend to be a bit more concerned about what goes on in the parking lot than typical bars. Dancers are escorted out to their cars at the end of their shift. A lot of dancers also smoke, which usually means there is somebody outside watching the parking lot grabbing a quick smoke between sets. The dancers have a vested interest in making sure the customers are safe. When you add the number of dancers in with normal bar staff there are simply more eyes watching what is going on.

In the 10+ years of hanging out at strip clubs I’ve only been two incidents that involved a bouncer having to intervene. One was a result of my own stupidity; the other was an encounter with drunk. Some guy who should have been cut off much earlier in the evening decided that I had taken the table he was sitting at. I staggered up to my table and began bitching at me about taking his table. Before he finished his drunken rant the bouncers had walked over and escorted him away.  

I’ve only seen one actual study that compared crime at strip clubs to other bars. Of course I can’t find it now that I’m writing about it. But it compared reported incidents at a strip club with another bar of similar size in the same neighborhood. The strip club came in with a lower incident rate. The police spent more time at the other club than the strip club. I don’t think the lower rate was because strip clubs have fewer problems, I think it was mostly because the strip club had bouncers on staff every evening, while the other club only had bouncers on the weekends. Problems that required the police to be involved at the regular club were taken care of by the bouncers at the strip club.  I think the ultimately result of the study was there really isn’t any difference between the two establishments.

The biggest problem with strip club safety is public perception. People have preconceived notions of strip clubs being dens of iniquity. The people who work and hang out at strip clubs must be morally corrupt. The reality is that the people who hang out at the clubs are your neighbors. The people working there are just trying to make a living and have a vested interest in keeping you safe. If you don’t feel safe at a club, you are probably not going to come back. That’s a quick way to go out of business.

A new scam

I ran into a new stripper scam a couple weeks ago. It wasn’t a very good scam but I’d never seen it before. I haven’t run into many girls trying to scam me recently. This is mostly because I only talk to dancers who have been working for the club for some time. Dancers who try to rip off customers usually don’t last that long. 

There really isn’t many ways dancers can blatantly rip off customers. Either they flat lie about the number of dances or the try to min-max a dance. A min-max dance is where the dancer does absolutely the least amount of work for the maximum amount of money. Typically she’ll start the dance halfway though the first song. Then end the last dance halfway through the last song. In between she’ll do as little as possible, mostly just posing. If it was possible to take a nap while doing a lap dance, she’d do that. This girl had a new strategy. She got to pay for all the dances up front and then tried to get kick out during the first dance. I'm pretty sure she'd keep the money, for her troubles. 

I normally wouldn’t have even approached this particular, but the waitress told me I should really get dances from her. The dancer was her friend and really cool, she also was having a bad day too. I don’t know why but it never ends well when a waitress tries to set me up.  Maybe it’s just confirmation bias and I only remember the terrible dancers. In any case they always seem to end up being a bad experience. But a few shots of Jack Daniels had pretty much erased any reluctance I had at that point, so I asked the waitress to invite the dancer over.

I recognized her when she sat down with me. She had been a pretty high profile performer about five years ago. You couldn’t open a copy of exotic magazine with out seeing her in an ad. Apparently her post stripping career had hit a bump and she was back dancing again. We chatted for a bit. She seemed a bit drunk, but I really couldn’t tell how much. Some people are better at hiding it then others. She asked for some dances.

She asked me to pay for the dancers up front. I’m fine with that. As a customer I’m guilt till proven innocent. Until I build up trust with a dancer she’s best served by treating me as a deranged psychopath. I paid for four dances. She started out by breaking a several club rules about what to wear and other things. Like I said, I’m guilty till proven innocent so I keep my hands at the 10 and 2 o’clock position by my side. If she wants to break the rules then that’s her business. She did a quick check to see where the bouncer was.

I’ve been going to the club long enough that the bouncers basically ignore me. I don’t have any special privileges but in the scheme of things I’m the least of their problems. I don’t drink too much, the dancers like me, I spend money.  As long as I don’t cause any drama they are happy to spend their time on more important things. The bouncer was else where in the club.

The dance progressed on normally until the bouncer returned. Once the bouncer was close she grabbed my hand and pushed it into an inappropriate location. I tried to pull it away but she was keeping where it was. It would have resulted in a pretty obvious tug of war so I left it where it was.  It was the least conspicuous thing to do. Also, I’m a nice guy but not a monk. The bouncer still ignored us and turned to walk off. The dancer then began to slap her ass really hard with her free hand and kept my other hand in place. She kept leaning back trying to get the bouncers attention. The bounce walked off anyway.

Once the bouncer walked away she let go of my hand. I put my hands back. As the second song started the bouncer returned. The dancer tried again to relocate my hands. This time I just kept my hands where they should be. She got frustrated. She was basically trying to get me kicked out for having my hands where they shouldn’t be. Unfortunately for her, neither I nor the bouncer was going to play along.

Eventually she switched to a more straight forward method. She just got up and walked off. I didn’t object. It wasn’t worth going after her for the money. After that day I never saw that dancer again. I suspect the bouncer probably knew what was going on the entire time. I’m pretty sure she got kicked out after trying that scam on a few guys. I probably should have said something if the dancer is scamming customers. It’s easier to keep my mouth shut. I’m just trying to relax and have a good time.