Is this Blog against Regualations?

So being reading around and a lot of people are saying we do not support regulation. So wanted to make things clear we have no issues with regulations providing they are they to protect the dancers and the customers. What are against is the banning of venues based on moralistic judgements by small minorities. If we go back to Prof Hubbard recent work only 3% of people said there was no place for Lap Dancing and remember that the survey invited people in certain towns to join in which would suggest at least some bias from those taking part or at least a percentage. And comments on and from certain websites about us shows how little they know, they judge without knowledge, moralise without understanding and make statements without establishing facts.

So regulations, not worried about these if they provide protection to the dancers. I come from the era when dancers were paid to dance and with the change so that dancers need to pay to work I would love to see standardised house fees, a single consistent set of fines and an external arbitration process for disputes. Just my personal opinion and having been friends with club owners/managers I understand that in this climate fines are sometimes the only way to ensure that dancers do not abuse the system. But their need to be fair and not just random based on someone's mood. I know of one dancer that in all the time I knew her she never made a single shift on time unless it was her first one of the day and she would work two venues regularly to boost earnings as she was supporting her sister as well as herself. But even with the fine and the house fee she was making enough to make it worth to work even with the two financial disincentives in place.

So do we need all the regulations currently in place? As I said I am old school so I would prefer things as what I see is the old gold days. However to be honest any regulations should be set in conjunction with dancers, they are the ones affected so rather than just some random politician making judgements they should engage and work with dancers to find the best options for the people who have to work within the regulations. Now that Equity and GMB are involved perhaps eventually we will get a standard set of T&Cs around clubs and pubs and how they work.

Someone buried a new comment on an old piece on the blog making accusations without even linking to any proof, the random thought that dancers dance for the money as though it was some revelation that no one had ever thought this before and customers assumed that the dancers danced for them because of their wonderful personalities. Striptease is a performance, 3 or 4 minutes of escapism the same as film, theatre and music. People may argue about the fact dancers are nude but we see nudity in all forms of performance including naked ballets. Okay I will say so far I haven't found an opera that is performed without clothes but if there is an Opera writer out there perhaps you want to change this. If you look at when Daniel Radcliffe was in Equus there wasn't any major outrage just lots of ladies talking about seeing his magic wand. Nudity but no issues, the film magic mike no one worried about that.

So yes we see people judging the men who see striptease as harmless, branding them as people who disrespect, dislike and objectify women throughout the day, every day, day after day. Yet many men are married, with daughters and are as far away from the woman hating, wife beating, rapists that feminist label us as can be. I have no issues being judged and would happily debate with those who want to bring down the striptease industry. Yes label us, accuse us, belittle us as none of these things hurt us unless we let them. You cannot make claims about me without knowing me, but it seems that many people will judge without facts and without at least discussing points of view.

Just one quick point I don't hate feminism, I do strongly dislike radical feminists with their labelling etc especially those that have made comments about dancers without knowing anything about those dancers except the fact that they dance.

TonyN