Last week I posted the first of what will be my weekly "journal" entries on this site. Thank you so much to those of you who e-mailed me words of encouragement on expressing my thoughts. I was very timid, and still am, about putting my words up for view because it seemed somewhat self-indulgent to think that anyone would want to read any of it. However, I decided that no one's forced to read these musings if they don't feel like it, so it doesn't really matter if they are up here or not. Writing has always been very therapeutic for me as it sates some unexplainable need I have to organize my thoughts and vent my emotions. I wrote the following over the past few days as I have been dancing a lot lately and the subject has been on my mind.

Quite often strippers encounter customers in the clubs who are needlessly rude and adversarial. Of course most men who come to watch the dancers are polite and respectful, but there is certainly a portion of them who can be dickheads. Over the years that I've danced I have often wondered at the source of their animosity.
To some extent dancers need to be comfortable with their sexuality and also have confidence in their appearance. If they don't have those qualities they will not be able to step up on stage half-naked and dance more than a few times, let alone make a living at it. Perhaps some of the customers are threatened by attractive, sexually expressive women and are further resentful of the fact that they have to pay to see them nude or semi-nude. That particular set of customers needs to regroup their thoughts about both strippers and women in general.
Every woman is entitled to feel sexy. She is not a "bitch" or "stuck-up" if she feels attractive and enjoys male attention. She is not a "whore" or a "slut" if she behaves provocatively in the appropriate environment. A strip club is the appropriate environment. Customers walk in the door of an adult establishment because they want to give shape to a sexual fantasy. Exotic dancing can be extremely erotic and beautiful. When customers come into the clubs and insult the women working there they expose themselves as the bitter, unhappy people that they are. It's not just that they dislike strippers either. (If that was the case why would they be in there paying a cover charge and buying overpriced drinks?) Their hatefulness reflects their attitude towards women in general. Some people just don't want women to enjoy their sexuality and have confidence in their physicality.
Something many strippers have heard at work is:

"You're not that hot. You do nothing for me."

Customers making comments such as that are merely trying to shake the confidence of the woman to whom they are speaking, and there's no need for that. Not every dancer appeals to every customer and that is fine. Nobody is universally attractive, but no one needs to be insulted unnecessarily either.
Another oft-heard line in clubs is:

"What's SHE doing up there dancing?? Yuck!"

Every woman, regardless of her weight, ethnicity, age, or any other factor should relish her own sexuality. Maybe she does not strike the fancy of some patrons, but there are probably others who enjoy her performance. There is no one "type" who suits everybody.
The crux of this whole matter is that many people try to punish women verbally for enjoying or displaying the erotic part of their beings. I can't count the number of times that I have been called such things as "stupid bimbo" or "dumb bitch" at work. On more than a few occasions I have been informed that: "it's a good thing you can dance because there's probably nothing else that you could do."
Inevitably these words come from people who have barely bothered to speak to me and who will never know me. I don't take their comments personally because they stem from a hatred towards women in general. A strip club is a place where customers can come and openly marvel at the beauty of women. Strippers can provide an enticing, beautiful performance for someone who enjoys viewing the sexual nature of a woman. Those people who do not like that type of entertainment should simply not come in.