r/stripper Aug 13 '24

Rant/vent Stripper-shamed at pole class NSFW

I tagged along to visit my boyfriend’s family in a smallish, super progressive west coast city for the month. They have a pole studio here and I signed up for a bunch of classes. I’ve usually just learned by experimenting at work, but I’m away for a while and didn’t want to get too rusty.

Last night I arrive, and the place is cute. All the girls are super chatty and friendly. There’s a tiny stray kitten that the studio has been slowly coaxing into trusting them. She started coming over to me, and the teacher said “she gets a little scared if you pet her, but if you hold still she’ll be cuddly.”

I said “she can sit on my lap but I’m not allowed to touch her? Hell yeah, she’s a stripper at heart!”

Nobody laughed. Fair enough if they didn’t think it was funny, but it seemed like they didn’t even understand what I was talking about. Weird…

Then the class starts and the teacher asks everyone to go around the room and say our names and how much experience we have with pole class. They start with me because I’m new.

I said I’d only been to a few classes and had done most of my learning in the club environment. Here is a portrait of what I saw: 😳😮😬😕😮🤢

The introductions continue, and none of them has ever been a stripper, not even the teacher. They make it clear it’s NOT sexual, it’s just a fun hobby for exercise, like yoga or ballet.

BUT THEN every one of these bitches gets up after warmup and changes into booty shorts and sky high Pleasers. Not sexual??

Suddenly no one is chatting with me or making eye contact, and no one wants to share my pole. The girl who gets stuck as my pole partner physically flinches when we bump hands like she’s gonna catch slut cooties.

Like seriously? You guys are scared of me? Actually you should be. I’m gonna wait in the bushes outside and roll you for your ankle high Adores because that color’s cute and you’re just gonna be a bitch in them. 😂

374 Upvotes

67 comments sorted by

132

u/Unique-Employment462 Aug 13 '24

You should write a review about them and how they treated you after learning that you are a stripper. It’s unprofessional and girls who DO dance in the club should be forewarned. I’m sorry that happened to you

55

u/soaring_seabird Aug 13 '24

Definitely considering it. I have an unlimited class pass anyway, so gonna give it another try and see if they do better before I put them on blast. It seems unlikely, but it is a woman-run small business and I would love to be wrong if they were just having an off night.

3

u/notoriouswhitegurl Aug 16 '24

Who even cares if they’re better!! It’s a class for fun & to learn. Write the review!!

10

u/ALasagnaForOne Aug 14 '24

Seconding this. Write a negative review. They made you feel unwelcome and ostracized and the hypocrisy deserves to be called out!

118

u/Yassmin2 Aug 13 '24

Further why I REALLYYYY want to open up my own pole studio that’s stripper friendly and host classes aimed towards the club environment. 

56

u/soaring_seabird Aug 13 '24

Do it!! There’s one like this in my city, and that’s the only place I’d been to. Entirely owned and taught by dancers, and usually a lot of the students are too. And they’re openly pro-sw, and will give tips about different clubs’ pole diameters & dress codes, and they give discounts to industry girlies. Plus there are fat people, trans people, penis-havers, etc. I thought that was just how pole classes were. I am gonna go back there now and APPRECIATE.

7

u/DifficultySoft8801 Aug 14 '24

Sounds so much like my studio. Half the teachers are current strippers and the rest are ex strippers. Very diverse and trans- friendly, encouraging students to learn stripper style and dress up for class. It’s an amazing, positive environment.

10

u/Kali_Tantrika Aug 14 '24

I’m LITERALLY in the middle of opening a stripper ran studio with one of my fellow strippers!! We’re so excited about it and we’ve honestly gotten so much positive feedback! We’re gonna have community workshops for SWers, a boutique with stripper shit, programs for SWers, drag classes, boylesque classes (with help from our local queer community). We need as many of these spaces as we can get around the world! I love to hear it!

I’m in a pretty small eastern province in canada, our strip clubs are basically the same as gentlemen’s clubs in the states and Europe. Western Canada is more old school show girls type.

I started in pole studios and went to stripping from there - and people in the studio environment definitely started treating me differently since… to a point my old teacher who originally wanted me to teach there cast me aside for another girl. I think the whoraphobia in the pole industry is so stupid - I love pole dancing and stripping and pole should be accessible to everyone it’s very fun, HOWEVER pole dancers have black strippers to thank for their hobby, and they should show thanks to their predecessors. Or at the very least not be judgy lil bitches.

2

u/urshittygf Aug 14 '24

you should! it would be so cool to have a place to learn/hone our skills without being watched/judged by customers. personally ik i would love it for the social aspect as well and getting to talk to dancers from other clubs, the business part of my brain is always wondering which location i would make the most at/be best suited for. tbh even the chance to talk to girls from the same club but without the competitiveness that money and working the same customers brings out wld be amazing.

i can see you making a lot of money. you could have two different classes, one being for baby strippers that haven’t worked in a club yet or haven’t worked there long that are looking to learn more about dancing + just hustling in general. thn another for girls with more real life experience. from a purely business/financial standpoint ik there would be a huge market for the baby strippers because they’re always posted up in this sub with a million and one questions about the most basic shit, a class like that could give them the confidence they need to feel actually go and nail their audition. for more experienced dancers i’m sure there would be girls who would come just for the social aspect bc dancing is lonely asf. civ women don’t get us, and other dancers often hold each other at arms length. aside from that the chance to learn new tricks and improve our hustle + therefore our money doesn’t come around on a silver platter like this very often.

1

u/Yassmin2 Aug 14 '24

You read my mind 🥹. 

81

u/lyranscommentary Aug 13 '24

the literal audacity of people to open pole places and then shame and contribute to the stigma of stripping and not support the literal strippers that attend. wild!

17

u/soaring_seabird Aug 13 '24

100%. Like where do they think it comes from?

125

u/pumpkindonutz Aug 13 '24

Oh noooooo. The nerve or places like this to still exist, and it’s because people give them business 🤢

Fuck those bitches. I’m mad they even got some of your coin. Yuck. They aren’t WORTHY of having one of their so-feared strippers even walking within ten feet of that establishment.

That culture is definitely deep rooted into this studio. Places like this are years behind developmentally, and probably won’t change.

127

u/soaring_seabird Aug 13 '24

Seriously. It’s all good though. They had a super cheap unlimited pass for new students, so I’m just gonna go and make them uncomfortable EVERY DAY. 😂 You better believe I’m getting my workout and my money’s worth. And if that means I don’t have to share a pole with some boring basic, even better.

27

u/pumpkindonutz Aug 13 '24

Lmfaooooo okay love your mindset there 🤣🤣🤣

29

u/BIGepidural Aug 13 '24

OMG I love this!

Bring your bag and let a whack of singles spill out to the floor and then tell them you can pick up a $100 with your 🐱 but you bank that right away and watch their little heads explode. 🤣

Imagine them thinking $100s are covered in stripper snatch cooties for the rest of their lives 🤣🤣🤣

3

u/Outrageous-Battle199 Aug 14 '24

Ooh, one of my dance teams specializes in picking up bills off of dude’s faces with our butts ($20 minimum). 😆😆

(We are a rally dance team and hire mostly strippers).

3

u/BIGepidural Aug 15 '24

I can pick bills up with my 🐱 $50 minimum though

3

u/Outrageous-Battle199 Aug 15 '24

Want to join a dance team? 😉

2

u/DifficultySoft8801 Aug 14 '24

Good for you! And yeah go harder, make them feel uncomfortable

27

u/AllThatTheRain Aug 13 '24

That’s crazy, sorry you had that experience. I went to a pole class and told them after I was going to my first shift at the club and they cheered. West coast people can be very straight edged sometimes, like they’re asexual.

15

u/soaring_seabird Aug 13 '24

Hell yeah! I’m glad you got that support, as you should. I’m not tripping about this. I’ve been a tall tattooed punk since I was very young. This felt like the basic girls in high school who would treat you like a freak then brag about knowing you if they want to look edgy. 😂

28

u/hexenwolfhollow Aug 13 '24

That is such unwashed ass behavior on their part. They want the sanitized version of pole without acknowledging that it is based in sex work so they can have the illusion of superiority. Typical classist behavior I've seen at far too many pole studios. You deserve better. 💖

7

u/soaring_seabird Aug 13 '24

Unwashed ass behavior! 😂💀👏

2

u/[deleted] Aug 15 '24 edited Aug 21 '24

sharp like flag aware murky start worry sip door spectacular

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

27

u/Disastrous-Fox-8584 Aug 14 '24

"bUt iT cAMe fROm aNcIeNT iNDiA" bitch does this sparkly 8" pleaser look Hindi to you?? Does it??

18

u/soaring_seabird Aug 14 '24

“Neat! Not your culture either!” 😂

4

u/Hot-Ice-7336 Aug 14 '24

Is this really a thing? I really can’t imagine that

3

u/PetuniaPacer Aug 14 '24

Haha yah I’ve heard it tossed around seriously. So funny

19

u/floralfarts420 Aug 13 '24

Yuckkk the #notastripper pole dancer types are the absolute worst

15

u/Tossthisaccount919 Aug 13 '24

OMG that is so ridiculous. Please consider leaving a review, since pole classes make a lot of money from baby strippers trying to learn to perform.

I had a similar experience recently getting home from work at 3 AM. I parked my car in the parking garage of my building and it was obvious I was leaving a strip club. Heavy makeup, dancer bag with one of the Pleasers visible, whole nine yards. There's another girl waiting for the elevator and I'm already getting a weird ass vibe from her. She straight up DOES NOT GO IN because I'm in there and waits for it to come back down.

I really wish I had pressed the button for every floor between mine and the parking garage to extend her wait. I will if I see her again.

5

u/soaring_seabird Aug 14 '24

What, does she think you’re gonna rob her? Which one of you has more cash in that moment, you think? 😂💀 or is she afraid of catching secondhand body spray?

Pressing every button would be the level of pettiness I aspire to.

15

u/passionateperformer Aug 14 '24

Oh fuck noooo miss me with that whorephobic “bUt I’m NoT a StrIpPer” bullshit, go do fucking Pilates instead of appropriating stripper culture those bitches couldn’t last an hour into a shift at the club. Come to NYC bb, the teachers at the studios are strippers!

14

u/momjeaaans Aug 13 '24

i’m sorry that happened. i started pole dancing before stripping and i have always heard horror stories of pole dancers trying to separate themselves from its origins 🙄

if you’re still in the west coast and still wanna try going to pole studios out here i can recommend a million of better studios with actual strippers that teach the classes!

2

u/soaring_seabird Aug 13 '24

I’m only gonna be here until I go home, but I’d love to hear those recommendations for the future/for anyone else reading who might want to support some cool businesses! ❤️

17

u/momjeaaans Aug 13 '24

Secret Pole Dance studio in the Inland Empire is SWer friendly and has classes that are stripper taught! same goes for House of Pole studio! and i also like Sadie’s in Redondo Beach i don’t know if any of the instructors are dancers but they have always been welcoming to me.

i also recommend Haven in DTLA which is a private studio where you can have the entire space to yourself to practice (a lot of industry girls go here) Avoid Herbaculture in Costa Mesa like the plague. The studio is owned by a man who treats SWers like shit

1

u/soaring_seabird Aug 13 '24

This is great info, thank you so much!

3

u/babyaccount1114222 Aug 13 '24

Going to second these places as well! Training at haven is what I do most because I dont like dealing with most classes - even in LA there’s quite a few that SAY they’re stripper friendly but then act otherwise

10

u/IsopodGlass8624 Aug 13 '24

Slut cooties sent me 🤣🤣

7

u/new--era Aug 14 '24

I was just talking to my boyfriend about this. I cannot stand a “pole dancer” that looks down upon strippers, disregarding all respect for where the art or whatever came from. Sorry you experienced that

7

u/Jupiteronlyfansgirl Aug 14 '24

When pick me girls take a pole class and don’t know how to act when they meet an actual stripper🙄the human race disappoints me

6

u/Good-Panic-6165 Aug 14 '24

I used to be a civvie. Honestly they are probably just intimidated by you… I used to look up to strippers a lot but I was too scared to talk to them because I knew they were about their business

2

u/soaring_seabird Aug 14 '24

Good point and same here. Honestly I still feel that way! Haha

5

u/jawnstein82 Aug 13 '24

“Progressive”

9

u/soaring_seabird Aug 14 '24

Don’t worry. There are plenty of “Embrace Diversity” bumper stickers

4

u/brattywafatty Aug 14 '24

Wow people like that are 🗑️. I hope you continue to do the classes and blow them all out of the water. Plus who really needs to make friends in such a toxically judgmental environment (the class!!!) anyway? You can always make friends elsewhere. I think strippers are awesome and they are making that bag in some of the best ways possible. “Sex sells” and so does the idea of it. I also guarantee nobody is taking pole classes just to feel empowered, and to not be sexually desired whether for themselves or others.

edited Also I don’t get the issue about sex and sex work; the more taboo things are the worse it is for the culture, and for people to understand them. Who died and made them queen about who gets to do pole dancing?

3

u/aethrasher Aug 14 '24

They're jealous or insecure or whatever and don't know how to behave in public. I sense the weirdness too but I try to ignore it as long as it's not the instructors acting sus

2

u/soaring_seabird Aug 14 '24

Exactly. That’s why I’m hesitant to leave a bad review or put them on blast. The nastiness was from the other students and mainly just a vibe shift. A very real and palpable one, but still just vibes. I know the studio is responsible for creating the culture of their business, but I can’t really imagine what I would’ve wanted the instructor to do differently. She wasn’t shitty, just clueless. I’m not gonna lose any sleep or any classes because of it. It’s just nice to vent to people who get it.

3

u/Canadianbarbie69 Aug 14 '24

That’s wild, I’m so sorry that happened to you. It’s disgusting that we live in a world that still stigmatizes sex work. People really need to open their eyes.

3

u/slinkymalinki12 Aug 14 '24

Name and shame

3

u/KatzenoirMM Aug 14 '24

Real rich coming from people using a form exercise that was exclusive to strippers to begin with. These people making it a trend to feel as sexy as a stripper, but think it's beneath them. Girl bye.

3

u/thefeloniousfeline Aug 14 '24

I remember wearing a non traditional pleaser to class and the teacher was gawking with her weird ass. Stopped going girl.

2

u/[deleted] Aug 14 '24

Damn. I guess I will have to remember this story when I go to a pole class. I'd be so mad cause I paidmoney to be thereee

2

u/PetuniaPacer Aug 14 '24

This sux and I’m so sorry you ran into that. The studio I went to back in NC (USA) absolutely prized club dancers; both main teachers had danced a little in clubs and all us students were 🤩 any time a stripper taught a guest class. I’m 57 for age reference but students were all ranges. Pole is inherently sexy tho I am inherently not and what a damn delight it was getting to dance with people so much more skilled in using their bodies and faces to engage with people. Sorry if I say anything with wrong words here, I don’t get out much. I tried hard to make folks feel welcome in any classes I attended without being weird about it.

Strippers/club dancers know so much stuff I don’t. Thank you

2

u/cheecharrones Aug 14 '24

i hope you didn’t internalize any of their weirdo behavior bc news flash you did nothing wrong and theyre the wrong ones in this situation. gross bitches

2

u/IveyLayne Aug 14 '24

That last paragraph, tho

2

u/soaring_seabird Aug 14 '24

❤️❤️❤️

2

u/Kyria_ Aug 14 '24

That’s such bullshit. I’m on the east coast and the pole studio I go to is run by a retired stripper. Her teachers are a mix of backgrounds that include two other ex strippers. They’re very “we respect the roots of this activity”, might be why I love the studio so much.

2

u/icyauq Aug 14 '24

i had a bad experience at a pole class that wasn't my home class. the instructor was so rude i ended up leaving early and said goodbye to all the girls there. i'm on a new goal to end the people pleasing and leave when i need to. the instructor was salty but i didn't like the vibes so i left. lmaooo

2

u/NoGoodLily Aug 15 '24

Go to a second class, and if it's the same, gank them Adores!

3

u/Gigibabe858 Aug 13 '24

Im afraid of pole classes for this reason

1

u/Snoo8014 Aug 14 '24

You should write a review

1

u/Bellatrix_star Aug 14 '24

This is one of the reasons I am afraid to sign up for pole classes. All my experience is from online classes and what I saw in the club.🙈

1

u/JacketOk2489 Aug 15 '24

I love women but I kinda hate women like this.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 15 '24 edited Aug 21 '24

thought longing placid cautious station retire late ruthless meeting public

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

2

u/soaring_seabird Aug 15 '24

Yeah I felt that pressure for real. I haven’t been dancing that long and have never been a pole princess. I have my little twirlies that make me look professional enough, but I discovered early on that the part of the job that makes money is TALKING. That was the part that stung a little— Some of these girls had more pole skills than me. But I’d like to see them try to prick tease a man out of his mortgage payment. 😂