Tyler Durden and the first rule of strip club

This article is a story mostly based on true events but with some fictional framing for entertainment.

I was a good kid, got good grades, never got into trouble, went to college, all the usual good person bullshit. I graduated and got a corporate job, just like all they all tell you. My job is basically selling stuff to other businesses. It’s high stakes. When you win a deal, you could pull in a million dollars for the firm and get a nice bonus out of it. But you never won every deal. And you spent most of your time just chasing people to solicit interest.
Oddly enough, being a “good kid” was my secret. My clients trusted me. I wasn’t the snake oil salesman in the plaid suit. I got to know my clients as people, I got to know their families, their kids, and I made my clients feel good when they worked with me.

Sure the money was good and I did like my clients, but everything else about my job sucked. Every week, we had to fill out these TPS reports so accounting could forecast our contribution to the business. Humans weren't meant to spend our life this way. Human beings were not meant to sit in little cubicles sucking up to clients all day, filling out useless forms and listening to eight different bosses drone on about mission statements.

Every week, the VP brought each employee into his office and ripped them a new asshole, trying to get them to work harder and bring in more money. The women and minorities got it the worst. He made one of my colleagues, a young but extremely talented Asian-American woman cry. So many nights, I fantasized about going into my weekly meeting and just beating the living crap out of him.

I travel a lot and meet clients at conferences. People don’t realize what happens at these things. The sellers are all whoring themselves and everyone else out to get the buyers to sign more deals with them. Unfortunately, I was an amazing whore. I remembered everything about my clients and they just kept coming back. The most I did was shower them with gifts and take them out for a ridiculous dinner and drinks. Some of my less moral colleagues would get their clients laid since conferences were filled with hookers. It was the old, “You do my deal and my lady friend will do you.”

My clients all had stressed out lives. So conferences were often a form of escape for the buyers and that was the opportunity for sellers. I always made sure my clients were well fed, always brought gifts for their kids, just made them feel as awesome as possible. Back at the office, they were just another suit, but here at the conference, I made my clients feel special. It wasn’t all on me too. Just getting the clients together for dinner was cathartic for them. They could share and commiserate on the bullshit in each of their companies, while I kept the food and drink flowing. Depending on where you are in the US, there are some classy places to spoil clients. Plush atmosphere, bartenders doing tricks, waitresses in sexy outfits, it all made it easy to give my clients a memorable, relaxing, entertaining experience.

On my flight out, the guy sitting next to me starts talking to me. “You whoring out at the conference this week too?” he said. I replied, “What?” He said, “Conferences. It’s thousands of soulless people jerking each other off for a week. It makes us high. Makes us euphoric, makes us docile.” I asked him, “What do you do?” He replied, “What do you mean?” “What do you do for a living?” He said he was in the same line of business as me and was going to the conference too. He introduced himself as Tyler Durden.

I told Tyler how much I had a love-hate relationship with my job. Tyler turned to me and said, “Fuck you.” I replied confused, “What?” “Fuck you. You don’t have a love-hate relationship. You love ripping your clients off. You just don’t want to admit it. You just don’t have the balls to accept that you’re a whore like the rest of us. Stop fucking feeling sorry for yourself. It’s just capitalism.”

So we part ways at the airport, I spend the next week, wearing my nice shoes and nice suits, kissing my clients’ asses, taking them out to fancy dinners. It was tiring, but maybe Tyler was on to something. I could quit anytime, but I didn’t. On the last night of the conference, I see Tyler at the hotel. “There’s my fellow whore, how was your week? Did you stick your nose up enough of your clients’ asses?” After some chat, he says, “Hey, you ever been to a strip club before?” I said no. Tyler says, “Why not? Oh wait, do you think it’s wrong to go? Is it going to spoil your goody goody image to go?”

I was still a bit hesitant when I saw an email come in from my VP asking how much money I had made the firm that week. Tyler smiled at my frustration and anger, and said, “Your VP seems to prefer that you go through life like a fucking prisoner while he keeps your dick in a mason jar under the sink.” I really didn’t know what to say. Tyler grabs my arm, hails a cab, and takes me to one of the clubs in town.

Wow, it was kind of a pleasantly shocking experience. It was pretty upscale, nice plush couches, gold colored railings, DJ wasn’t terrible, and damn, there were some gorgeous girls in there. Tyler turns to me and says, “You like what you see? Now, I hope you sauced up at the hotel, because this place doesn’t serve alcohol. Because they don’t serve, they can hire girls under 21.” I took a look around and it was pretty obvious that Tyler was right about the hiring. We sit down in a couple of chairs and Tyler says, “Who’s the hottest girl here?” I scan around and see a cute athletic blonde girl in a red top and red mini-skirt sitting by herself near the bar. Tyler says, “Good choice” walks up to the girl to introduce himself. I just sit and watch him hit on this gorgeous girl. I can vaguely hear the conversation through the loud DJ music and she says her name is Spring, she’s a freshman at the local university and had just started working at the club. After more chit chat, Tyler agrees to a VIP. Having never seen a VIP before, I was a bit curious to see what actually goes on. So when the bouncer wasn’t looking, I just followed Tyler and Spring into the back room so I could watch through the bead curtain. Spring quickly took off her clothes and planted herself on Tyler’s lap. I was both fascinated and a bit unnerved. She was very gentle with her grinding, maybe because she was new, but let Tyler feel her up all over her body. This seemed both exciting and a little wrong.

After they were done, Tyler gave her a tip and a kiss, and we walked back to the main floor. Tyler could sense my mixed emotions. “It’s not fucking wrong.” “What?” “I can tell what you’re thinking, that you think I’m a creep for feeling up a naked freshman.” Before I could react, he continued. “Tell me what’s the difference between what she’s doing in there and what you and I just did this week? No one’s forcing anyone to do anything. We’re all just whores and we love it. It’s just capitalism.”

Two years go by and I’m back in town for another conference and busy week. On the last day, again, I run into Tyler. “Hey, how you doing man? Kiss enough ass for the week? Come on, it’s been a while, let’s go out.” Tyler took me to a different strip club this time, bigger with multiple stages, but 21+ with alcohol. The vibe was definitely randier. Everyone, the dancers and the patrons were drunk off their ass. As we were sitting at the bar, a young Hispanic girl named Maria shimmied into Tyler’s lap. Maria was 17 sheets to the wind. She had clearly been drinking all night and was all over Tyler. Tyler relished the attention. After some chat, she got him to agree to a VIP. Being a new club, I was curious to see what the VIPs were like here too so followed behind to watch. Inside the semi-private booth, Maria took off her top and pulled Tyler's shirt up. She straddled him cowgirl and began grinding like she was at a rodeo. I don’t know if Tyler was caught by surprise, but I sure was, because Maria pulled Tyler’s head into chest to suck her nipples with her left hand while she dropped her right hand down below to shift his stick through his pants. Holy shit. The music was loud and heavy metal. I could hear Maria and Tyler breathing loudly on each other as they worked up a sweaty grind. Suddenly, Tyler’s body froze and Maria pulled him close. He gave her a tip and walked back into the club with the look of victory on his face. I asked him, “Dude, did you just….” “Of course I did, it’s called an LDK. And it felt fucking fantastic.” I looked back around at this weird jungle environment I was in not sure how to process all of it and Tyler said again, “It’s just capitalism.”

A couple more years go by and I had a last minute trip to meet a couple of clients for an urgent meeting. I was feeling a bit stressed the night before and suddenly Tyler calls my phone. “Hey, I saw you in the lobby, you up for going out?’ Needing to get my mind off this meeting tomorrow, I told him yes and we hit another strip club. Being the middle of the week, there were much fewer patrons to compete with. As we were sitting in one of the lounges, I saw Tyler grab a cute blonde’s hand, but she was with another patron. He apparently didn’t go for a VIP, because the blonde came back and sat on Tyler’s lap in a minute. Her name was Heidi, she was a nursing student, and she was quite a flirt. Tyler and her were all over each other just sitting in the lounge. At some point, Heidi took Tyler back to the VIP area, and as usual, I followed behind without anyone seeing me. Heidi wasted no time getting naked, straddled Tyler, and gave him the deepest French kiss ever. Tyler kissed her down her neck and I heard her moan out loud as he devoured the stiff pointed pink nipples on her firm 32C breasts. Heidi brought her hands down between them to unzip him while he brought his hands down to her ass. She turned to her side so she could lean one of legs on the couch and give Tyler enough space to let his hands go in between her legs. As Tyler got lost in the lustful but oddly intimate and comfortable VIP, Heidi saw me and looked me in the eyes and it startled me for a second. I felt feelings of adoration and affection, and wasn’t sure why. The VIP seemed to go on forever and Tyler and Heidi eventually both stammered out and headed to the restrooms to clean up. Before they parted ways, I could hear Tyler ask Heidi for her Instagram handle. On his way out of the restroom, Tyler smiled and said, “Not feeling so stressed about your meeting tomorrow huh?”

As I kept getting promoted, I kept doing what I did but the stakes were just higher. Harder clients, higher payouts, the usual corporate hierarchy. I was back in town and sure enough Tyler made his appearance on the last night. He took me out to the first club we’ve been to that was under 21 and non-alcoholic. Either the club had changed or it was just a strange night. The girls on stage were raunchier than I remember the last time. The guys sitting at the tip rail were getting PhDs in anatomy from the spreading of all sorts of body parts. I couldn’t tell if it was exciting or shocking. The girl on stage was now openly getting herself off with her fingers as the guys gathered closely around the front of the stage, crowding around to get a better view. I saw business guys just like me sitting around smoking cigars and a couple of guys seemed to have brought their wives. Wait, the wives were ok with this? Or were the wives getting turned on by it too?

As Tyler and I sat down, a cute young spinner with blondish brunette hair came on stage. Her outfit was barely there to begin with and she wasted no time getting rid of it all in the first song. She had a flawless body and was teasing all the seated patrons. By the time the third song came on, she had stopped dancing and was just performing gynecology demonstrations for each patron at the tip rail. She started on her side with one of her lean bare legs sticking out towards the patron, while she pointed the other leg straight up doing a sideways split so the patron got the greatest view of her entire crotch. Then, she would roll over onto all fours with her knees wide apart so her bare bleached and waxed asshole was staring right at the patron. It was kind of a turn on to see her do this repeatedly for each patron, but also slightly disturbing at the same time.

After she went back to change, Tyler and I both spotted her again in a bikini top and skirt standing by herself in a hallway. Before I could even say anything, Tyler went up to her and brought her back to where we were sitting. Her name was Barbie and she just started dancing a few weeks ago after graduating high school and moving to town. She said she was a good kid, got good grades, never got into trouble.

Sadly, she had a rough relationship with her parents and needed to move away. She couldn’t afford to go to college so she worked in customer service during the day and danced at night. She loved to draw and hoped to go to some kind of art, design, fashion school someday once she saved up. She was on the track and swim team in high school, and it showed, because she did not have a single ounce of cellulite on her thin, tanned, and tattooed body. While Tyler and Barbie were talking, I noticed Barbie’s phone open with Instagram and memorized her Instagram handle.

Tyler took her back to the VIP and I was able to sneak in to watch from the outside again. The VIPs had these half chair, half bed, half bean bag things, so she asked Tyler to lie down. She took off all her clothes and her high heels and positioned her thin, petite, muscular, nubile body in a 69 position. I’m not sure if it was really the standard protocol or not, but her fully shaved lightly pink colored vajayjay was literally no more than centimeter away from Tyler’s face. Meanwhile, she brought her face down to Tyler’s pelvis on the other side. I couldn’t tell if the club actually had few rules or if she just hadn’t danced enough to know them, because she wasn’t stopping Tyler from any kind of touching, groping, licking, or sucking anywhere. The more comfortable he seemed to make her, the more she seemed to allow. It might have been one of the most intense VIPs I’d ever witnessed.

After we all came out of the VIP, Tyler could sense the mixed feelings on my mind again. “What, you think what I just did was wrong?” I wasn’t sure how to answer him. “Let me ask you something, all those dipshit clients whose asses you kissed this week? You think they’re buying this shit from your firm because they want to? No, they’re buying this shit because it’s their job to buy it just like it’s your job to sell it. It’s just capitalism. The money that dipshit’s company makes goes to the dipshit to give to people like you and me, so we can go give it to girls like that her.” I couldn’t tell if Tyler was genuinely expressing a moral argument or if he was just justifying his own debauchery. “Look, it’s not your or my fault that she’s had a rough life. But maybe that money is what’s going to get her out of her rough life and get her back to school. So stop feeling guilty and weird. You are just as much a whore as she is. You whore yourself out in a fancy fucking suit and she does it naked. It’s just capitalism.”

And so it continued. Tyler and I kept coming back to town for conferences and meeting up on the last day. Tyler would DM Barbie on Instagram to let her know he’d be in town so they could hook up. I don’t know why, Tyler always dragged me to the strip club with him. Tyler told me Barbie was his ATF, a guaranteed sure thing he could count on. Tyler must have blown his bonuses (and a lot more) on Barbie over a dozen times over the last couple years.

Right before the pandemic, I was back in town, doing my thing, when I had just taken a couple of clients out for an expensive steakhouse dinner. As we walked out of the restaurant, a couple of the clients went back in to pee. I waited for them outside and suddenly heard Barbie’s voice say, “Hey Tyler!” I turned around and Barbie was standing there in an adorable t-shirt and jeans. She must have just randomly been walking around the same shopping area that I had brought my clients to. My mind started racing. Fuck, would my clients see her and ask who she was? And then it occurred to me, she said, “Hey Tyler.” Was Tyler around? I looked around with sweat starting to pour down my face and I couldn’t see him anywhere. Barbie, or whatever her real name was, must have realized I was waiting for someone, and she blew me a kiss and walked away. What the fuck just happened? After my clients came out, I got them cabs back to their hotel and walked back to mine.

As I walked into my hotel room, I was shocked to find Tyler sitting at the desk. “Jesus Tyler, what the fuck is going on here? Why did Barbie think I’m you? Answer me.” Tyler smiles and says, “Sit. I think you know. Why would anyone possibly confuse you with me?” My mind raced for a second until I finally understood. “You got it. Say it.” I swallowed and said, “Because we’re the same person.” “That’s right.” I was confused, “I don’t understand this.”
Tyler continued, “You were looking for a way to change your life. You could not do this on your own. All the ways you wish you could be, that’s me. I pick up girls like you wanna pick up girls. I spend money like you wanna spend money. I suck random girls’ nipples and finger random girls’ pussies like you wanna. I am smart, capable, confident, wealthy, and most importantly, I am free in all the ways that you are not.”

I didn’t know what to think. “Oh no, this is impossible.” Tyler continued, “People do it every day. They pretend to be other people. They see themselves as they’d like to be. They don’t have the courage you have to just run with it. “

Tyler continued, “You think her name is really Barbie? How do you even know if a single thing she said was even true? When you’re out kissing your clients’ asses, are you being honest? Where’s the morality in what you do? It’s all the same shit. Take one mask off to put on another. Spring, Maria, Heidi, Barbie, you think any of them are actually who they said they were? Those stripper personas were just their Tyler Durden. Have you ever considered the fact that you’re the only one who thinks they’re naked when they’ve probably never felt more masked or disguised ever in their life?”

“Everyone wants to blame capitalism as the problem, when maybe it was the solution all along. Gordon Gecko was right. Capitalism is what liberates us. Greed, for lack of a better word, is good, right, and works. Seriously, who is greedier, those corporate nimrods who buy your useless shit because they think it’ll raise their coin or you for selling the useless shit to them? Who’s greedier, you for paying to fondle and grope consenting girls, or the girls for charging you to do so? Who the fuck is the predator and who is the prey anyway? Your problem was that in the real world, you, your fancy degrees and fancy corporate ass jobs could never convince you whether you had mastered the system or the system had mastered you.”

“Have you ever thought about why you were so comfortable being Tyler Durden when you were in the club? Have you ever thought that maybe the strip club was the clear, pure, ethical and moral place where everything was out in the open and where you and the girls could actually just be who you wanted to be, and it’s your so-called real world that’s the fucked-up twisted fantasy with TPS reports and all the drama and bullshit?”

“Do you even really think you go into strip clubs to see a bunch of naked ass? How many naked asses do you need to see before it gets old? It was never about the naked asses. Sure there are married asshats that are going in to cheat on their wives. Sure there’s an occasional perverted piece of shit that disrespects the dancers. But that wasn’t us and that’s not what’s it’s about.”

“We are the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. Our Great Depression is our lives. You’ve been raised to believe that you’d be a millionaire, a movie god, a rock star, but you won’t. You’re slowing learning that fact and you’re very, very pissed off.”

“Going to the strip club is about freedom from this daily bullshit. It’s about escapism. It's about the thrill of the hunt. It’s about victory and conquest. It’s about celebration. It’s about relaxation. That’s what it is isn’t it? You can’t fucking deal with the fear and vulnerability of failure. You didn’t hate your boss because he calls you a loser. You hated him because you were insecure that he might be right.”

“That’s what you were escaping. You were escaping all the people who reminded you you weren’t perfect. Going to the strip club was about removing all the fucking vices wrapped around your nutsack by your dickhead bosses, your jerkoff clients, your angry wife or girlfriend, your bill collectors, your kids, by all these people you choose to whore yourself out to. It’s about the fact that despite all the people you are constantly surrounded by, that in the end, you feel alone.”

“Sure it was great to have a random pretty girl help you blow a wad once in a while, but this was about more. You didn’t go into the club to get a hardon for your dick, you went into to get a hardon for your ego. Going to the strip club is barely about arousal. It’s about adventure, attention, acknowledgement, asylum, and acceptance – all the shit you wish you could get from the real people in the real world but don’t.”

Confused, I mutter, “I don’t understand. What can’t I get rid of you?”
“You need me.”
“No. I don't. I don't any more. I don’t think I need you.”

“You created me. Take some responsibility. Have I ever let us down? How far have you come because of me? How many tuitions have we contributed to? How many careers did our VIP money build? Who was using who? God damn it, it’s just capitalism.”

I sat on my hotel bed trying to process all of my thoughts. I remembered Heidi from many years ago and looked up her Instagram page. She was a full time nurse in a small hospital in Portland Oregon. I then looked up Barbie’s handle from seeing her phone a couple years ago. Her feed was filled with photos of her with friends at the local art and design institute. She had pictures of projects she had worked on for classes. She was studying to get her bachelor’s in fine arts and become a professional designer. I smiled at the pictures of both looking happy in their new lives.

Tyler paused and said, “Friends?” I paused and said back, “I’m really ok.”