lady to entertainer... flipping the switch.

RickDugan has the inane capability of identifying this switch and the knowledge to know when it has been turned on.

Once the switch has been flipped, the predators will pounce.

I think from the PL side there is also a switch one flips for first deciding to go beyond 'vanilla' LDs in the form of going for ITC LDK or an extra. Then a PL has another switch for deciding to do OTC with a stripper. And eventually it becomes a switch to go straight to a prostitute.

To me personally, going beyond LDK to an extra is like that big switch you are talking about going into pr0n from stripping. I know if I ever flip that switch for me, it would change me as a person and one that I personally don't want to become.

Money and sexual fantasy are huge triggers for flipping switches of essentially pushing out one's personal moral boundaries. It's the same for PLs and strippers. I'm sure there are non-stressed going through the same thing that you just posted but only on the level of deciding to strip rather than getting into pr0n.

^ Oops. "non-stressed" was meant to be "non-strippers"

@PD - you offer very interesting insights. Your post almost seems like stream of consciousness thinking.

When we need money - we need a job - and there are many different places for us to look. For some folks - stripping would be one of the last things we’d consider. The morality of the job might be far from any part of the decision. The truth might be simple - as most folks might choose to find a job in a field that is familiar - based on family upbringing - or based on friendly recommendations.

I’m sure you will be a successful entertainer.

The process that you describe reminds me of stages of change theory, which is most often applied to addiction recovery. But it might also apply to any personal change in behavior, including the decisions to become a stripper, to dance nude, to do extras, etc.

Here are the stages from a google search of "stages of change":

"individuals move through a series of stages—precontemplation (PC), contemplation (C), preparation (PR), action (A), and maintenance (M)—in the adoption of healthy behaviors or cessation of unhealthy ones (Prochaska & Velicer, 1997)"

The equally interesting issue is what factors move a person from one stage to another, sometimes economic issues, sometimes pre-existing or changing beliefs, sometimes knowing someone who tried out a new behavior, sometimes sampling the new behavior and having a good or bad experience, etc.

Economics is the primary motivator. Girls with little education or experience can earn big bucks as strippers. But as you say, some girls will not follow this career path.

Strippers, in my experience, are less inhibited and more sexual than most girls. They come from lower class neighborhoods and have no interest in pursuing advanced degrees. Their families are often dysfunctional--divorce, abuse, violence, drugs and alcohol. They often have friends or relatives who have stripped, and so it does not seem too foreign to them. Many of them like drugs and alcohol, and a strip club is one of the few workplaces that condone being high on the job.

i agree with all of those things jack i guess im looking at it in a more deep way. ive often wondered if things were less taboo would more girls start stripping. if the social ramifications werent so bad maybe so.

I met someone that was very stripper-like just prior to beginning clubbing. A young woman addicted to pain killers, was ADD, tattoos, smoked, came from an abusive family. But she was working in construction... Never hinted at ever considering stripping. So yeah, sometimes the ingredients are there but the switch does not flip.

^ I really do hope that economics is the primary motivator these days. I don't think it always was. Back in the 90s when i went to school, girls often thought that strippers were so slutty (and this was when air dances or one way contact were the norm), and porn stars made 10-20k a week featuring at strip clubs. And they made almost as much shooting porn. Even as much as pink collar workers or sex workers made (and these figures are from todays dollars well over 20 years ago), many "regular" hot girls would and could not be motivated to get into this line of work. It usually required some dysfunctional psychology often heavy sexual abuse when they were children to warp their perspective of what their bodies were meant for and at least they could monetize it quite handsomely without consideration of the consequences.

Fast forward to the present and despite the strip club scene become more interactive and raunchy and i don't know how much of the mainstream really knows what goes on but the music industry (particularly urban) has glamorized strip clubs as a potential career choice with less stigma and many more people do consider it an honest living as well as the explosion of the cam scene. And you have the oversexualization of the current young generation with social media like Instagram selfies, sexting on smart phones, Tinder and just the loose hook-up culture in general. Also, technology has just made it easier to do sex work as well with Craigslist, Backpage, SeekingArangements. The current recession and it's long lingering effects have also made stripping (and to a lesser degree other sex work) much more attractive in terms of making a living when otherwise a woman may not be able to pay off her bills let alone live a high standard or living.

I treat the clubs I go to as the bars that they are and on many occasions I am there to drink and watch sports. A lot of the dancers when they aren't busy will come around for 10 -90 minutes to shoot the shit etc. Over the past 35 years I notice that speaking to about 80% of the dancers remind me of speaking to a lot of t he abused women I represent in family court. In my mind a large segment of dancers were abused or mistreated when they were young and as such were never raised with the elf-confidence or self-respect needed to figure out that the more money people make, the more trade offs are required. They seem to gross a lot of money but as with my criminal clients, they simply piss the money away. Ill gotten money is spent and seldom saved, but without the confidence to change one's life they stay stuck. One of the clubs I go to has been a place I have been going for 30 years, so I get to see the dancers come in with the idea of making money and getting out and then over the years I watch the dream fail; their looks fail and one day I walk in and they are tending bar or have become the house mother. To answer PD - for most of these dancers the group they socialize with sees nothing wrong with dancing. My wife wanted to dance when she was young, but married an abusive guy instead, just to get out of her parents house. She was abused by a relative as a little kid, so her "confession" about wanting to dance came as no surprise.

Skibum put it quite well. Jives with my own exp as well, I have dated 2 girls who danced seriously. 1 I met in the SC. Both of them had family/abuse issues. Both had dysfunction issues growing up and carried into adulthood. Neither had serious drug or alcohol abuse though. Both had friends or family in the biz prior, so I also got to know them as well.
Both were however true Gems, diamonds in the rough who maintained their humanity throughout their dance careers.
@Sir LD agree up to the point about us PLs and prostitutes. I personally would never, especially the streetwalker variety, though I know guys who used to do that after the SC. Our switch is somewhat different, after all it's not what we do for a living, though it can have life changing consequences also.

When does a PL switch to the pay for sex acts happen?

Some are in it for the thrill because their lives are empty and need to fill a void, and she satisfies that for him.

My excuse is to get away from my crazy work and family life so I can be entertained by other people's crazy work and family life at the club. But I definitely leave it at the club.

I wonder about those crazy teachers (the ladies) that have sex with all those teenage boys and then get caught. Most of them don't do serious prison time (although male teachers often have the book thrown at them); i don't think they always should, as i don't think most of them are really that much of a danger to society in general, as long as they aren't allowed to be in a position of power over youths, and they usually aren't. But still the damage is done (to both parties). The teacher now has a useless degree since she can never teach again and probably still has student loans if she's still young. If she's married or in a committed relationship with or without children, that is usually gone and she has to support herself on her own. She has to register as a sex offender which is public knowledge and is going to have a hard time finding any decent employment. Likely, she will probably turn to sex work. I'm not giving her an excuse or absolving blame, but her life is pretty much turned upside down.
The boys (and sometimes girls) on the other hand will have to go through a circus for a good part of their life and have to deal with unnecessary shame and guilt (this is probably worse for the girls), probably even more because they were caught.

Hey PD. You've been creating several good discussion topics lately. Keep it up please. Love your perspective.

Question for you - If you could find a traditional job paying 75% of what you make now with the standard set hours and dip ship managers would you take it?

To your question - life is complex. Without guidance it becomes easy to go in debt and derail into all kinds trouble that is difficult to pull out of. Very easy. Given the generations of single young single moms broken families etc...it is no wonder so many women have turned to dancing or porn to make money just to survive. Factor in semi pro sugar babies and the numbers go up exponentially. I think the stigma of making making using sex is slowly fading.

Like getting on government assistance, once the line is crossed to get that easy sex money, it is difficult to stop.

A lot of dancers seem to get into stripping after breakups with significant others. Sometimes it's with a boyfriend and the girl develops a "what the fuck" attitude. Sometimes it's a divorce, and money problems are an additional incentive. Of course a lot of women become dancers because they have a child to feed. I've met some who came to this country with no skills and almost no ability to speak English, so stripping is the one thing that allows them to provide for themselves (and their children). Of course many girls now strip to pay for college. Girls today are being sexualized at unbelievably young ages. All it takes to get explicit hardcore porn is a phone, and everyone has a phone these days. Society has gone from Breakfast at Tiffany's to Pretty Woman to 50 Shades of Gray. Every young girl these days has read all the books and seen all the movies. Don't know how many ex-cheerleaders I've come across in strip clubs. Girls who were raised extremely conservatively, either Catholic or Mormon, can go to extremes in rebellion. And sometimes there is actual abuse some distant time. A girl I knew had a thing for older guys, not guys who were old enough to be her father, but rather guys who were old enough to be her grandfather. Another dancer I knew well told me how she had lost her father at the age of three due to suicide...

Good idea, very interesting. I also think a lot of it has to do with the "pre-contemplative" future stripper's friends. If, when your switch "flips," you have friends, acquaintances, family members in the business, it makes it easier to take action on the urge. I know a lot of sister's, mother/daughter, or schoolmates work at the places I frequent.