tuscl

Some Humor on Ohio Bill 16

yndy
Maryland
Friday, May 18, 2007 2:14 PM
[view link] Move over Hef, here comes Bobby! State Rep. Robert “Bobby” Hagan, D-Youngstown, showed up Wednesday in the Ohio House with his “girls” — and for a little while at least, there was some comic relief in the otherwise staid chamber that's dominated by Republicans. Indeed, when Bobby's girls were recognized as guests in the House, they received a round of applause. And why not — that's the closest some of the legislators would have come to exotic dancers — strippers, to you liberal Democrats. Why Booby's (oops, Bobby's) girls? Because they were his guests — for a debate on one of the most pressing issues in Ohio today: Controlling what goes on between strippers and customers in adult clubs. Thus, after welcoming the visitors, who wore pink T-shirts emblazoned with “Dancers for Democracy” and who unfurled a banner that read, “Talk is cheap. Speech is priceless,” the House passed a bill that includes a no-touching rule and bans full nudity at clubs after midnight. The 73-24 vote was along party lines. The bill is backed by a conservative Christian group, Citizens for Community Values. It's the same organization that pushed through a constitutional amendment in 2004 banning gay marriage. Hagan, who spoke out against the legislation with passion and humor, was the man of the hour — at least for the strippers. After the House session, the exotic dancers surrounded him in the hallway to thank him for defending their right to bump and grind. There was some affectionate touching, which prompted Hagan to remind the dancers that the bill passed by the House would prohibit such expressions of gratitude.

14 comments

  • casualguy
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    17 years ago
    I'm surprised the people in Ohio want to pay their police force to enforce something as silly as this. I would rather pay a police force to go catch people robbing banks, killing others, stealing identities, etc. etc. rather than spending time in a strip club observing if a dancers tits violated a spacing distance of a couple of inches. I guess the police in Ohio can bring their flashlights into the strip clubs to keep a better eye on those tits to see if they get too close to a customer. Meanwhile, Joe blow is breaking into someone's home. Sam blow is breaking into someone's car. Mr Smith is stealing someone's credit card all while the people of Ohio worry about those tits getting too close to a guy in a strip club. I guess they got their priorities straight in Ohio.
  • Book Guy
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    17 years ago
    Some hotties here: [view link] But I don't understand why erotic dance services should count as protected under the First Amendment free-speech rule. I mean, I AGREE that they should be protected -- I want as many erotic dance services as possible (and can we get a constitutional amendment that makes them cheaper, too?). But I don't follow the reasoning, of tying it to "free speech" in some manner. It's not self-expression, is it? Not any more, than my right to turn left or right at the intersection of Esplanade and Rampart. It's a "choice" of mine, but it's not somehow ... "free speech" like Patrick Henry and George Washington fought for, is it? There's a no-left-turn sign, by the way ...
  • Pete22z
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    17 years ago
    A lap dance, just like any dance, can be construed as a means of expression. How have the lessons of "Footloose" and "Breakin' I & II" been so quickly forgotten?
  • Book Guy
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    17 years ago
    Yeah, I GUESS that "dance" is an "art form" and therefore has something to do with "self expression" and therefore ought to fall under the first-amendment protection of free speech. Vaguely. I just HARDLY see the connection. I don't complain, that courts and lawyers tend to equate the two (first-amendment protection of free speech, and right to lap dances) more closely than I tend to equate them, since I consider that equation to be in my self interest. More lappers, and hoorah First Amendment protection of them! But really, scenario: late at night in Club Rubber Inner Tube a girl is grinding on my hee-haw with her hootchie-coo for $20 a song. I'm mildly drunk. In seven other locations the same thing is going on within thirty feet of me, yet absolutely none of those men will ever talk to me, and I will be involved in absolutely none of their lap dances (I hope!). Through the course of the night one hundred forty-five other similar events will take place. All participants understand the sexual nature of the business at the establishment. What "expression" has been "expressed", which would be endangered were it not for the First Amendment? What is she "saying" or "stating" or somehow politically "communicating" by means of grinding in my lap? The girl is hot, whether or not she sits on my lap; she is not "turned on" by me, whether or not she sits on my lap; no other customer's right to free association and assembly would change, were the First Amendment suddenly not apply to Club Rubber Inner Tube. There is no discourse. No paper will be written, no philosophical school invented, no political party unseated on the basis of the astute and grammatical paragraphs of "movement language" which the girl has somehow "delivered metaphysically" in my general direction. There is no grammar to her self-expression. There is no content to it. It is not a sentence, a paragraph, an utterance. It relates in no way to ideas that I have communicated verbally about any political party -- I could be a Republican, a Democrat, a Bull Moose, a Whig, and still get a boner underneath her hootchie-coo's grindage. I could join or leave the Communist Party, write or burn a screenplay, and her lap dance would have nothing to do with whether or not McCarthy called me to the House UnAmerican Activities Committee. What is she "expressing"? Aside from, the merest of simple facts of existence. A girl "expresses" via a lap dance nothing more than, that her crotch is on my crotch, and she only does that to the merest of extents, for example as far as a giraffe "expresses" that its own neck is long and spotted by merely standing up in a zoo somewhere. This is not "self expression" to me, therefore is not related to speech to be protected by the First Amendment. I wish it were, but I just can't see a very strong connection at all.
  • shadowcat
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    17 years ago
    A couple of years ago, a dancer brought her mother into the club. She sat up close to the stage. I asked the dancer "what does your mother think about this?" "She thinks that it is an art form and part of the freedom of expression" Her mother did not observe what went on in the lap dance rooms.
  • Pete22z
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    17 years ago
    Physical forms of expression: hugs, kisses, pat on the back, pat on the ass, etc. Any one of these things has little political merit and yet are valid forms of expression. Just the context and timing of these actions can communicate quite a bit of information. I do believe some of them could be considered illegal in certain parts of the world if performed publicly. Dances are of course subjective and very open to interpretation. I've had dances from girls that were just a physical service performed for a fee -- comparable to getting a haircut or an operation. However, if the dancer chooses to make a dance personal, she can communicate quite a bit of information through eye contact, facial expression, touch, pressure, etc. Was the information conveyed of great importance? It felt important to me, but wouldn't mean jack squat to anyone else. Now, should the government really concern itself with the difference between the two? Hmmmm, a law against impersonal and boring dances...it might be a good thing...
  • Book Guy
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    17 years ago
    Pete: your points about some of the more subtle "communications" going on are not lost on me. In fact, that IS the cornerstone of the pro-lapper movement, this concept that it's not like a haircut, it's like a hug. And from that point of view I do agree, it "shouldn't" be limited by law. Then again, I don't really see that it's a First Amendment issue. The "point" of that Amendment is to prevent the gummint from squelching opposition by means of totalitarian measures which limit free expression. The "point" of a lap-dance is to get me off. We aren't doing it as a political act. I guess that doesn't really hold LEGAL water. You don't read the Constitution, say to yourself, "Well, the POINT of it was ... X, so I'm allowed to ignore the rest of it," and go about your day. One is required to read and observe ALL of it AS WRITTEN. Lucky for the pro-lapper movement. :) Right to privacy, right to self-expression, right to peacable assembly and association with others, they're all very important to me. The reason I nit-pick the arguments which seem to support the equation of lappers, on the one hand, with political speech protected by the First Amendment, on the other, is that I want to know what the pitfalls are. I'm not a lawyer or judge (though I do enjoy trying to think like one, on occasion), so it's of course just armchair lawyerizing. But sometimes the armchair sort of discussion gets more at the root of the matter, than the "official" one does. And above all, I want to know the enemy and forestall his advances. If I can find a loophole in the pro-lapper argument, I can more effectively aid that movement in countering the anti-lappers. Or at least write about the idea to someone who has more clout than me. And really, I DO consider writing to people, sometimes. I send those emails to my Congressmen, when they come around the internet from friends and I agree with the concepts in them. I know of Luke Loirot, a lawyer in Tampa who regularly chimes in on Civil Liberties issues (sometimes in a rather grand-standing way, I must admit). He and Joe Redner, owner of Mons Venus, like to put themselves at the forefront of all publicity in these matters. I wonder what they'd say to these questions.
  • Pete22z
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    17 years ago
    Fight the Power my brotha'.
  • Justanotherexvirgin
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    17 years ago
    The last I heard, there was little chance the bill will pass in the Democratically-controlled Ohio House of Representatives. All that means is that the religious nuts who are pushing for it will then get petitions together to get the item on a state-wide ballot, probably in Niovember '08. And it will pass. This state is full of people who take perverse pleasure in doing away with a minority's idea of fun. The fact that many dancers are paying their way through school or just trying to keep their kids fed doesn't matter. The only way nude dance clubs will be legal once this passes will be if the Supreme Court rules it unconstitutional. With "W" appointing the judges there's little chance of that. The last time such an issue was thrown out of court, the dancers' lawyer used a First Amendment argument regarding "free speech" to get a restrictive law thrown out. Of course, as slow as the courts are, it may not get in front of the court before 2015!
  • chandler
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    17 years ago
    Book Guy: I agree with your questioning of the First Amendment defense. However, I think part of the justification relates to the issue of nudity and sexual expression in public performances more than private dancing. Usually laws like this Ohio bill don't simply address sexual services in private dances. They can't resist including provisions on how much skin needs to be covered, how many feet away from the customers the dances must stay, what kind of gestures dancers may engage in onstage. The courts are understandably skeptical about government's attempts to repress activities like that, which could just as well be a part of a serious stage play. Historically, suppression of sexual freedoms in the arts has been something like a canary in the coal mine, warning of a general, brutal tyranny in the making. Not that US constitutional law recognizes that principle, but I bet judges are mindful of it.
  • Book Guy
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    17 years ago
    Hahahah, so the fundamentalists are their own worst enemies! Hahaha, they get what they deserve. If only they'd restrain their impulse to impose their will on all behaviors of all others 100% of the time, and just impose some restrained restraints, then they might get some of what they want. Nyah nyah ... :)
  • ThisOldManPlayed1
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    17 years ago
    Read in the Columbus Dispatch today, an editorial that certain Ohio politicians were asked if they ever visited a strip club. Most said yes with one big denial. 6 foot rule, close at midnight to include Adult book stores! What a crime! Ohio generates 37 million $$$ in taxes and fees every year from their strip clubs. Now they're voting to eliminate $37 mil income for the state? LAUGH!! Now that I am 'having' to live in Ohio for awhile, I guess I'll be saving a lot of money for my visits OUTSIDE THIS FRIGGING STATE!!!!
  • yndy
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    17 years ago
    will this go to Ohio courts first, and then appealed all the way up to US Supreme Court? i haven't read the law yet, but one blogger mentioned there is not a single word about enforcement. May 22, 2007 5/22/2007 6:26:00 PM New strip club bill to become law without Strickland signature COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - A bill that puts new strip club regulations in place in Ohio, including a ban on patrons touching dancers, will become law without Gov. Ted Strickland's signature, a spokesman said Tuesday. The Senate on Tuesday voted 25-8 to adopt the House version on the measure that includes a rule prohibiting patrons from touching dancers rather than keeping them 6 feet from dancers at all times, as originally proposed. There was no debate. In light of economic, educational and other problems Ohioans face, the debate over the bill was 'silly,' Strickland said before the Senate voted. 'I think this issue has consumed too much time and attention.' Strickland spokesman Keith Dailey said Strickland wants to focus on the issues that matter the most to most Ohioans. 'If he were persuaded it was unconstitutional, he would have vetoed the bill,' Dailey said. Patrons of strip clubs and dancers will not be allowed to touch each other under the bill, which will take effect in late August.
  • ThisOldManPlayed1
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    17 years ago
    A note to all OHIO politicians and all those PURIST citizens of OHIO: A personal thanks to you all for allowing me to SAVE money! Problem is... I will be taking it OUT OF STATE to spend on strippers! Next year when you find your STATE in a deficit crisis, don't EVEN think about allowing strip clubs in your STATE anymore. You all blew it when you enacted this Bill 16 and lost millions of incoming dollars! And finally for all you OHIO purists who vote in decency laws and standards...... don't ever light up a cigarette, don't ever take a drink, don't you ever take you clothes off in front of anyone again, and by all means..... don't EVER say a curse word! OHIO - The Holy Land!!
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