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Forgive me sisters, for I have sinned. I have been a crappy feminist.
I’m here because I love pole. Y’all probably already know that, because a lot (all?) of us are here because of that passion. I also someday want to own and operate a studio. I want to be a leader in a local pole community and contribute to pole culture. I want to draw new people in – men, women, people who identify otherwise – all kinds of people.
This means I NEED to get better at a few things. Like *not* jumping to being defensive when (male) coworkers mention “stripper.” Of course I know there are many styles of pole. Of course I know pole, as I practice it, has roots in strip clubs. Of COURSE I know better than to act judgmental about women who choose to strip! But here I’ve been, taking a defensive tone like NOPE THAT’S NOT ME as if there’s something shameful in there.
This defensiveness is my knee-jerk because it’s in response to people I know have spent their fair share in clubs, and they say it with that gross tone that sounds like there’s no way it can ever be a respectable thing to do. My primal lizard brain thinks, “If that’s their only association, and they don’t respect the pole dancers they’ve seen, then they don’t respect me, and I HAVE to make them respect me!”
But really…I don’t. Why should I give a fuck what some of these people think? They’re coworkers, but they’re not my supervisors and they’re not potential students. Just loudmouths that most of the office knows are sort of jerks anyway.
Dear strippers and anyone who does sexy style pole – I’m so sorry I’ve taken this tone when I should have made it an opportunity to say any of the sassy or educational comebacks mentioned in the two threads linked below. I get flustered and anxious and revert to primal lizard brain, and I do all of us a disservice. I’m working on it, I swear.
https://www.studioveena.com/forums/view/2937
https://www.studioveena.com/forums/view/530378eb-00cc-49ed-982d-45ea0a9aa0eb
For being so passionate about pole, getting ridiculously excited about breaking down a move or combo to figure out, finding a new song to add to my pole playlist (which is seven hours long and growing!!!), I’m actually incredibly shy about talking about it with people. At an office party, I spent a good twenty minutes talking to a new coworker’s wife, trying to feel it out and see if I should invite her over to let me practice teaching, when suddenly my husband jumps in and outs me! It actually went over great, she was very excited and is familiar with videos of Anastasia Sokolova.
Most people I’ve had the guts to bring it up with have a positive response. “Oh, you do that? That’s so cool! I bet you really bust your ass! etc.” Now that I’m breaking it down and thinking hard about it as I write this, I’m pretty much only shy because of a couple of jerks at work, whom I didn’t like much before telling them about pole anyway.
When I first started pole, I staunchly wanted to imitate Oona Kivela’s sporty athleticism. But as I practice more, and watch endless performance videos and follow endless polers on instagram (I’m currently following more polers than I am actual friends OOPS lol), I’ve dabbled in sexy stripper-y style when no one’s looking. Y’all. It’s so fun! I’ll have to work up way more guts to do it where anyone could see me, but I no longer want to emulate *just* Oona. The pole world is too big to be inspired by just one performer/athlete/dancer/stripper.
Roz the Diva (who is totally my #WCW this week) has a short video on her IG that’s her basic pitch for pole. To paraphrase: A mash-up of gymnastics, strength training, and dancing! I’m totally going to steal this and practice saying it in the shower. If I expect to get ANYWHERE with my own studio or teaching service, I know that I MUST get more smooth and chill about how I handle presenting pole to all flavors of people, future enthusiasts and jerks alike. Give me time, I’ll get there.
I started writing this post thinking I would ask to re-open the discussions of, “How do YOU talk about pole to people who aren’t familiar with it?” But this isn’t a new question. The answers are there. I just need to pick some out, try them on, see how they work. Maybe now a better question would be, “What do you do, or what do you wish people would do, to promote pole as a community and as a thing people can have fun doing?” Maybe after writing this out I can no longer articulate an exact question, lol, but there may still be a question hiding in these paragraphs. And maybe this just should’ve been a blog post. But I’ve been thinking about a nice big bundle of grand pole thoughts while I start working on my first instructor certification (!!!! EARLY CHRISTMAS PRESENT YAAAY! THANKS, DAD!!!!), so if nothing else, here’s a public documentation of some awkward personal growth.
Here’s a question, finally – In what ways have you grown as a person since taking up pole?
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16 Replies
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The “stripping” has always been a favorite part of mine as far as finding dance goes. Sheila kelley pulled me into pole and her love for it came from playing the role of a stripper , then realizing after the role was gone there was something there she had found about herself that she really liked !! Being 3 years into pole I love the sexier side now more than ever . I will admit along the way there’s been guilt for liking to feel sexy etc but I’ve learned at the end of the day pleasing the world does nothing for me if I’m not being fulfilled. Stripping is powerful. Loving your body and owning it is fully whatever shape size etc is priceless !! Women need to be lifted up by their fellow women, Not compared! I plan on sharing body love in the town I live in as well. I want to do more s factor style where women get to know their bodies and how they move in a meditative state of bliss. Letting the body do the talking for the first time in many women’s lives. It’s coming. Feminists are rising up, even men can be feminists. There are too many of us this time .We are being heard and seen 😠thanks for the post. Was fun to read !
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I get the disconnect you have in your mind between strippers and pole artists–I do it too, even though I agree it’s not right. Thanks for putting this out for discussion, because I think it’s proper to give credit to the roots and not deny people are out there doing this for a living. And, dabbling in the sexier side doesn’t mean you’re doing exactly the same thing (not that this is what you were saying). And anyway, it sucks we have to defend ourselves for something that really isn’t that wrong if it’s being chosen freely. If a person wants to strip and pole, great! If another wants to approach it from a more family-friendly pole-athlete side, that’s fantastic, too! As for the style aspect, I want to be more athletic, but I think my background in belly dance causes me to want to freestyle in a more sexier way than purely athletic. IDK. I do love it! Way fun, but I haven’t dared do this yet in front of others (or make a video).
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One way I’ve grown–to answer your question–is by not getting so angry with my body for not being an ideal size or shape all the time. I’m wearing pole clothes and not freaking out. I’m not getting jealous or mean towards other women for being younger/cuter/better at pole. It’s like I quit competing with the world and started appreciating what I can do for ME. Great question!
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Thanks for the responses so far, y’all! It’s neat to hear other people weigh in and can’t wait to read more.
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Unfortunatly, this is perfect discussion for introducing myself.I am Renata and I am newbie in Veenas community 🙂 Well, I live in Croatia. Croatia is beautiful Mediterranean country with amazing nature, wonderful Adriatic sea and the most narrow-minded people ever. Saying “I am a pole dancer†in most part of my country is the same as saying “I’m a witch†in 16th century. As I get tired of explaing that pole dance is not disrespecting womens body, it is celebrating it, I decided to stop doing it. It is Sysiphus job, indeed. It isn’t truth that roots of pole dance are stripper clubs, it is actually a circus. But as long as we are living in male-dominating world, stripper pole will be first association about pole dancing and a word stripper will be disrespectful. I don’t care any more if anybody calls me a stripper – as long as I am happy stripper. Please, excuse me for potential grammar massacre, haven’t used english in a while (except listening lessons :))
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It was wrong expression 🙂 I am still pole dancing, but I stopped explaining the difference between stripping and pole dancing, I stopped defending myself cause it is Sysiphus job, it just doesn’t make sense. My new New Year’s resolution is to take some enlish lessons 🙂
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Renata, welcome to SV, you are in good hands here. And personally I love ur english.
As for this whole discussion, has anyone considered that WE are the ones making this problematic for ourselves? I think back to the days of when I was in a Latin dance troupe, or taking ballroom dance with my hubby, or when I was fanatical about kick-boxing or an advanced step aerobics class/trainer that I got so hooked on. Or the flamenco classes I was taking a while back. Or when I took up Lyra and fell in love with it. Or… I guess my point is, why do we feel pole as an activity (workout/sport, form of dance/therapy/whatever, etc) is in a special class of “mention”? Suddenly we get all sneaky about this new thing we take up and love, and treat it all taboo. Why? Do we do that about anything else we have an interest in and spend time or energy doing, presumably for our well-being? Be it a cooking class of prayerevan group, or who knows what… do we really bother going around telling the whole world abt what we did or started doing? (Does everybody even CARE what we do that much? Other than our partners/kids/BFFs? maybe parents too?)… anyway I started thinking, “if I do a yoga class or join an intramural soccer team, do I bother telling anyone? Let alone make a big old deal out of it?” I mean how often do we hear about our co-workers’ workouts at the gym or whatever? Pretty uninteresting topic I would think, other than to the person doing it. Not to minimize what we do and love on the pole, but it’s only important to US, and anyone else who may be interested in it for themselves. Marketing activity aside (say for a pole biz/performer/etc), when (and why?) did we start becoming all evangelistic about pole?
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I’ve been away and I’m still on a trip but I wanted to pass by and answer what I can, even if I have to come back in and expand on it later.
WonderRenchy – Welcome to SV! Your English is good! Second languages are challenging for anyone and I think most of us understand you just fine. Can you elaborate on how/why you refer to stripping as a Sysiphys job? I need to go read up on that myth. 🙂
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Firebird – I notice you’re in San Diego. Is pole pretty mainstream there? In the Midwest and across a lot of the South, pole isn’t mainstream. In my experience that I hinted at above, telling some people about pole is met with derision because they don’t hear much about it and don’t respect it. When the person doing pole isn’t used to that kind of adversity in conversation, it can make them want to be sneaky about it and avoid talking about it too much.
But the prevailing attitudes about pole in these regions won’t change unless we timid polers get braver and become evangelistic about it, all styles included, until pole really does become as mundane and “not a big deal” as soccer or yoga. I think we need to take a cue from the Crossfit people and not shut up about it, lol!
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Firebird, I know what you mean. The only times I really speak about pole is when someone asks what I do as a hobby or if someone asks how my pole dancing is going.
I used to get defensive when someone made judgments but I think it’s really up to you whether or not you let it affect you…
The people that I’m close to know that I do it and they haven’t said one bad word about it, just encouraging .. I think that’s really all that matters, Because everyone in this world has their opinions… My partner and I, for example, have many opposing opinions, but we agree to disagree.
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San Diego, while in progressive Cali, can be fairly conservative too. You got a lot of Military, that alone nevermind the diversity of cultures (lots of Latino and Asian folks, more and more middle-Eastern and African refugees — many Muslim…). Anyway lots of everything here. My point I think was lost. It’s all the “non-mentioning” of pole people feel like they have to do — vs the mentioning we WOULD do? That’s weird to me. I’m a very extroverted and chatty person by nature, and very few topics at off-limits to me –and yet even I think it’s a bit cray to think we gotta go telling ppl about the latest hobby/passion we have taken up. I guess *maybe* it can come up in casual convo? That’s still a bit weird and far-fetched to me. And frankly, as for the Crossfit folks u bring up as an example? Um, yeah they can be a bit cray themselves.
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Omg, it’s good to discuss this. Think the fantasy of stripper just follows “pole dance”. This seems deeply rooted in men’s minds. The more we educate and inform people about the beautiful athletic workout of pole, will we slowly bring this to the awareness of everyone. I read 59,000 poles were sold in USA in 2014. It was hard for me to tell my mother. Sent a clip of a class l was in, and that really helped her. It is so nice to embrace my feminine side and feel good about myself. Plus pole help me through divorce. What more can l say.
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A related article: http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/notastripper-pole-dancing-instagram/
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