There is no shortage of businesses still clinging to traditional sexism, capitalising on exploiting women’s bodies and sexuality, despite a growing societal awareness into the harms of objectification.
Ian Strover, owner of Perth tavern The Sixty30, has spent almost five years trying to introduce topless waitresses into the venue.
His application attracted objections from local residents, police and women’s rights groups, but garnered support from those who share his financial motivations, including the managing director of Perth’s Best Girls stripping agency, Natalie Baker, who recruited support for the application on social media.
To date, his applications and an appeal have been denied by the Liquor Commission.
“It is also important to distinguish between the public interest and private interests … the application is primarily concerned with the private financial interests of the applicant and the operators of Perth’s Best Girls,” noted the director of Liquor Licensing.
“Whilst ‘Dan the Man’, ‘Show me pussy’, ‘Robbo’, ‘Marshy’, ‘Bob’, ‘Jacko’, ‘Swanny’, ‘Fido’, and others may want to see strippers at the hotel based on their signing of the questionnaire, there is nothing before the commission that is capable of establishing that the variation of the licence is in the public interest.”
This latest rejection has not deterred Mr Strover, who has already invested $40,000 in legal costs in his righteous battle for boobs on demand, and has pledged to take his fight all the way to the Supreme Court if he has to — God forbid venue patrons have to suffer the minor inconvenience of not being able to ogle women’s naked breasts while they drink a beer.
Power imbalance
The reason sexual entertainment exists and maintains some appeal is simple: the fully clothed men who frequent such venues get a kick out of being served by women wearing little or no clothing.
Author and sociologist Dr Gail Dines explains: “It’s no accident that in prisons the first thing a prisoner has to do is strip naked, because to be naked in the presence of somebody clothed is to be in a vulnerable situation.”
Consider the power dynamic at play when topless or near-naked women serve fully dressed men.
These unequal power relations are the very premise sexual entertainment venues are built on.
Women are reduced to decorative objects, eye candy or merely sexy props, whose job it is smile, flirt and boost men’s flailing egos without presenting the sort of threat that comes with being regarded as an equal.
A toll on all women
Researchers have documented the psychological toll for female employees in workplace settings where sexual objectification of women is endorsed, from so-called “breastraunts” (think Hooters) to strip clubs.
These women describe sexual harassment, unwanted lewd comments and sexual advances, reporting feeling a range of negative emotions such as anxiety, depressed mood and degradation.
A report from Coalition Against Trafficking in Women Australia includes scenarios of female staff in strip clubs experiencing degrading and abusive treatment from male customers, such as being spat on, sprayed with beer and having men trying to pull their clothes off.
Research indicates women report increased harassment, abuse and violence in areas in close proximity to sexual entertainment venues.
The Victorian Prostitution Control Act Advisory Committee report found such sites created “no go” zones for women by cultivating an environment unsafe for women, with patrons harassing women outside clubs, with cat-calling, harassment and “open hostility” and the assumption being “any woman is up for sex”.
Attitudes behind the violence
More broadly, men’s violence against women is on our radar: we recognise it is at epidemic levels and urgent steps must be taken to rectify it.
But it’s not enough to merely condemn violence against women. In order to see any meaningful changes we need to address the roots of male violence and identify the cultural conditions in which violence against women thrives, such as gender inequality, casual sexism and an entitlement to women’s bodies.
There are those who argue that if women want to work in sexual entertainment, then it should be legitimised. But as Dr Meagan Tyler, Vice Chancellor’s Research Fellow at RMIT, explains: “If you allow some women to be bought and sold for men’s sexual arousal or entertainment, then you compromise the position of all women in a community.”
All women are affected. And all government initiatives to address men’s violence against women undermined.
It’s time to decide where our values lie — with men’s “right” to accessing breasts on demand or with upholding the full humanity and status of women?
Caitlin Roper is a campaigner against the sexual exploitation of women and girls.
