Drugs, danger, and discrimination: Portland's strippers describe precarious workplaces despite organizing for better conditions

• Labor organization efforts among Portland strippers have improved some working conditions in the area.
• Despite their efforts, dancers still report facing discrimination and sexual violence at work.

While growing mutual aid and labor organization efforts among Portland, Oregon, sex workers have had some success in improving working conditions in the area, multiple dancers told Insider they still have a long way to go as strippers in the area still often face discrimination and violence at work.

Dancers said they appreciate their jobs for flexible scheduling and higher than average wages, but making a living in the sex industry comes with painful and dangerous experiences and little support from people outside the industry to manage them.

"I'm not saying this in a bad way, I'm saying most of us bond on the fact that every dancer I've ever met has trauma," a stripper called Mercedes told Insider. "Every dancer has something super traumatic they had to go through and I think that the reason for that is because you have to have a strong mental and thick skin to be able to do this job."

Mercedes

Mercedes, a Polerotica award-winning pole dancer, has worked at multiple clubs in the Portland area in the past two and a half years. A single mother of one, she relies on her income from both stripping and selling pictures and videos online to provide for herself and her son.

Though she loves the artistic and athletic elements of stripping, she described witnessing or experiencing multiple instances of drugging, stalking, and sexual assaults while working.

"I have customers and friends of mine getting attacked in clubs because security can't do their job. I'm getting assaulted on a regular fucking basis because management won't keep creepers out," Mercedes said. "There's dudes that I have to basically hide in the dressing room most of the night when they're there because they're fucking stalker types and I don't want anything to do with them."

Whether these incidents are well-handled by management, Mercedes said, depends entirely on each individual owner, as there are no set standards for clubs handling handsy, belligerent, or violent customers. The inconsistency between clubs — and the behavior allowed within — can cause problems for strippers working with unclear expectations.

"I've not seen a single club in Portland that doesn't secretly have prostitution going on there," Mercedes said. "Not a single one. There's always something."

That prostitution goes unchecked at most venues makes dancers who don't engage in full-service sex work less safe, Mercedes said. Customers may expect that they'll be able to purchase sex from strippers and can get violent when told no.

"Don't get me wrong. I'm not trying to judge because a woman's body is her own. What she does with that is not my business," Mercedes said. "But as a dancer, as an entertainer, a performer, I don't want to compete with prostitutes. If you're going to do that, don't do it at the club."

Bunny

Bunny, a Black and nonbinary stripper and content creator who has been a sex worker for less than a year, told Insider one of the most common issues they see in clubs is drug use. Though they are regularly misgendered at work and said their race is fetishized by clients, they said the prevalence of drugs makes the club a more dangerous place to work.

"I just don't like the whole drug dealing crowd because they're always trying to like push it up on you," Bunny said.

At several clubs, Bunny said they have seen dancers dangerously intoxicated at work, with an inconsistent response from management. At one club, they worked with a dancer who was fired for being too intoxicated and causing a scene in a dressing room, while at other venues drinking and drug use from dancers and clients is ignored.

Even if the dancers aren't doing drugs themselves, the risk of clients being under the influence can impact them in dangerous ways. Bunny told Insider they once experienced a contact high after the saliva from a client high on cocaine came in contact with their nipples.

"Obviously, I didn't ingest it or anything, but it's like, that was so violating to me," Bunny said.

Bunny also told Insider that they've seen and heard of manipulation from management to get dancers to perform sexual favors in order to get preferential shifts or receive more lenient treatment when it comes to rules like drug use and prostitution.

"There's clubs that, like, if you want to actually get good shifts you like have to perform for the owners or the managers or, you know, whoever's making the schedule and a lot of people take advantage of that," Bunny said. "Like, 'how come so and so gets this and I don't' like it should be based on merit or some other fair system. And they say like, 'well, they're playing ball.'"

"And it's always that stupid fucking euphemism, like, 'Well, if you don't, you just can't hang.'"

Sarah

Harassment from managers is common among dancers, especially of "minors" — dancers over 18 years old but under the age of 21.

Sarah, a dancer for about two years, told Insider that management may use the excuse of "helping" or "mentoring" younger strippers to ultimately take advantage of them, ask for sexual favors, or put them in uncomfortable situations.

"One of our daytime managers was like, 'Do you know what happens in a VIP room?' And he was like, 'Portland has like a lot of gray area,'" Sarah said, describing an instance of sexual harassment at work. "And he, one day pulled me into the office, and was just like, 'Oh, I'm just worried about you like pleasing your customers, like I just need to know that they're getting like a good experience so that you can keep them coming back.'"

In Portland, dancers who are under 21 years old are not permitted to freely roam the floor and are confined to separate, caged stages when they aren't performing on the main stage. Keeping younger dancers separate also makes them a target for clients who are only interested in their inexperience.

"A lot of people are really into the fact that the girls in the cage are all under 21. And it's like a little creepy, but they want someone who's like, just got out of high school, as young as they can get them and there are people who would only hang around the minor stage area," Sarah said. "And I've noticed that some of the customers that liked me when I was under 21 have stopped having as much of an interest in me."

Vixen

Vixen, a former firefighter, has only been dancing for four months, but after several interactions with unsupportive management, already strongly feels the need for organization among strippers and other sex workers.

"One night, I had a couple of drinks before I went to work so I was a little tipsy while dancing, but one guy snuck a kiss in on my mouth," Vixen said. "And I was the one who got in trouble. The manager acted like I was the one who did it."

At 34 years old, working as both a stripper and private lingerie model, Vixen has a protective impulse at the venues she works at, taking younger dancers under her wing even if they have more sex work experience than she does. She looks out for them, making sure they don't drink too much or find themselves in dangerous situations. A caretaking demeanor, she says, which is not appreciated by those in charge.

"The managers have called me to the office multiple times now to tell me to stop trying to be a house mom," Vixen said.

"House moms" are usually experienced strippers or part of the management team who help take care of dancers in the club — the club Vixen works at doesn't have one and, while she isn't trying to fill the role, she doesn't want other dancers to feel like they're alone at work.

Instead of encouraging dancers to stick together or look out for one another, Vixen said, management has been discouraging of attempts to get close to other strippers.

Though Vixen has only been in sex work for a short time, she's been inspired by the things she has seen in that short time to try to support other sex workers. Since she started stripping, she has created a brand "Respect the Hustler" to try to change the public perception of sex work and promote positivity among dancers.

"I think it's important for people to realize that sex workers are real people," Vixen said. "They have real lives they have real families, they're daughters, they're mothers, they're sisters, they're fucking aunties, they're maids on the side, they're watching your kids."

Forward Momentum

Vixen is not alone in her efforts to create resources for strippers and improve the quality of their work life. Mercedes said she someday plans to start her own club with stripper-friendly policies and organizations such as the Haymarket Pole Collective have created funds to provide strippers with basic necessities and mental health support.

Despite progress made by individual dancers and organizations designed to help their material conditions, multiple dancers told Insider the attitudes surrounding sex work — both from management and clients — urgently need to change to ensure the safety of strippers and other sex workers.

"I don't care if I'm naked. That doesn't mean you get to touch me. I don't care if you're paying me for my entertainment. That's what you're paying me for, is my entertainment. And I feel like a lot of customers get that twisted," Mercedes said. "And I'm nobody's property, no dancer is anybody's property."