Values, Norms, Power Struggles, and Hierarchy Among Women Working as Club Strippers in Israel: A Qualitative Perspective

Abstract

This qualitative study analyzes the attitudes of 11 women who work as club strippers in an attempt to discern the characteristics of the subculture of Israeli strip clubs as viewed in real time. A thematic analysis of individual interviews indicated the existence of a women’s strip club subculture in Israel. This is typified by ongoing efforts to reduce mental and emotional stress, deceit, ambivalence, and power struggles, as articulated in the intense consumption of alcohol, relationships between strippers and their peers, and strippers’ sexual and non-sexual relations with club owners and clients. The study concludes that this subculture serves as a platform for generating and designing social systems and achieving various needs and desires unfulfilled in general society; however, it simultaneously weakens the woman stripper who lacks the necessary pragmatic instruments to preserve her fundamental human and occupational rights.