Earlier this year, the Washington State legislature adopted Bill SB 6105, better known as the Strippers’ Bill of Rights, a new state law that will protect strippers’ rights in the workplace. This law began as a grassroots effort in 2018 led by the organization Strippers Are Workers, when dancers, fed up with the lack of safety and labour protection at work, started to organize.
This bill will provide strippers with protection in terms of occupational health and safety, labour law, and have a positive impact on our human rights in the workplace. There are also some interesting clauses that try to preempt further moral panics, safeguards against Footloose.
As a stripper in Ontario, I was amazed at how much better strippers were treated in Washington compared to in Ontario during the pandemic. At one point during the pandemic, there was a huge moral panic and ensuing media circus when as a knee jerk reaction to Covid-19 outbreaks at two Toronto strip clubs, the province enacted a blanket closure of all the provinces’ strip clubs, while adjacent businesses such as bars, nightclubs and pole dancing studios were allowed to remain open.
Instead of consulting with strippers, the government shut strippers out of the conversation to the point that they required club owners to submit a safety plan to the province, all without the knowledge or input of strippers – the very workers who would be most affected. The organization Work Safe Twerk Safe launched a judicial review of the decision, but the government dragged out the legal proceedings to the point that by the time strippers got their day in court, the case was no longer considered timely as strip clubs had all reopened by then.
On the other hand, Washington state took strippers’ health and safety concerns seriously. They consulted with them via advisory panels, and Strippers Are Workers also collected their own data to demonstrate how the lack of safety infrastructure and labour protections affected them.
Requirements of Stripper’s Bill of Rights
As Stefan from SNL would excitedly say, this bill has everything!
First, all clubs are mandated to provide strippers with “Know Your Rights” training. Topics included will be, rights and obligations of strippers as either employees or independent contractors, financial literacy where and how to report occupational health and safety concerns, including sexual harassment or sexual violence of any kind.
The bill also requires clubs to hire adequate security guards, and training for all staff members about how to address dancers’ concerns about violence and harassment at the workplace. Clubs will be required to keep a written record of all dancers’ complaints regarding violence and harassment for five years, and to keep a list and ban clients who violate these basic rules for three years.
The bill also addresses the labour exploitation that dancers are subjected to in terms of paying “house fees.” House fees are fees that strippers’ pay to the club to work, in a way, it’s similar to the way that some hairdressers pay their salons to rent a chair. The idea is that you pay the fee, then keep all the profits. But in practise, sometimes these fees are a portion of the dancers’ income, now there is a cap on the portion that the clubs may collect.
There is also a provision that strippers cannot be prevented from collecting their own money. I once worked at a high end club, and at one point we were forbidden to collect cash from our clients. Instead, clients had to buy chips, similar to casino chips, at a ten percent premium. Dancers would then submit their chips and be charged an additional fifteen percent. It was unfair and infuriating. It was also demeaning to have to wait until a manager graciously found the time to pay you out the cash that you earned. At times they would refuse to pay you your earnings all while the club owners kept earning money, there was never a delay for them to receive their cut.
In terms of advancing strippers’ human rights at work, there is one provision in the legislation that I find particularly promising. The club will have to provide strippers with their reason for termination in writing.
I have both witnessed, and been subjected to all sorts of bullshit in this regard. Clubs firing girls for gaining too much weight after an injury or after having a baby. Clubs firing girls for not making enough money for them in their casino chip grift. Clubs firing (or refusing to hire) Black women because “we have too many Black girls already.” Clubs firing girls for sticking up for themselves or their fellow strippers when we fight back when a client assaults us, instead of being on our side and banning the jerk. This provision will dramatically reduce this type of discrimination, and I yearn for the day that we see something similar in Canada.
Other welcome inclusions
Interestingly, Washington state was the last state where alcohol was banned in strip clubs, and this legislation reversed this ban. Strippers made a series of successful arguments about how if there is no measure as to how much a patron had to drink, it makes the club less safe for them. And it’s true, a bar or nightclub can gauge how many drinks a patron has, based on how much alcohol they served them, it makes it easier to remove unruly patrons.
More importantly, liquor licenses will only be granted if the club is found to be in compliance of the safety clauses in the legislation. If clubs don’t have the appropriate policies and mechanisms in place to ensure strippers’ access to safety supports, the application for a liquor license will be denied until the club complies. I find this to be more refreshing than a cold beer on a hot summer day!
There is also a provision that makes a version of Footloose impossible in the future. Cities or counties over a certain population will not be able to enact any additional bylaws that govern dancers’ nudity or whether or not there will be a prohibition on lap dancing in the clubs. Effectively, this means that it will be business as usual in major urban centres such as Seattle, where the majority of strip clubs in Washington states are located. It’s a particularly clever addition.
Sadly, there is one thing missing from the legislation that, as far as I can tell, was in older versions of the bill: the creation of a Dancer Advisory Committee. This committee was supposed to be made up at least in part, of current or former strippers with at least five years of experience. Its aim was to study the impacts of the new law, and if needed, bring their concerns and proposed changes back to the legislature.
Future of stripper’s organizing
As we approach another “hot labour summer” in Canada, where all sorts of workers are in the process of renegotiating their collective agreements, I am hoping to profile, and hopefully interview, stripper advocacy groups in the States, to see what kind of strategies Canadian strippers could use to strengthen our position as workers. In the last year, two clubs in the US have successfully unionized and now strippers in Washington states have their own Bill of Rights.
We have a lot of catching up to do here in Canada. Despite how we were treated in the pandemic, however, I remain hopeful.
It’s time that strippers get what we deserve – a seat at the decision making table, so that we can work in clubs that are safe, well maintained, and free from discrimination, harassment and violence.
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