Are strip clubs really that bad for your marriage?

It’s a few minutes to midnight on a Friday night, outside one of Nairobi’s infamous striptease joints. Things are just beginning to heat up inside and muffled music can be heard through the doors.

Two middle-aged men emerge from the club’s interior, heading home. One of them is 42-year-old Tom*. He visits this particular joint four or five nights every month. This father of one says that he is happily married and he intends to stay married.

He is just one of the numerous Kenyan men who secretly maintain their patronage to these establishments. And while it is a subject that evokes strong moral opinions, the truth is that a significant number of men in committed relationships pay to watch exotic dancers.

What would a respectable looking man who claims to be in a sexually fulfilling relationship be seeking in this seedy world of adult entertainment?

For Tom, the strip club is where he comes when he needs a mental vacation. He says that he tends to be very visual and when he comes, he appreciates the beauty of the performers and enjoys the shows. Occasionally, he will come in with a business associate, like the one we just saw him with, for some male bonding. Besides, he notes that unlike regular clubs, these ones tend to be quieter and one can easily hold a conversation. “That is all there is to it. It’s an unemotional experience,” he says.

If his exploits are innocent, why does he feel the need to keep it secret from his wife? “There are a lot of misconceptions regarding what happens here. She would not understand,” he says.

TALK THERAPY

Confirming his thoughts, seven of the 10 women we polled, aged between 23 and 38, felt that these clubs are dens of sin where sex and money are the tools of trade. Some were of the view that stripping is degrading to women and that it encourages chauvinistic attitudes, while others expressed worry that it would lead to an addiction resulting in him prioritising it above the couple’s other needs. From the answers they gave, it would seem that to the woman in a committed relationship, the strip joint is an adversary.

But is the strip club that harmful, though? Is there any way to make it a welcome addition to a couple’s intimate life?

Two of the three that weren’t against these joints saw allowing their man to go as an acceptable compromise to keep their relationship going, while one felt that she trusted her man enough not to worry that he would want to sleep with a dancer he met in a club.

Fortune, 26, a retired stripper who has a little over five years’ experience twirling on a pole says that while sex sometimes happens here, it is not the norm. In fact, from her experience in the adult entertainment world, she says that a man is more likely to sleep with a woman he meets outside than a woman who he meets at the joint. “They get hooked by the attention they get here, not the nudity,” she says.

At the club you will see the occasional batch of men seeking a weekend thrill. These, she says, are the ones who proposition for sex. The regulars, who make for the greater number of men in strip clubs, just want to talk, men who see these girls as therapists who give them undivided attention without judging.

“They usually see the same girl on each visit. Basically she listens as the man talks himself through his problems, sometimes getting solutions and sometimes just to let it out.”

The men are obviously aware that they get this attention because they paid for it. Leaving you at home to pay to be listened to can only mean two things; that he loves you and doesn’t want to worry you with his problems or he just needs someone to listen to him without trying to solve his problems.

The other less common group of strip club regulars are men who have odd fetishes; they pay the girls to create these fantasies for them. “I had a regular who would rub my feet all evening,” Fortune says. These men have been made to feel by society that some of these desires are unacceptable and weird, so they hide these parts of themselves from their wives.

What can the woman in a committed relationship learn from this? Seeing as some of these fetishes are harmless and clearly no cause for shame, it may work in your favour if you became more sexually open with your man. It may be his affinity for high heels or for your belly button, but if your man is able to have a healthy sex life with you, embracing that side of him seems like the wisest idea.

Instead of paying strangers to create these fantasies for him, he will let you into this part of his life and you will rid your relationship of the strip joint.

FORM OF VIAGRA

As much as it is a tease based on fantasy, strippers are real women who go the extra mile to take care of their bodies. It is hard for a man not to react to them. Clifton*, a married father of two, gives this as the reason the strip clubs have kept the spice in his marriage. For him, his once- or twice-a-month visits spikes his libido. When he goes back home, his relationship with his wife benefits.

The girls at the particular club he frequents are young and buff. Doesn’t this give him unrealistic expectations of a woman’s body, I ask? He thinks not. He says that a big number of these girls are, in fact, not perfect; they just have huge amounts of confidence in their bodies. He admits that sometimes, he wishes his partner would loosen up a bit.

The Viagra argument is one that Jacqui, a 26-year-old media professional, disagrees with. She observes that sex is supposed to be as a result of an attraction to each other, not an attraction stirred by a third party. “How bad does the state of your relationship need to be for you to feel it necessary to invite a third party to stir things up?” she poses.

SHARED FANTASIES

For Hilda*, 31, what began as a simple suggestion to visit a strip club from her then boyfriend a couple of years back turned out to be a pleasant surprise. Occasionally, now that they are married, they get to share in their fantasies. Hilda admits that her first time in a strip club with her man stirred up jealousy.

“I was even a little angry when a particular girl appeared to be too pushy. I had to remind myself that I had agreed to it. It was not the type of jealousy that causes you to make a scene though; it was the kind that prompts you to raise your game, which I took to be a good thing.”

For this young couple, aside from stirring things up a little, these visits inspire them in the bedroom. The thrill of partaking in something so unconventional is exciting and being able share their fantasies without breaking trust pushes them close together. “When we are there, we make it about the two of us, not about the strippers,” Hilda says.

The reason this works for them, she reckons, is because she understands that restricting him from doing something he wants will not make her feel any more secure. After the first time they went together they sat down and discussed the boundaries about what one could and couldn’t do in the club with the girls.

NOT FOR EVERYONE

The girls who work in these clubs are handpicked on the basis of youth and near-perfect bodies. To a woman with body image issues, a visit to a strip club may thus do more harm than good. Hilda considers herself attractive and is comfortable with nudity even away from the strip club.

As Geoffrey, also 31, learnt, a woman needs to be comfortable with her body before she can enjoy this experience especially in the presence of her man. Two years ago, he offered to take a woman he was dating to a strip club because she seemed to have a very open mind but he ended up regretting it.

“From the get-go, she was visibly uncomfortable. She was looking for the girls’ body faults, the things that were wrong with their hair or their make-up which, I guess, was her way of making herself feel better. She kept talking and we couldn’t enjoy the show. Now I keep my women away from the strip club.”

While the views of these men and women may not represent the whole of mankind, two things are clear; the strip club is not for all couples, and the role it is playing in relationships today cannot be ignored. Whether it aids or damages your relationship, the debate is still open.