Abstract

This study notes a rising number of female customers at heterosexual strip bars and explores the reasons for this change. Drawing methodologically on audio-taped interviews with strip club employees and 150 hours of observation in strip bars, we explore the dynamics of raunch culture—a hypersexualized climate—and andro-privilege, a new concept in feminist theory that we originate here. Patriarchal cultures condition members to preference practices associated with hegemonic masculinity, and uphold masculinism, the ideology that justifies male domination. Andro-privilege is a new Western cultural practice that cloaks masculinism in a discursive mantle of gender progress. That andro-privilege exists at all is a sign of growth. It demonstrates that progressive ideas about gender equality have affected people, and created, at least among some, a misalignment with unfairness. Andro-privilege resolves this discomfort by temporarily allowing some girls and women to be “one of the guys” while allowing no parallel for boys and men to benefit from being “one of the girls.” We argue that andro-privilege thrives in raunch culture because it permits a woman or girl to resist objectification and position herself as a subject—a lad or bro—rather than a sex doll.