Stacey Clare is a stripper, performance artist, writer, activist, Buddhist, care worker, and co-founding member of the East London Strippers Collective. She grew up in northern England and began working as a stripper aged 22 in Scotland, while on a gap year from her Fine Art degree at Glasgow School of Art.
The Ethical Stripper will be joining us at The Blether to talk to us about her new book which is about feminism, sisterhood, community, financial independence, economics and legislation. It’s about exploitation, misogyny, discrimination and bigotry. It’s about strip clubs, punters, showgirls and the joy of performing. It’s about ethics and consent. It’s about sex work, emotional labour and exhaustion. It’s about the business of being objectified, how it feels, what it means and what impact it can have.
Stacey delves into her past, recounting stories that are hilarious, risqué and poignant in equal measure. Alongside her memoirs she reveals inside truths about the industry, divulging the absurdity of licensing legislation and explaining who is really calling the shots. She backs up her tales with historical and critical context, as well as the latest feminist theory on sex work to contextualise her own observations and experiences.