Thursday, June 2, 2011
Have You Ever Tried to Sell a Diamond?
[ed. Fascinating history on the marketing and economics of the diamond industry. Hint: they are not really as rare or valuable as you think.]
by Edward J. Epstein
The diamond invention—the creation of the idea that diamonds are rare and valuable, and are essential signs of esteem—is a relatively recent development in the history of the diamond trade. Until the late nineteenth century, diamonds were found only in a few riverbeds in India and in the jungles of Brazil, and the entire world production of gem diamonds amounted to a few pounds a year. In 1870, however, huge diamond mines were discovered near the Orange River, in South Africa, where diamonds were soon being scooped out by the ton. Suddenly, the market was deluged with diamonds. The British financiers who had organized the South African mines quickly realized that their investment was endangered; diamonds had little intrinsic value—and their price depended almost entirely on their scarcity. The financiers feared that when new mines were developed in South Africa, diamonds would become at best only semiprecious gems.
by Edward J. EpsteinThe diamond invention—the creation of the idea that diamonds are rare and valuable, and are essential signs of esteem—is a relatively recent development in the history of the diamond trade. Until the late nineteenth century, diamonds were found only in a few riverbeds in India and in the jungles of Brazil, and the entire world production of gem diamonds amounted to a few pounds a year. In 1870, however, huge diamond mines were discovered near the Orange River, in South Africa, where diamonds were soon being scooped out by the ton. Suddenly, the market was deluged with diamonds. The British financiers who had organized the South African mines quickly realized that their investment was endangered; diamonds had little intrinsic value—and their price depended almost entirely on their scarcity. The financiers feared that when new mines were developed in South Africa, diamonds would become at best only semiprecious gems.
The major investors in the diamond mines realized that they had no alternative but to merge their interests into a single entity that would be powerful enough to control production and perpetuate the illusion of scarcity of diamonds. The instrument they created, in 1888, was called De Beers Consolidated Mines, Ltd., incorporated in South Africa. As De Beers took control of all aspects of the world diamond trade, it assumed many forms. In London, it operated under the innocuous name of the Diamond Trading Company. In Israel, it was known as "The Syndicate." In Europe, it was called the "C.S.O." -- initials referring to the Central Selling Organization, which was an arm of the Diamond Trading Company. And in black Africa, it disguised its South African origins under subsidiaries with names like Diamond Development Corporation and Mining Services, Inc. At its height -- for most of this century -- it not only either directly owned or controlled all the diamond mines in southern Africa but also owned diamond trading companies in England, Portugal, Israel, Belgium, Holland, and Switzerland.
De Beers proved to be the most successful cartel arrangement in the annals of modern commerce. While other commodities, such as gold, silver, copper, rubber, and grains, fluctuated wildly in response to economic conditions, diamonds have continued, with few exceptions, to advance upward in price every year since the Depression. Indeed, the cartel seemed so superbly in control of prices -- and unassailable -- that, in the late 1970s, even speculators began buying diamonds as a guard against the vagaries of inflation and recession.
The diamond invention is far more than a monopoly for fixing diamond prices; it is a mechanism for converting tiny crystals of carbon into universally recognized tokens of wealth, power, and romance. To achieve this goal, De Beers had to control demand as well as supply. Both women and men had to be made to perceive diamonds not as marketable precious stones but as an inseparable part of courtship and married life. To stabilize the market, De Beers had to endow these stones with a sentiment that would inhibit the public from ever reselling them. The illusion had to be created that diamonds were forever -- "forever" in the sense that they should never be resold.
Read more:
image:
Demolishing Detroit
by Howie Kahn
The massive twelve-wheeled demolition truck rumbles down the street and lures the neighbors out to gripe. It's not that the truck or the driver, Lorenzo Coney, are unwelcome. The people here just want to know what's taken them so long.
On this June morning, with the heat and humidity rising, residents emerge from their homes one by one: mostly women, mostly older, mostly taking care of their mothers and grandkids. They've been calling the city, they say, for years without response and feel as abandoned as the houses that surround them—the foreclosed, devitalized structures that require immediate wrecking. They have questions for Lorenzo. Comprehensive to-do lists for this man who has powerful machines and, so, they figure, actual power. They ask when the dead trees are coming down. They want to know when the drug dealing will stop. Does Lorenzo's boss have a job for their sons, by any chance? Or for their nephews? Or what about for themselves? They can still work, they say. They can lift things. Handle a shovel. Run a hose. They pointat any number of vacancies on their street: "You tearing down this one? What about this one? How about this one?"
When they find out Lorenzo's only there for one house, they seethe. "But those are drug houses," they demand, imploring the crew to tear them all down, imploring me to somehow tear them all down. "That one," they say, "somebody got raped in. You're not taking that one down? Are you serious? I called about that one. I called. And called. When are you doing that one? You should be here all day. All week. All year."
Lorenzo explains he's only a wrecker; he's not the mayor. He's simply following orders, knocking down houses as fast as he can.
"I can do twenty a day," says Lorenzo, standing outside a Craftsman-style bungalow at 18058 Joann. This house took the better part of 1926 to build. Crews of men dug a hole, poured a foundation, assembled floor bridging and ceiling joists and a truss for the roof. Shingles were laid down, one at a time. Wooden siding was hung. Mortar was spread and bricks were stacked. By the time the house was completed, it boasted a gable roof, central dormer windows, and generous eaves shading a balustraded veranda. Covering 1,300 square feet, it had a couple of bedrooms, a bathroom, a small kitchen, and a light-filled parlor facing the street. It was priced for a worker—less than $4,000 new—and meant, for a family, a future.
It will take Lorenzo and his two-man crew from Farrow Demolition Incorporated thirty-six minutes to destroy it. It will be their fourth wreck of the day. By 9:30 a.m., 1718 Field, 3911 Beaconsfield, and 13103 Canfield have all been reduced to rubble, having met the mechanized violence of the CAT 330D L excavator. From house to garbage in the time it takes to do a load of laundry. Soon one of Farrow's drivers will collect the remains and haul them to the landfill—eighty-year-old houses, each ground down into a hundred tons of trash and dumped from the back of a truck. In the end, the house is just one more useless thing.
Read more:
The massive twelve-wheeled demolition truck rumbles down the street and lures the neighbors out to gripe. It's not that the truck or the driver, Lorenzo Coney, are unwelcome. The people here just want to know what's taken them so long.
On this June morning, with the heat and humidity rising, residents emerge from their homes one by one: mostly women, mostly older, mostly taking care of their mothers and grandkids. They've been calling the city, they say, for years without response and feel as abandoned as the houses that surround them—the foreclosed, devitalized structures that require immediate wrecking. They have questions for Lorenzo. Comprehensive to-do lists for this man who has powerful machines and, so, they figure, actual power. They ask when the dead trees are coming down. They want to know when the drug dealing will stop. Does Lorenzo's boss have a job for their sons, by any chance? Or for their nephews? Or what about for themselves? They can still work, they say. They can lift things. Handle a shovel. Run a hose. They pointat any number of vacancies on their street: "You tearing down this one? What about this one? How about this one?"
When they find out Lorenzo's only there for one house, they seethe. "But those are drug houses," they demand, imploring the crew to tear them all down, imploring me to somehow tear them all down. "That one," they say, "somebody got raped in. You're not taking that one down? Are you serious? I called about that one. I called. And called. When are you doing that one? You should be here all day. All week. All year."
Lorenzo explains he's only a wrecker; he's not the mayor. He's simply following orders, knocking down houses as fast as he can.
"I can do twenty a day," says Lorenzo, standing outside a Craftsman-style bungalow at 18058 Joann. This house took the better part of 1926 to build. Crews of men dug a hole, poured a foundation, assembled floor bridging and ceiling joists and a truss for the roof. Shingles were laid down, one at a time. Wooden siding was hung. Mortar was spread and bricks were stacked. By the time the house was completed, it boasted a gable roof, central dormer windows, and generous eaves shading a balustraded veranda. Covering 1,300 square feet, it had a couple of bedrooms, a bathroom, a small kitchen, and a light-filled parlor facing the street. It was priced for a worker—less than $4,000 new—and meant, for a family, a future.
It will take Lorenzo and his two-man crew from Farrow Demolition Incorporated thirty-six minutes to destroy it. It will be their fourth wreck of the day. By 9:30 a.m., 1718 Field, 3911 Beaconsfield, and 13103 Canfield have all been reduced to rubble, having met the mechanized violence of the CAT 330D L excavator. From house to garbage in the time it takes to do a load of laundry. Soon one of Farrow's drivers will collect the remains and haul them to the landfill—eighty-year-old houses, each ground down into a hundred tons of trash and dumped from the back of a truck. In the end, the house is just one more useless thing.
Read more:
Apocalypse - What Disasters Reveal
By Junot Diaz ONE
On January 12, 2010 an earthquake struck Haiti. The epicenter of the quake, which registered a moment magnitude of 7.0, was only fifteen miles from the capital, Port-au-Prince. By the time the initial shocks subsided, Port-au-Prince and surrounding urbanizations were in ruins. Schools, hospitals, clinics, prisons collapsed. The electrical and communication grids imploded. The Presidential Palace, the Cathedral, and the National Assembly building—historic symbols of the Haitian patrimony—were severely damaged or destroyed. The headquarters of the UN aid mission was reduced to rubble, killing peacekeepers, aid workers, and the mission chief, Hédi Annabi.
The figures vary, but an estimated 220,000 people were killed in the aftermath of the quake, with hundreds of thousands injured and at least a million—one-tenth of Haiti’s population—rendered homeless. According to the Red Cross, three million Haitians were affected. It was the single greatest catastrophe in Haiti’s modern history. It was for all intents and purposes an apocalypse.
TWO
Apocalypse comes to us from the Greek apocalypsis, meaning to uncover and unveil. Now, as James Berger reminds us in After the End, apocalypse has three meanings. First, it is the actual imagined end of the world, whether in Revelations or in Hollywood blockbusters. Second, it comprises the catastrophes, personal or historical, that are said to resemble that imagined final ending—the Chernobyl meltdown or the Holocaust or the March 11 earthquake and tsunami in Japan that killed thousands and critically damaged a nuclear power plant in Fukushima. Finally, it is a disruptive event that provokes revelation. The apocalyptic event, Berger explains, in order to be truly apocalyptic, must in its disruptive moment clarify and illuminate “the true nature of what has been brought to end.” It must be revelatory.
“The apocalypse, then,” per Berger, “is the End, or resembles the end, or explains the end.” Apocalypses of the first, second, and third kinds. The Haiti earthquake was certainly an apocalypse of the second kind, and to those who perished it may even have been an apocalypse of the first kind, but what interests me here is how the Haiti earthquake was also an apocalypse of the third kind, a revelation. This in brief is my intent: to peer into the ruins of Haiti in an attempt to describe what for me the earthquake revealed—about Haiti, our world, and even our future.
After all, if these types of apocalyptic catastrophes have any value it is that in the process of causing things to fall apart they also give us a chance to see the aspects of our world that we as a society seek to run from, that we hide behind veils of denials.
Apocalyptic catastrophes don’t just raze cities and drown coastlines; these events, in David Brooks’s words, “wash away the surface of society, the settled way things have been done. They expose the underlying power structures, the injustices, the patterns of corruption and the unacknowledged inequalities.” And, equally important, they allow us insight into the conditions that led to the catastrophe, whether we are talking about Haiti or Japan. (I do believe the tsunami-earthquake that ravaged Sendai this past March will eventually reveal much about our irresponsible reliance on nuclear power and the sinister collusion between local and international actors that led to the Fukushima Daiichi catastrophe.)
If, as Roethke writes, “in a dark time, the eye begins to see,” apocalypse is a darkness that gives us light.
Read more:
The Two Lives of Tom Watson
[ed. I was as curious as anyone to learn about the "Secret" so I looked it up. It's at the end of this article, in Tom's own words.] by Joe Posnanski
Tom Watson is one of the greatest golfers who ever lived. That’s a given. He won eight major championships — only five legendary golfers (Nicklaus, Woods, Hagen, Hogan, Player) have won more. He won 39 PGA events, which ties him with a couple of guys named Sarazen and Mickelson for 10th. He beat Nicklaus head-to-head three times — at Augusta, at Turnberry, at Pebble Beach — in three of the most famous duels in the history of golf. On Sunday, at age 61, he won the Senior PGA Championship in Louisville. That was his sixth major title on the Senior Tour (or “Champions Tour” as they beg people to call it) — only Nicklaus and Hale Irwin have won more. I’m not saying anything here that you don’t know. Tom Watson is certainly and unquestionably one of the greatest golfers who ever lived.
And yet … I think Watson’s career is singular because unlike any of the other great golfers, Watson’s life is really divided in two. There was the young and wild Watson who hit the ball all over the place and won with one of the great short games in golf history. And there is the older Watson, whose ball-striking is so magnificent that men half his age salivate, but who has been held back by 5-foot putts that stubbornly go their own way.
If the game of the old and young Watson had ever met, they would not recognize each other.
If the old Watson and the young Watson had ever shared a season, they might have won the Grand Slam.
They did not. Watson won the last of his six PGA Tour Player of the Year awards in 1984. He found what he calls “The Secret” in 1994. In the nine years between, he suffered. The young Watson was stormy and miraculous — even HE used the phrase “Watson Par” to describe his hit-into-the-trees, hack-it-somewhere-near-the-green, somehow-get-it-to-10-feet, drain-the-putt style. He would say it with a hint of mischief in his voice — “There you go, another Watson par” — but he did it too often for anyone to think of it as luck. In those days, Watson was the boldest putter in the world. And this was because he was fearless. He knew that if he hit it 4- or 6-feet by, he would make the comeback. He KNEW it.
Read more:
image credit:
Doc
by Katherine A. Powers
Doc Holliday, Bat Masterson, Wyatt Earp, and Earp's many brothers are known to most of us as they have been shaped successively by sensationalist journalism, dime novels, movies, and TV series. Though biographies of varying degrees of seriousness have also been written of most of these men, their lives might best be suited to fiction; only it can adequately convey the animating tincture of myth that has made them momentous.
This, at least, is the thought that comes to me upon finishing Mary Doria Russell's "Doc." This extraordinary novel, whose central figure is John Henry "Doc" Holliday, is both a work of reclamation of the man from his legend as a coldblooded killer and an inspired evocation of a mythic quintessence. That fundamental aspect of Doc's life is announced from the start: "The Fates pursued him from the day he first drew breath, howling for his delayed demise."
Though set chiefly in 1878 in Dodge City, the story begins with John Henry Holliday's early life as a man beset by misfortune. The son of a Georgia planter, he was born with a cleft palate, later repaired by innovative surgery. His mother, a woman "educated in excess of a lady's requirements," devoted herself to the arduous task of teaching him to speak clearly. She also taught him to play the piano and supplemented his formal education, sharing with him her love of the classics. She died of tuberculosis when he was 15, leaving him in life-long mourning. She quite possibly left Holliday with her disease as well -- the tuberculosis that eventually killed him two decades later.
Read more:
Doc Holliday, Bat Masterson, Wyatt Earp, and Earp's many brothers are known to most of us as they have been shaped successively by sensationalist journalism, dime novels, movies, and TV series. Though biographies of varying degrees of seriousness have also been written of most of these men, their lives might best be suited to fiction; only it can adequately convey the animating tincture of myth that has made them momentous.
This, at least, is the thought that comes to me upon finishing Mary Doria Russell's "Doc." This extraordinary novel, whose central figure is John Henry "Doc" Holliday, is both a work of reclamation of the man from his legend as a coldblooded killer and an inspired evocation of a mythic quintessence. That fundamental aspect of Doc's life is announced from the start: "The Fates pursued him from the day he first drew breath, howling for his delayed demise." Though set chiefly in 1878 in Dodge City, the story begins with John Henry Holliday's early life as a man beset by misfortune. The son of a Georgia planter, he was born with a cleft palate, later repaired by innovative surgery. His mother, a woman "educated in excess of a lady's requirements," devoted herself to the arduous task of teaching him to speak clearly. She also taught him to play the piano and supplemented his formal education, sharing with him her love of the classics. She died of tuberculosis when he was 15, leaving him in life-long mourning. She quite possibly left Holliday with her disease as well -- the tuberculosis that eventually killed him two decades later.
Read more:
House Rule
by Peter J. Boyer
John Boehner’s introduction to the political force that would make him the Speaker of the House of Representatives came on a cool April afternoon in 2009, on the streets of Bakersfield, California. Boehner, the Republican House leader, had come to town for a fund-raiser for his colleague Kevin McCarthy, who represents the area. The event was scheduled for tax day, April 15th—the date targeted for a series of nationwide protest rallies organized by a loosely joined populist movement that called itself the Tea Party. One rally was to take place in Bakersfield, and Boehner and McCarthy decided to make an appearance. “They were expecting a couple of hundred people,” Boehner recalls. “A couple of thousand showed up.”
The two congressmen witnessed a scene of the sort that played in an endless loop across the country for the next eighteen months: people in funny hats waving Gadsden flags and wearing T-shirts saying “No taxation with crappy representation,” venting about bailouts, taxes, entrenched political élites, and an expanding and seemingly pampered public sector. (Noticing an open window in a nearby government office building, some in the Bakersfield crowd shouted, “Shut that window! You’re wasting my air-conditioning!”) Although Bakersfield is in one of the most conservative districts in California, the Tea Party speakers assigned fault to Republicans as well as to Democrats. The event’s organizers had been advised that Boehner and McCarthy would be there but did not invite them to speak.
For Boehner, the Bakersfield rally was a revelation. “I could see that there was this rebellion starting to grow,” he says now. “And I didn’t want our members taking a shellacking as a result.”
Back in Washington, Boehner reported what he’d seen to his Republican colleagues. While many Democrats and the mainstream media mocked the Tea Party, Boehner pressed his members to get out in front of the movement or, at least, get out of its way. “I urge you to get in touch with these efforts and connect with them,” he told a closed-door meeting of the Republican Conference. “The people participating in these protests will be the soldiers for our cause a year from now.”
Read more:
John Boehner’s introduction to the political force that would make him the Speaker of the House of Representatives came on a cool April afternoon in 2009, on the streets of Bakersfield, California. Boehner, the Republican House leader, had come to town for a fund-raiser for his colleague Kevin McCarthy, who represents the area. The event was scheduled for tax day, April 15th—the date targeted for a series of nationwide protest rallies organized by a loosely joined populist movement that called itself the Tea Party. One rally was to take place in Bakersfield, and Boehner and McCarthy decided to make an appearance. “They were expecting a couple of hundred people,” Boehner recalls. “A couple of thousand showed up.”
The two congressmen witnessed a scene of the sort that played in an endless loop across the country for the next eighteen months: people in funny hats waving Gadsden flags and wearing T-shirts saying “No taxation with crappy representation,” venting about bailouts, taxes, entrenched political élites, and an expanding and seemingly pampered public sector. (Noticing an open window in a nearby government office building, some in the Bakersfield crowd shouted, “Shut that window! You’re wasting my air-conditioning!”) Although Bakersfield is in one of the most conservative districts in California, the Tea Party speakers assigned fault to Republicans as well as to Democrats. The event’s organizers had been advised that Boehner and McCarthy would be there but did not invite them to speak.For Boehner, the Bakersfield rally was a revelation. “I could see that there was this rebellion starting to grow,” he says now. “And I didn’t want our members taking a shellacking as a result.”
Back in Washington, Boehner reported what he’d seen to his Republican colleagues. While many Democrats and the mainstream media mocked the Tea Party, Boehner pressed his members to get out in front of the movement or, at least, get out of its way. “I urge you to get in touch with these efforts and connect with them,” he told a closed-door meeting of the Republican Conference. “The people participating in these protests will be the soldiers for our cause a year from now.”
Read more:
5 Technologies That Will Shape the Web
It was 1997—eons ago, in Internet years—and the Web was only beginning to take off. People used dial-up modems to get online, and Netscape Navigator was the browser of choice. Google was still a research project of two Stanford students, and Facebook…well, Mark Zuckerberg was a 13-year-old having his Star Wars–themed bar mitzvah.
Flash forward to 2011. The Web has since reinvented itself time and again: when businesses embraced it in the late 1990s, when Google dominated search in the early 2000s, when user-generated content became prominent in the mid-2000s. Today the Web is going through another reinvention, morphing into a place where our social interactions are ever more important. And the main force behind this phenomenon is, of course, Facebook, led by Zuckerberg, now a 27-year-old billionaire.
So where will the Web go next? We asked two dozen analysts, engineers, and executives to describe what technologies they think will shape our online experiences in the next several years. Their predictions could easily fill this entire issue, but we distilled their wisdom into a more palatable list of five key technologies that our sources mentioned most frequently.
We also asked six of the experts to tell us what these technologies mean for today's dueling titans, Google and Facebook. What challenges do they face? Who's got an advantage? You'll find their comments sprinkled throughout these pages.
Lists like this are nothing if not contentious. Some critics will say we overlooked more crucial trends. Others will claim our technologies are already history. So we want to know what you think. Join the discussion in the comment section below.
Pentagon's Cyberwarfare Strategy
by David Gewirtz
Three related events this week caught the attention of security professionals and news organizations everywhere.
The first was when defense contractor Lockheed Martin announced it had been hit by a cyberattack. The second was when a Pentagon spokesman said the U.S. might consider a cyberattack to be an act of war (and might respond with physical force). The third news story was of another attempted penetration of Google’s systems from China, this time phishing for Gmail account information from senior U.S. officials.
These events are a continuance of the ongoing trend of digital attacks. They are noteworthy in context because they’re helping us see how cyberspace is finally being formally integrated into international policy.
Last night, I was back on BBC radio, where we discussed many of the issues surrounding the formalization of cyberdefense policies. During the interview, it became clear that there were a bunch of questions people on both sides of the pond had about what these new policies mean, and if they indicate a new aggressiveness on the part of the United States.
To clear up some of the confusion, I’ve listed ten things you should know about America’s new cyberdefense policies.
1. Attacks can by symmetrical or asymmetrical.
In warfare, the attackers and defenders aren’t always evenly matched. We’ve all seen what modern bombers can do to a small village, but many people don’t realize that cyberwarfare flips the equation, making it much more costly to defend than attack.
For example, any small group with a pile of PCs (or even PlayStations) can mount a hugely damaging attack, especially if they make use of zombie botnets as a force multiplier.
This means that while the attackers only have to aim at one target, the nation states have to defend every possible target from every possible attack. The cost of defense can be wildly more expensive than the cost of attack.
This changes the entire budgetary calculus of war. Take tank warfare, for example. Back in the days of tank warfare, each side needed to come up with the necessary resources to build and buy tanks — an expensive endeavor. The nuclear race was even more costly, costing in the billions (and, nearly — in today’s dollars — the trillions) to develop.
By contrast, a PC capable of launching a digital attack of mass destruction might cost a few hundred bucks. Defending against those attacks could cost billions.
Three related events this week caught the attention of security professionals and news organizations everywhere.
The first was when defense contractor Lockheed Martin announced it had been hit by a cyberattack. The second was when a Pentagon spokesman said the U.S. might consider a cyberattack to be an act of war (and might respond with physical force). The third news story was of another attempted penetration of Google’s systems from China, this time phishing for Gmail account information from senior U.S. officials.These events are a continuance of the ongoing trend of digital attacks. They are noteworthy in context because they’re helping us see how cyberspace is finally being formally integrated into international policy.
Last night, I was back on BBC radio, where we discussed many of the issues surrounding the formalization of cyberdefense policies. During the interview, it became clear that there were a bunch of questions people on both sides of the pond had about what these new policies mean, and if they indicate a new aggressiveness on the part of the United States.
To clear up some of the confusion, I’ve listed ten things you should know about America’s new cyberdefense policies.
1. Attacks can by symmetrical or asymmetrical.
In warfare, the attackers and defenders aren’t always evenly matched. We’ve all seen what modern bombers can do to a small village, but many people don’t realize that cyberwarfare flips the equation, making it much more costly to defend than attack.
For example, any small group with a pile of PCs (or even PlayStations) can mount a hugely damaging attack, especially if they make use of zombie botnets as a force multiplier.
This means that while the attackers only have to aim at one target, the nation states have to defend every possible target from every possible attack. The cost of defense can be wildly more expensive than the cost of attack.
This changes the entire budgetary calculus of war. Take tank warfare, for example. Back in the days of tank warfare, each side needed to come up with the necessary resources to build and buy tanks — an expensive endeavor. The nuclear race was even more costly, costing in the billions (and, nearly — in today’s dollars — the trillions) to develop.
By contrast, a PC capable of launching a digital attack of mass destruction might cost a few hundred bucks. Defending against those attacks could cost billions.
Stripper FAQ
by Kiko Wu
Introduction
Introduction
This site is a nonprofit resource for those women who have already decided that they would like to earn a living as a stripper. I'm not going to get into the pluses and minuses of the profession. There are a great deal of misconceptions out there about strippers and that is something you will have to deal with if you enter the profession. I will say this- I truly enjoy what I do and I have never felt exploited because I'm a stripper. In fact I have always felt it was far more personally empowering than any other profession. But it's not for everyone. It requires a certain temperament. Don't go and become a stripper because you feel you "have" to. If you hate what you do it WILL show and you will make very little money.
Tools of the TradeOther than your body, which we'll get into later, the tools of the trade are clothing, makeup, and shoes. In dancing, as with any other trade, it never pays to buy cheap tools-they don't work well, they break and you'll just have to replace them anyway.
Heels are your first purchase. Minimum height is 3 inches- anything shorter and your gut will stick out and your legs will look like tree trunks. Look for a shoe with a plastic one-piece sole and heel. Shoes with the leather and wood heels are much more elegant but after the second night of dancing on them the heels tend to flex too much and put a lot of stress on your knees and back. Open toes tend to be more comfortable but if you're going to wear them you have to make sure your toenails are painted and trimmed. Putting no-slip rubber pads on the bottom of the shoe is a good idea- it prevents embarrassing falls on slippery stages.
Bottoms come in a few different varieties: choose according to your tastes, club rules, etc. Almost all clubs require thongs. A dancing bottom can be purchased through mail order or at stores that carry them. Girls who try dancing in underwear or a swimsuit bottom always look tacky. Buy the right kind. Some topless clubs have rules against g-strings (string sides and back) because they tend to not provide enough coverage to comply with local laws.
Some clubs don't care what kind of dress you wear- lots of girls wear neon spandex micro minis etc. Other clubs called "gown clubs" have more strict rules and generally require these sort of slutty evening gowns. These gowns like the bottoms need to be custom made or ordered- nothing from the department store will cut it. One thing that I cannot emphasis enough- NEVER ever wear an asymmetrical dress (hem cut at an angle or one shoulder strap). As most people know, men subconsciously look at certain physical attributes as signs of good genetics and a desirable partner -- boobs, hips etc. They also look for something anthropologists call "Bilateral Symmetry" which means that your arms and legs are the same length, your torso is straight etc. An asymmetrical dress throws this off. It may look nice but you can actually chart the drop in earnings on a night to night basis.
Read more:
image credit:
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)