Hey, You Know Any Strippers? I Do!

It's been awhile since I have written here.  Too many things going on in the world and I found myself reading as much as possible about them.  Too much anger and hatred.  Too many people fighting for human rights.  Too much war and power mongers.  Sometimes I have to step back and look at everything...and I do mean everything..then move on to the path in my journey in order to comprehend the events occurring.  You might call it an individual isolation movement.  You see I have been looking not just at the international scope of the world, but at the personal or localized schemes as well.  I know, what the hell are you talking about, right?  Simple.  How does one feel when one sees individuals who were once in your life involved in stripping, drugs, or crime?

At first you are aghast.  Honestly, I knew two girls who are now strippers at the local titty bars.  When I first met them, they were living alone in a house provided for them by their mother.  The eldest was 19, the younger 17.  I hadn't known that they were alone without parental guidance.  The mom made sure to show up early in the morning, and be there at night.  In reality, she was living with her boyfriend and the sisters were "kept" in the house at the end of the street from mine.  The mom didn't even live in the same neighborhood, she was 5 miles away!   So, I hope you understand when I say, my heart just tore upon finding out their treatment.  They had both dropped out of school, but the eldest had gotten her GED.  The younger one....she was lost in a haze of drugs, sex, and booze.  Her mother and grandmother made her have an abortion when she was 17.  When she was 18 she was pregnant again and had this one, with an abusive baby daddy.   Now, she is 21, given birth to two children who have been removed from her.  She has a police record for drugs and is a stripper.  Yeah, a stripper.

Now, her elder sister, did get a degree in medical assistance, but she couldn't hold down a job.  I don't know why, we lost contact with them....she has been the girlfriend of a now 31 year old man for four years.  Party, booze, sex, drugs....Yeah, all of it and guess what?  She's a stripper too at a different club.  So, the two sisters live in a world many of us only see on tv.  Really!  How does society look at these two girls?  Think about it.  Not good.  Let's face it, how many of us called them lowlifes?  Scuz?  Whores? Waste of society?  What else?  How many of us would look at them with disgust?  Hey, let's be honest!  Wouldn't we?

So, now you know what I have been thinking of lately.  Those two girls.  I don't pity them.  I don't put them down.  They are a product of their environment.  This is what they know.  What I do question is why?  Not why about them, I question why WE the community around them allowed this to happen to them?  Do you really think when they were little girls they wanted to grow up and be strippers?  Hell no, they loved to play and run like every little child does.  Did they desire to be addicted to drugs?  NO!  They wanted to be loved.  Yeah, loved.  Just like any other kid.  But their parents divorced when they moved here.  Their father was abusive and went to jail for it.  Their mom dumped them for a boyfriend who didn't want them around.  Okay, so now we can blame the parents!  Yes!  The parents are to blame, but so are we.  The community they lived in.  Yeah, some of their neighbors knew the girls were left alone and never reported it!!!!  One guy friend even put a red light in the outside light!  Yep, he was a great friend to them, gave them drugs, alcohol, and yeah, you got it, pimped them out.

Really great.  What the hell was I doing?  I had no idea....but I wondered.  Did I do anything?  No, I thought the mom lived with them.  But here's the catch, what do you do when you think that there is parental involvement?  I don't know.   I still haven't figured that out yet.  I didn't find out all of this stuff until two years ago!  By then it was too late.  Way too late....Now, they are strippers, fast money, social outcasts to many, but not to all.  To the group they are in they are hard workers and earning their money.  Isn't that the American way?

Now, I want you to think about this which has really made me sick to my stomach....who goes to strip clubs?  Okay, some women do, young men do----in one aspect I wonder if it is a right of passage for some.  Older men go...Yeah, I'm talking about the 40, 50, 60, 70 somethings who are there.  That's right....men who are watching these women.....granted some women are in their 40s... but, I'm thinking of the two girls I know....21 and 22 years old.   I know, to me they are kids....to the men.....I'll let you think about it.  Why are the older men there?  Are they lonely?  Are they looking for something to justify their manhood?  Or are they just wanting to....well, you know....I'm not going into details.. For that matter, why do I even care?  People choose their own paths, but I wonder why?  Easy answer, we follow the "advice" of those we think are friends.  We believe this is what we are good at.  Many follow the path of least resistance for it is the flow of society and society's will. We think who cares about others, I have to take care of myself.  We follow our religion and the doctrines / dogmatic of our churches.  It is so easy to condemn and judge rather than realize that our attitudes contribute to those who live and work in "alternative lifestyles".

How many of us are like the

"The Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector

9 To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: 10 “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.11 The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’

13 “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’

14 “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

Luke 18:9-14."

Or do we look at each other with hope and love? 

Well, now you know why I haven't been writing.  I've been trying to figure out the world around me....I know, I never will...but I keep doing in order to find out.  Those two girls.....God be with them....and with us all for failing them...