A rchive Date
[ 23-02-2005 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ Canada ]
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[You ain't seen n-n-nothin' yet
By LINDA WILLIAMSON
Toronto Sun
May 25, 2000
It was bound to happen. The g-g-generation that embraced the words "I hope I die before I get old" has now decided it will do neither.
In the more erudite columns to be found in this newspaper and others, much has been made of the sad case of Kimberly Glasco, the 39-year-old National Ballet of Canada dancer who was told to hang up her toe shoes before she was ready.
Glasco's fight to keep dancing has generated a lot of attention and, no doubt, cash for a lot of fancy-stepping lawyers, though great questions about isues of artistic vision vs. age and ability remain.
But such ethical debates are by no means the exclusive purview of the tutu-and-tiara crowd, as the Sun's own story of Shirley Zegil amply illustrates.
Zegil, a 52-year-old dancer who prefers fishnet stockings to tights onstage, has launched her own legal challenge after her last two employers stopped the music.
Another case of artistic vision? Well, sort of. Zegil is, of course, a stripper. She claims her bosses fired her, despite more than 20 years of experience, because she's "too old and fat." While those bosses deny the age aspect (one said she was fired because "she's overweight and she can't dance"), her complaint has been taken up by the Exotic Dancers Alliance, which says a basic principle of human rights is at stake.
"There's no age limit for strippers," Zegil (a.k.a. "Contessa," a.k.a. "Toronto Torch") told reporter Tom Godfrey.
Added Exotic Dancers Alliance president Mary Taylor: "Discrimination is rampant in strip clubs. All the clubs want thin girls with big boobs."
This is, obviously, an outrage. After all, it's one thing if those elitist ballet types want to discriminate in favour of a very small group of young, thin, fit people with an extraordinary talent.
But to think that strip clubs, those bastions of human dignity and equality (not to mention fraternity), would tolerate such blatant disregard for a woman's rights is utterly shocking.
This is a country, after all, where women have fought hard to be able to bare their breasts in public. Are we now expected to accept that some might not be able to do so in a private club, just because someone says they aren't young or perky enough?
If a woman doesn't have the inalienable right to take her clothes off for a bunch of paying, appreciative customers (and Zegil insists older patrons prefer a stripper of a certain vintage), what rights does she have?
STRIPPER SHORTAGE
Besides, as recent Sun stories have also documented, Canada is also apparently experiencing a severe stripper shortage. (There is never, incidentally, any shortage of stories about strippers in our popular culture, it seems. If you did a study of the most-depicted female occupation in movies, print and TV, my money would be on stripper and hooker in a dead heat. This is, of course, because of the well-known and influential stripper/hooker lobby in Hollywood and other power centres, and not because of any prurient interest by media proprietors or consumers. But I digress.)
As two Toronto-based burlesque associations also told Godfrey, it's high time Ottawa relaxed immigration rules to allow more foreign strippers into the country to meet the demand. Otherwise, they warn, dancers will (as some already have) resort to disguising themselves as nannies, babysitters or nuns to get into Canada.
Imagine, hard-working, honest strippers having to stoop to dressing up as nuns! Oh, the humanity!
Fortunately, the Torch, er, Zegil, subscribes to that other rock mantra of her era, "It's better to burn out to than fade away." She's discovered a new way to keep on burning brightly.
As the Sun reported yesterday, she now plans to launch her own Web site where she will perform online strip shows - tapping that boundless market of one-handed computer surfers around the world.
"Men won't have to leave their homes to watch me perform," she says. Good news for all those shut-in boomers all hopped up on Viagra with no
lace to go.
As well, she plans to give tips to women who want to strip for their husbands, or young whippersnappers (so to speak) who want to get into the trade. Anything to ease that shortage!
The beauty of it is, given the Internet's capability for artifice and virtual reality, Zegil may well have hit upon a way to keep on stripping on the small screen forever, never dying, never getting old (okay, older).
You go, Contessa. There's hope for your generation yet.
And people try to put her d-d-down. Imagine.
Linda Williamson is the Toronto Sun senior associate editor. She can be reached by e-mail at lwilliam@sunpub.com
 World Fact Book (CIA)]]
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