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In this day and age, a lot of us are gig workers. And that can mean flexibility, but it can also mean unpredictable ups and downs. In this episode, we learn from the real experts on hustling and succeeding as a freelancer: unionized strippers! When dancers at the Star Garden strip club were fired for speaking out against an unsafe workplace, they rallied together and went on strike. In our final episode of The Dough, we give you an empowering story that leaves you with tips on how to make your work, work for you.

Please note, The Dough contains mature themes and may not be appropriate for all listeners.

You can find Lilith and her coworkers on Instagram at.instagram.com/equitystrippersnoho/ or on Twitter at twitter.com/EquityStripNoHo.

This series was created in partnership with Flourish Ventures, an early-stage global investment firm backing mission-driven entrepreneurs and industry influencers working toward a fair finance system for all. Learn more at flourishventures.com.

Thank you for listening to The Dough. To help us learn more about what is resonating and how we can keep creating great content, please take our short listener survey at bit.ly/thedoughsurvey

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To follow along with a transcript, go to lemonadamedia.com/show/ shortly after the air date.

Transcript

SPEAKERS

Interviewer, Dancers, X Mayo, Lilith, News 3, Christina Viega, News 1, Velveeta, Kate Shindell, News 2, Cardi, Gloria Riviera

Gloria Riviera  00:27

The Dough is a production of Lemonada media created in partnership with Flourish Ventures.

 

Cardi  01:41

Everybody used to see me on Instagram and they used to think I was so late but the truth is that I used to be like from home to work from home to work because I mean I oh let’s go to the club for a while like I work in a strip club knickers buy me drinks, why am I gonna go to the club to buy my own drinks? That’ll make no goddamn sense.

 

X Mayo  02:03

Hey, boo hey, it’s X Mayo here with our final episode of season one of The Dough and we want to send you off with something inspirational. Making your work work for you. Y’all we are living in the golden age of the hustle. People got it the LEM jobs piecing together shift from writing creative work, bucking DoorDash just look at Cardi all she went from stripping to Love and Hip Hop to one of the biggest rappers on the planet.

 

Interviewer  02:32

I read once that you saved 32,000 in singles. Yeah, that’s amazing.

 

Cardi  02:38

Whatever Korea that you pick, make sure it’s gonna be a Korea that’s gonna make you a whole lot of fucking money.

 

X Mayo  02:43

I’ve been an entrepreneur all my life and maybe when I say all my life, I mean I planned my motherfucking Elementary School graduation and you better believe that shit was perfect. Yeah, to Silas okay. And ever since then I’ve spent most of my life as a free agent, a hustler. But not now I’m wasn’t dealing that elite guy just want to say I don’t want the white people to hear me say that if like she was dealing drugs revenue, I was okay. It takes a certain kind of person to be a good worker. You got to be brave enough to deal with the uncertainty and you’ve got to know your value. But it can be awesome too, you can build your work around your life instead of building your life around your work. And especially for my friends who want to have kids. That’s huge, it’s basically work ala carte. But honey, I’ll take TV writer with […] to go. But not everything is nice and gig Landia, no, man it’s not for everybody. You have way less financial security than a lot of people working nine to five, and you got to do every damn thing yourself. I remember when I started out I was HR. I was customer service. I was fucking shipping and handling. But I wouldn’t trade it for anything. But this shit is complicated okay? It would have been damn near impossible to get going if I didn’t have some incredible financial role models to learn from especially the undisputed Queen’s of money management strippers on YouTube […]

 

Christina Viega  04:21

Hi guys, and welcome back to my YouTube channel.

 

X Mayo  04:23

Christina Viega is one of my favorites. Her vlogs cover everything from Beauty Tips to ice balls to break breakdowns of where to hell our checks go. It’s a feed of her life as a stripper as a mother and as a boss ass bitch. And I’ve learned so much from her. And one of my favorite videos she talks about exactly how much money she makes and why it’s important to save as a freelancer.

 

Christina Viega  04:51

I was making between $7000 and like $26,000 a month. I know that’s a big range but you can have really good months you can have bad month and out average, I would probably say like, I don’t know, 18,000 or 16,000. Somewhere around there but that can always change.

 

X Mayo  05:07

Now I know what you’re thinking $18,000 a month, I’m gonna start stripping a night. And you know what, I love that for you baby, go get your money. Just make sure you log in autumn sweatiest ones for Texas.

 

Christina Viega  05:21

A lot of people tell me like, oh, don’t count your money in your videos, because IRS is gonna come after you. Okay, so I be on my taxes. Um, I think it’s really important to pay your taxes, especially if you want to start establishing credit and like having things under your own name.

 

X Mayo  05:36

Look, you don’t understand how easy it is to lose track of money until you’re juggling 40 to 1099 crying at h&r block, while a man named Tyler say July. If you know, you fucking know. So here’s what you’re gonna do. You’re going to open up a Google sheet or your notes app or whatever, and you’re gonna log every single time $1 comes in. It doesn’t matter if it’s from your Venmo or your G string. That’s money you got to pay taxes on the IRS will be on that ass. Trust me, though, like 25-30% of that in a separate account don’t even think about it until tax season. And I already know what you think because I’m psychic. No, I’m just kidding. But I know what you’re thinking X how the fuck do you expect me to save a quarter of my paycheck just for taxes? I need that whole thing just to pay my bills well, honey, if you can’t pay your bills and your taxes, we gotta get you a bigger paycheck. And that brings us to our main topic for the week, how to fight for what you’re worth. Look, there’s an inherent power imbalance between freelancers and our clients. They have the money, we need the money, okay? And the starving artists shit is played out. So you got to be smart about making sure they’re paying you well. Your expenses, your taxes, shut your fucking sick days. If you’re a freelancer, you’ve got to make sure all of that is included in your fees. If you give these people an inch, they will take a mile. Have you working 60 hours a week for what exposure bitch, I get enough sun okay, you see this melanin don’t pay me. And it’s not just about the check either you got to be willing to fight for decent working conditions too, a lot of places will hire you as a freelancer because then they don’t have to treat you as well as they treat employees right. You don’t have access to their benefits their overtime pay shit, even their non discrimination clauses. But if you stand up for yourself, sometimes you can win bigger than you ever dreamed. Back in May, I was on strike with the Writers Guild doing just that and it was hard fucking work. We were holding down picking lines every damn day and trying to figure out how to make ends meet every damn night. But about two weeks in we got some incredible news. There was this other group of entertainers right here in Los Angeles who were getting treated like shit and they went on strike and baby they won.

 

News 1  08:06

After 15 grueling months of battling their employers. The dancers at Star Guard and topless dive bar, just voted unanimously to join a union. That’s right, they are unionizing.

 

News 2  08:16

They are officially the only strippers in the nation to be represented by a union. They voted unanimously to join the Actors Equity Association.

 

X Mayo  08:25

That’s right y’all unionize strippers right here in Los Angeles. Ya know, I had to talk to these people, I love strippers. I play one on TV. And I figured who better to talk to us about how to fight for what your worth in a professional bad bitch slash labor organizer. We live in multi hyphenate okay, so I got in touch with one of the leaders of the stripper union. She was on the front lines of that fight, sometimes in fishnets and booty shorts, I noticed right. Okay hi Lilith.

 

Lilith  08:54

Hi!

 

X Mayo  08:55

Lilith is a television writer by day and stripper by night. So we’re actually union sisters in the Writers Guild.

 

Lilith  09:02

The reason that I became a stripper is because work in television was so infrequent and unpredictable. And there would be just long stretches of unemployment where if you don’t have a backup gig, you’re just not earning any kind of sustainable wage. So stripping was really helpful for me because it was so flexible.

 

X Mayo  09:25

And on top of that she loves the work.

 

Lilith  09:28

With stripping, it’s just like a treasure trove of people’s lives. Like really and truly customers will just divulge the juiciest details about their lives and like just really like vulnerable and beautiful tangents that you wouldn’t hear from them in any other space.

 

X Mayo  09:50

We had a lot to talk about gig worker taxes, picket line fits LA traffic, all of that. But first I had to know how these strippers got unionized in the first place. For Lilith, the story starts back in January 2022, she had just started stripping for the first time at a little dive called Star Garden. Okay, so can you just ascribe this space for us? Like walk us through that, like, your first day at the strip club?

 

Lilith  10:17

Yeah, so I actually went into Star Garden first as a customer to kind of get my lay of the land. And it’s this really cute charming dive bar type vibe, like very intimate. And all of the dancers at Star garden like to like work together and make sure that everyone was getting money and that it was just like a fun experience for both customers and dancers. So I was very, I think, surprised. And it like subverted a lot of my expectations.

 

X Mayo  10:48

So you go in there are you like you said that there was camaraderie immediately, so you didn’t feel like nervous? It felt like these are a girl’s girl, like, you know, like.

 

Lilith  10:56

Yeah.

 

X Mayo  10:56

Girl power period.

 

Lilith  10:58

Yeah, there was like immediately welcoming and was like, trying to show me the ropes. Like it was like the sweetest and most lovely thing.

 

X Mayo  11:08

Okay, so tell me what stripping actually is like, like, like as it because it is a job? You know, people would think that it’s, and I’ve been to a shipper before I’m like, this woman is an acrobat.

 

Lilith  11:19

Right.

 

X Mayo  11:20

You should be in a Olympics section for this she’s an athlete.

 

Lilith  11:24

Yeah.

 

X Mayo  11:24

So I want you to like talk to us about like, what is your day to day?

 

Lilith  11:28

Yeah, sure. I think predominantly stripping is a sales job. Because while there is the performance component, and you do go on stage, and you do get tips from dancing on stage, the majority of the job is being on the floor and trying to sell lap dances to customers. So I would say like maybe you know, you’re on stage for maybe 5% of your shift. And you’re also trying to push drink sales like trying to make the club money that way. So it’s a lot of hustling and trying to convince customers to buy your product, which is your one on one lap dance with them.

 

X Mayo  12:13

Sheesh, that is a lot to balance. It’s not just hanging around with your titties, that is a lot of fucking work. And it’s big business. There are nearly 4000 strip clubs in the US according to IBIS World, it’s a $7.4 billion industry. Before an industry that big, it can be hella shady. At Star garden, the owners didn’t even keep up with the maintenance. That’s one of the major issues the shippers had with the club.

 

Lilith  12:38

We galvanized around really pressing safety concerns like we had uneven flooring, which when you’re wearing seven inch heels, is can be completely catastrophic. And we also had a hole in the stage we had some rusty nails in the stage. And there was also just a cleanliness issue with the venue. So those kinds of things how can and have caused injuries to dancers.

 

X Mayo  13:07

Baby for me seven inch heels alone is a pressing safety concern. Not to mention those rusty ass nails. Anyways, what these dancers had to deal with was absolutely next level. And to add insult to injury, the club was taking a massive cut of everything they made.

 

Lilith  13:26

So we were not paid an hourly wage. And we were we received 50% of our lap dance money and the other 50% would go to the club and all of the money.

 

X Mayo  13:40

That standard?

 

Lilith  13:42

It’s not across.

 

X Mayo  13:44

A lot of money because you have to pay taxes.

 

Lilith  13:47

Totally, yeah, it’s standard in Los Angeles. All the club owners will kind of band together to pull the same bullshit because you know, with all the clubs are doing it, you have to kind of prescribe to it. But yeah, in other states, you get to keep all of your lap dance money.

 

X Mayo  14:04

Okay, yatta math here is crazy. Let’s break it down. If you’re a dancer at Star garden, you pay 50% of your lap dance money to the club off top. Then you got to pay your taxes. So that’s another quarter of your paycheck to Uncle Sam, at least. And on top of that, you got to buy your own outfit, your own makeup and get your own health insurance. In case you chip on the hole in that ready stage, which is seven inch heels. So you’re taking home what maybe a quarter of what you made given lap dances all night, and that’s if you’re lucky. Some clubs even have a flat house fee you have to pay just to work for the night. And if you don’t make that much money on lap dances, you’re going home with less money than you started with and baby that’s stripper math. It’s an industry of extremes. At one club, you might walk away with 10 grand a month, and at another you could end up losing money. And one of the ways the clubs maximize profit is by claiming that dancers aren’t technically employees.

 

Lilith  15:11

When we started working at Star Garden, they had us sign this agreement that is called Alessi agreement, which basically says that we were leasing the space and therefore, we’re not actually employees at the club, which is an illegal agreement and like, wouldn’t have held up. And they also, you know, they they were managing us, which you cannot do for independent contractors.

 

X Mayo  15:37

Oh, the independent contractor loophole, they call the strippers leasee, which is just another bullshit way for these owners to avoid labor laws. Because if they’re not employees, the strippers can’t claim workers comp file for unemployment benefits or be protected by anti discrimination laws. So I also heard that black dancers did not get hired at Star garden. Is that something you noticed off rib? Or were you looking around? And he was just like, it’s very wide in here?

 

Lilith  16:07

Yeah, yeah, it was very obvious from day one, that the entirety of the dancer roster was white and light skinned people so yeah, they did not hire a single black dancer in the time that I worked there.

 

X Mayo  16:22

So that’s where the Star Garden dancers were at when shit started hitting the fan in February of 2022.

 

Lilith  16:28

One of the dancers got fired for raising a safety concern with our managers.

 

X Mayo  16:34

That concern, security was letting customers hangout after clothes, which is potentially really dangerous for the dancers.

 

Lilith  16:43

They would allow certain customers to stay in the club after closing, which can be an issue because we’re in our civilian clothes, we’re no longer in our, you know, our stripper persona and made up. But also we’re, you know, after closing, we’re being paid out. So they’re able to see the exchange of cash. And also, we’re walking to our cars, so they’re able to see what vehicle we’re in the final straw for us, we had we had another dancer that was fired for standing up to a customer who was filming another dancer without her consent. And like the final straw for us was we were told by management that if we ever had an issue with a customer we had, we were not allowed to go directly to security. Instead, we had to go to the management first and they had to decide if it was a severe enough instance for security to intervene, even if that meant management wasn’t on site, and we had to give them a call. And in a strip club, when you are faced with a dangerous situation, it’s very urgent and immediate and needs immediate intervention. So it just completely was not workable for a strip club.

 

X Mayo  17:55

The strippers were fed up. So in March 2022, they put together a petition to management, demanding that the girls who were fired get reinstated, and that their safety concerns get addressed immediately.

 

Lilith  18:09

And we ended up getting a group of around eight of us to show up to our usual shift on a Friday night with the petition. So we gave it to them and the owners had told us that if we did not feel safe to work that night, we did not have to, so we did not work. And then when we came back into work for our usual shift the next night, there was a security guard posted up front with a rope walking off the entrance and he said, if you’re not on the list, you can’t work.

 

X Mayo  18:43

Never he said y’all are not on a list baby Lilith is the list.

 

Lilith  18:46

Thank you.

 

X Mayo  18:48

I work here, excuse me, sir.

 

Lilith  18:50

These are our customers.

 

X Mayo  18:52

Just to give you a sense of scale. There were 17 strippers that signed the petition and walked off the job. And the club didn’t have more than a handful of strippers still working so Star garden started to lose a lot of men. Without you all there’s no reason for me to come in there right like the women are the club, these beers on tap are not hitting like that, sir. For me to just come up in here, that pool table oh my god smell like a black and mountain mixed with a Colt 45 shut up. No, we are here for the girls period. And these girls had a plan when we come back how Lilith and other strippers made the sidewalk of star garden the hottest club in LA.

 

Gloria Riviera  19:42

Okay, so it’s March 2022. and our stripper friends over at Star garden have just gotten locked out of the club. So what are these bitches do they get to work they decide to hit the club owners where it hurts their wallets. They start picketing all the busiest nights at the club, convincing customers to spend time with them on the picket line instead of going inside. It was a ton of work, but they made striking look effortless, fun and sexy.

 

Velveeta  22:03

Velveeta here with a live update from the stripper strike no hoe, picket outside of Star garden. We’re live everybody. That’s right, yeah today’s picket line is like super chill, it’s been great, great vibes.

 

X Mayo  22:24

My favorite part of the strike they had over 40 theme pickets like hoedown showdown.

 

Velveeta  22:31

Howdy partners we’re live on the stripper strike no ho picket line.

 

X Mayo  22:38

Star garden roast.

 

Velveeta  22:40

If Star Garden doesn’t get his act together and recognize our union, then it won’t be a place to see happening and dancers anymore. Is going to be closed for good.

 

X Mayo  22:54

Even at a runway show outside the club. But my favorite thing is.

 

Velveeta  23:05

Twerking class heroes.

 

X Mayo  23:07

Twerking Class heroes genius! These bigots were a phenomenon and the club was losing a shit ton of money. But somehow the dancers still weren’t making any headway with the club owners is wild jaw the crowd outside the club was usually bigger than the one inside. But the club was not budging. So as the strike went on, the strippers realized that they needed some serious muscle to force the club to improve their working conditions. They wanted a union. And look, unions aren’t perfect for everybody. They’re a lot of fucking work, and there’s plenty of whack ass unions out there who are more concerned about keeping their staff paid than actually fighting for their members. But for the shippers that star garden unionizing felt like the best option for getting the club to actually listen to them. And the labor movement was actually already paying close attention to what was going on with the strike. Here’s Kate Shindell, the president of Actors Equity, they’re the National Union of stage actors and managers.

 

Kate Shindell  24:07

I first heard about this from a couple of different staff members. And it was it was interesting because most of those conversations started in what I would what I would call similar fashion, which was a sort of a hushed voice have you heard about the strippers yet? And what I figured out very quickly, was that there was actually nobody in those early conversations who was reticent, or concerned or reluctant about representing strippers. It was a question of whether the person we were talking to might have reservations and then as we had more and more conversations internally, it’s fair to say we all started getting more and more excited.

 

X Mayo  24:56

Kate was blown away by what the strippers were doing outside of star garden.

 

Kate Shindell  25:01

Strippers are great organizers. I spent two nights on the picket line and August of last year. It was actually incredible to me how, how good they were at just for example, talking to people who are walking down the sidewalk, didn’t have anything to do with Star garden weren’t planning to go in, we’re just passing by, or maybe we’re going to go in, but the strippers wanted to ask them to join the picket line instead. It shouldn’t have been so surprising to me, given what these dancers do for a living, that they’re really good at talking to people. And they created such an amazing atmosphere on that picket line

 

X Mayo  25:44

Lilith talked about this too, how their strength inside the club translated seamlessly into striking out front.

 

Lilith  25:51

As strippers a large part of our job is to make something like dancing on the pole, which is very painful to make it look effortless and sexy and fun. So that’s exactly what we tried to do with our picket lines.

 

X Mayo  26:06

While my skill set also includes talking shit and throw an ass around what these girls did was actually incredible. The idea of a stripper union really started gaining traction. And right around the same time they connected with Kate and actor’s equity.

 

Lilith  26:21

We ended up having some kind of connection where we were able to reach out to them and get a meeting with them. strippers, we weren’t entirely confident that an established union would be delicate about things like stigma, and would fully support all of our best interests. And when we had our meeting with equity, we were immediately proven wrong.

 

X Mayo  26:48

Actors Equity didn’t see the strippers as a curiosity or a joke. They saw them as workers deserving of a safe working environment and equitable wages and as they kept talking, both the dancers and the union folks realize this was a really natural fit.

 

Kate Shindell  27:03

And ultimately, I’m so glad that things happened the way they did, because the more we talked about the issues that they were facing in their workplace, the more they seemed not only to be, in many respects, issues, all kinds of workers face, but also, they were things that we knew how to deal with.

 

X Mayo  27:03

Like Katie saying some of the issues at Star garden were universal. Nobody wants to work with a big asshole in the middle of the office. And if your boss is taking 50% of the money you make off jump. We gotta have some words when I’m sweating yes, but some of the issues that strippers were dealing with were unique to being live performers. And Actors Equity had a lot of experience with that.

 

Kate Shindell  27:49

There are probably very few unions that already have clauses in existing collective bargaining agreements about auditions about onstage nudity about patron or audience interaction. So things like that were things that we had dealt with, and regularly deal with. And we’ve also had an increased focus on eradicating all kinds of harassment and hostile work environments, from our workplaces for for quite some time. And so the the issues that they were confronting there, they felt like things that we could handle.

 

X Mayo  28:27

So the strippers decided to join Actors Equity. The only step left was a union election in November 2022, where they cast ballots to make it official. And they knew they had the votes. So they were all set to become the only unionized strip club in the country. But star garden wasn’t going to make it that easy. The owners filed a legal challenge against the strippers. They said that since the dancers weren’t employees, they couldn’t form a union. So those ballots the strippers cast, they couldn’t get opened until the case made its way through court, and then star guard and tried to file for bankruptcy. There yes, I’m fucking terrible. Despite the fact that the owners had another whole asked strip how you bankrupt and you got another place where they throw an axe and asarco. Actress equity and star guard and loaded up and got into it. So Lilith and her covenant strippers, they were waiting to see whether they ever get the union they worked so hard for that’s after the break.

 

X Mayo  31:20

On May 16 2023, the Star garden strippers got some amazing news. They were officially the only unionized strip club in the United States.

 

News 3  31:53

The only unionized strippers in the nation celebrating their victory.

 

Dancers  31:57

This is incredible. This is a victory for dancers. This is the first union for dancers in the 21st century, we raised ticket machine and we want.

 

X Mayo  32:07

Lilith told me how it all went down.

 

Lilith  32:10

Basically the club ended up settling with us. And we were able to finally open those ballots that we had submitted in November of last year. And we all were very fortunate to have that moment be in person at the NLRB office. We love a costume theme. So we were dressed as sexy Newsies because we were going to hit up the Newsies themed picket line of the WGA after a victory lap, and we all got to be together and have that really emotional, beautiful moment together, and we won unanimously. So it was a huge victory.

 

X Mayo  32:48

The final vote was 17 to zero, not a single one of the strippers who were working at the club before the strike voted against the Union. It was an absolute blowout. It was like a flock of ducks voting on a greatest good. And it wasn’t just a victory for them. The star garden campaign set a precedent that so called leasee can organize with the union. That is massive, not just for shippers, but hairstylist nail techs, anybody who rent space to work. It’s too early to tell what kind of effects that’s going to have across the country. But it opens a lot of doors for gig workers who want to organize their workplace. And as someone who was on strike when the strippers won, it was really inspiring to see him kicking ass and taking names. Did you get to go over to WGA to your second picket of the day?

 

Lilith  33:43

We did a cute little victory lap and we were we were shocked that so many people knew who we were and then knew that we won that day.

 

X Mayo  33:52

Oh yeah, it was everywhere. I kept reposting I was so excited for you all. The star garden dancers went back to work in August 2023. They don’t have a full contract yet. They’re operating under an interim agreement while they work out the details. But opening night was still a hell of a party.

 

Lilith  34:09

It was like all of my closest union friends they’re like a very specific niche of my social network was there which was like so beautiful. We had like a sea of Unite Here shirts there was like a beautiful WGA contingent so I was able to wear my WGA Captain hat and dance to Union made for them which was a big hit. Yeah, and all of our like picket line regulars, a lot of whom had never been inside the club were able to finally see behind the curtain and see what we were fighting for. So it was very special, there were definitely some some obstacles that I did not foresee in my like fantasy version of the opening night but it was still like I’ll remember it for ever.

 

X Mayo  34:56

You guys that last part. She said that there’s been obstacles because the club owners have continued to create problems for the dancers.

 

Lilith  35:05

There were things like they had removed the ATM from the club. And they weren’t exchanging big bills for singles, which is pretty standard in a strip club, to be able to tip the dancers. So there were a lot of people who weren’t able to get cash to tip us and, you know, weren’t able to make it rain on stage in the way they wanted. And our allies are so lovely, they were just like throwing 20s anyway, because they still weren’t gonna let it stop them. And the cover charge was a bit high, definitely higher than we were used to. Before the strike, it was free to get inside of the club. And the cover charge eye opening was $40 so that kind of, you know, there’s a bunch of strip club regulars who are working class neighborhood guys who haven’t yet been able to return to the club. So because of that reason, we have been making less money, but we have been paid hourly, which is new and there’s no scenario where we work a shift at a strip club at this strip club, where we come out in the negatives, which is the case in a lot of other clubs in the country. So the financial depression, I guess, that’s been hitting in this new reopening phase, we definitely don’t see it as a permanent thing. It’s definitely growing pains with this club opening. So those are all things that are works in progress, and we’ve already had progress with them, they’ve told us they’re going to be getting an ATM back in the club. So that’s a huge way. And the cover charges, as of this week, gone down to $25 so even even before getting a contract progress is being made.

 

X Mayo  36:59

Right now the dancers are negotiating that contract. That process isn’t open to the public, so Lilith couldn’t say much about it. But she did mention that they’re working on making the club more diverse.

 

Lilith  37:10

We want really strong language in the contracts to be able to encourage that. And equities like diversity and inclusion departments been like super involved in making sure that we have that language.

 

X Mayo  37:27

She says the best way you can support the dancers in their new union, go to Star Garden, and do what America does best baby a good old fashioned bump and grind. And don’t forget to bring some ones okay, they want the kind of phone at the time that jingles Don’t be don’t pity that the strippers get hurt.

 

Lilith  37:43

I like to think that we’re offering a really enticing Labor Action where all we’re asking you to do is come to a strip club and throw money at strippers and have a good time.

 

X Mayo  37:55

And the movement continues. In September, another strip club voted to unionize. That’s right jaw star garden is no longer the only union strip club in America. They’ve been joined by Magic Tavern in Portland, Oregon. And the rest of the labor movement is on a roll too, the WGA sag jawed NWA to CIA everybody’s getting in on the action. And here on The Dough we are here for a baby. We got to stick together, y’all we got to keep standing up for each other, whether it’s just in the daily grind or in the strike of the century, especially those of us who are gig workers, creatives strippers, we got to celebrate those wins and keep on learning from each other. And in that spirit, I asked Lilith, what advice she has for other gig workers thinking about unionizing.

 

Lilith  38:42

One thing that I have kind of struggled with in this unionization journey is feeling like I have the capacity to step up and be be a labor organizer and the I have like the power to do that and it’s been empowering for me to understand that every single labor organizer was started out as a worker and who realized that things could be better and who wanted to step up and make things better. So I just want those people to know that you anyone can be a labor organizer and that you you don’t you won’t be doing it alone in order for for change to happen. It’s like solidarity with the workers around you that’s going to make you rise to where you want to be.

 

X Mayo  39:40

So that about wraps it up for this season of The Dough guys although we’ve got I don’t think we have the clearance for this limited in a way to the end of the road. Wow, some of you guys thought that was in sync, but it’s okay. What a note to end on am I right? Lilith shake her ass off into the sunset see say whether bitches you can find Lilith at her fellow strippers on social media at stripperstrikenohome or in person at star guard and topless dive bar in North Hollywood, Thursday through Saturday, bring money. Well, it’s about time for me to shake my ass off into the sunset to y’all it has been a phenomenal season full of great guests with amazing advice. We’ve turned money mishaps into dough we can work with. And I want to thank each and every one of you for listening. I’ve had a hell of a time. I’ve learned how to divorce an asshole, how not to get scammed on the internet, and how to unionize or whole ass strip club. And I know I’ve said this a million times. But I think the most important lesson, the one we keep coming back to is how much we can learn from each other. So many of the conversations we have about money really fall into this trap of hyper individualism, right? This idea that is every girl for herself, but y’all we are social creatures. We live and we die on the strength of our communities. And I think sometimes we really forget how strong those communities are. Listen to me. We have everything we need. Maybe we are gig workers reminding each other to save for taxes and sharing salary information. We are badass strippers doing fashion shows on the picket line. And we are writers actors and crew standing together to change an entire fucking industry. We are divorcees and sorority girls shit we fucking black yacht owners. It’s all for one and one for all and if we work together baby capitalism and got shit on us. Cash is queen and I hardly know that bitch but I’m glad we got to know her a little better to get. Take care and I’ll see you soon.

 

CREDITS  42:07

There is a more of THE DOUGH with Lemonada Premium, babe. Subscribers get exclusive access to bonus content like what it takes to be an entrepreneur and a bus bitch with my girl Lauren Miller. Subscribe now and Apple podcasts. The Dough is a Lemonada Original. I’m your host X Mayo. This series was created in partnership with Flourish Ventures. This episode was produced by Kristen Lepore and Becca De Gregorio. Tony Williams is our associate producer. Mix and sound designed by Ivan Kuraev. With additional mixing and engineering from Andí Kristinsdóttir. Original Music by Pat Mesiti-Miller. Kelsey Henderson is our production intern. Additional production help from Jerusalem Truth, Claire Jones, and Hoja Lopez. Jackie Danziger is our Vice President of narrative content. Executive Producers include me X Mayo, Stephanie Littels Wachs and Jessica Cordova Kramer. Help others find our show by leaving us a rating five stars, and writing a review. You can follow me on IG at @$80inasuitcase and Lemonada at @LemonadaMedia across all social platforms, not including MySpace. Follow the dough wherever you get your podcasts or listen ad free on Amazon music with your Prime membership. Thanks so much for listening. See you next week. Bye.