Performance Tempel: Thirst Traps & Power Trips

Some erotic evangelism about transing in spaces amongst thirst traps and power trips

The motivation of this post is to promote the class I’m prepping and to be more forthcoming about the points where my opinion on appropriation and memory diverge amongst peers and other professionals that teach pole, do erotic labor or have done/do sex work ( I hate this f*kn word).

Also this part II of the conversation with

The Majestic Maij

and it really will be triggering to people whose identity politic cannot fathom transing space, time, culture and other aspects of life.

I’m prepping for today’s class by reading Funk The Erotic: Transaesthetics and Sexual Cultures by LaMonda Horton-Stallings. The theoretical work that is an encapsulation and vantage point for most of what I do. The class is “BodyView” Thirst Trap— Cinematic Cues and I realized that I needed to share my opinion. Not because it’s yall’s business to know, but I think it’s a perspective that may undergird my philosophy on Performance Tempel as a space/site itself.

Sites of Memory

(Source for section title)¹

My opinion is there should be spaces where people can erotically or sexually fantasize or memorialize. They already exist. As Stallings hi lights: Some of them are called pole studios. Some of them are called church. Some of them are called the gentlemen’s clubs. . Some of them are called basement parties. Some of them are called Caribbean carnival. Some of them are called prayer circles. Some of them are called Dragon-Con. Some of them are called Pride Festivals. Some of them are called concerts/world tours. Some of them are called Mardi Gras. Some of them are called cabarets. All of these spaces are grounds for the ability to trans in them².

The issue is there are very few people who want to recognize or admit or even realize that they first fantasized or up-skilled their erotic gains or capital outside of a specific labor environment—you know before they got there. Though there are exceptions to this, but I have examples.

Examples Of Transing Erotic Spaces.

Take a person who before they were employed as a stripper first gained their awareness of pole work skill outside of the strip club in a pole fitness studio. Or take a presently employed stripper who wants to learn more platform heel technique to increase their erotic allure and takes a class about heelwork. Or the person who cosplays has watched copious amount of footage of a character to know the mannerism and stylizations designed by the character’s author. Or the person who does drag performances who cites their family members, ethnic influences, cultural icons and sexual cultures to effectually rouse an audience. The privilege to fantasize and make that fantasy reality isn’t one that is freely given and most of the time is demonized depending on the space you show up in. Most people are forced into it, some in the face of violence and detriment. There are some people though who have actively chose it amongst other options. So what does it look like when that privilege is placed in a space that recognizes the transitoriness of time, gender, sexuality, labor— life. It’s complex and it’s nuanced. It looks and it feels different. It can be like a shadow.

Digital Era Politic Power Trips

I have often witnessed mothaeffers get on the internets chastising either side of people in space or people with an identity. Either the non-sexual laborers are chastising and criticizing the workers of sex. Or the workers of sex are chastising the civilians. (By the way, I hate the words sex worker and I hate the word civilians in juxtaposition). They start off with opinions and arguments that seem fair to consider but then both sides become too self righteous and politically correct.

Political correctness earns merit in these online spaces amongst a base of supporters. It makes folks respect you cause you follow the same politic. But meritocracy or the perception of people who "do good" or perform their class, their labor, their power or their politic ain't what we or I am doing here. I'm looking for efficacy in the movement. Can what you say, do or how you be actually transform people even if they aren’t completely living or sharing your reality?

So What?

My opinion is if sexual fantasy is initiated by folks thinking they are a stripper or a prostitute or even just a whore, and if they can do so under the integrity of respect for human beings that actually are with the knowledge of the violence they face then I will gladly be the erotic evangelist for that sort of, what some will consider profaning or desecration of sex work.

This is, to me, how transformation and mutation begins and possibly the elimination of stigma. Folks can gain a full bodied understanding without having to legitimize or merit themselves based on the stipulations and determinations of others. They can have a full bodied awareness or even a revelation without having to put themselves in harm. It ain’t always safe playing in these type of spaces or site— regardless of it is a formal institution or one more imaginary. That my friends is how we start bucking the systems. It isn’t from logic or theory alone— it is through living, doing and full body imagining.

1. Stallings, L. H. “Sexuality as a Site of Memory and the Metaphysical Dilemma of Being a Colored Girl.” University of Illinois Press, 2015, pp. 149–175. Transaesthetics and Black Sexual Cultures, http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5406/j.ctt16d68qx.10. Accessed 10 July 2024.

2. Stallings, L. H. “Black Women, Androgyny, Dance, and Profane Sites of Memory.” University of Illinois Press, 2015, pp. 176–204. Transaesthetics and Black Sexual Cultures, http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5406/j.ctt16d68qx.11. Accessed 10 July 2024.