The dancers, cashiers, janitors and security staff at the Lusty Lady Theater in San Francisco ratified the nation's only existing union contract for sex workers early this spring.

We started organizing last year after we discovered customers were routinely and clandestinely filming us through the peepshow's one-way windows. We complained to theater management for months, and asked them to remove the one-way glass to make it easier for us to spot videocameras and film equipment. Management refused and told us to "get another job" if we didn't like it: despite the company's no camera policy, they maintained that getting photographed and filmed without our consent was an occupational hazard. Tired of making porn for free, we hooked up with the Service Employees International Union, Local 790.

As soon as we announced our plans to unionize, the management removed the one-ways, but also refused to recognize the union, and hired a law firm infamous for busting unions. Though the one-ways were gone, the power inequity their presence symbolized was still festering: favoritism was the norm, the company's disciplinary policy was unwritten and erratically and inconsistently applied, dancers had their pay cut in half for missing a staff meeting or calling in sick, and were suspended for reasons like not smiling enough. Like all other non-union workers, we had virtually no recourse if we were suspended or fired unfairly. We knew a union contract could temper these injustices and hold the company accountable for its actions.

Undeterred by the company's last ditch concession, in June, 1996 we decided to go through with a National Labor Relations Board union election, and theater management spent the summer running a "vote no" propaganda campaign. Despite (mis)informational flyers, threats, harassment of union activists and mandatory group meetings about the evils of unions, we stuck together and won the election 57 to 15.

We spent the months following the election negotiating a union contract with management -- or at least attempting to. Instead of trying to work out an agreement with us, management and their lawyers spent the sessions insulting us, rejecting all of our proposals and dragging their feet. The lawyers were like customers from hell: like the egotists who want something for nothing, they were constantly trying to control the show. Their female submission fantasies didn't go over well at a bargaining table full of retired pro-doms. (Compared to the hours and hours of rhetorical circle jerking I sat through at Labor Board hearings and bargaining sessions, I can now say unequivocally that the real thing is a lot easier to swallow.)

A few months into this routine, we staged our first job action to protest the slow pace at the bargaining table. The Lusty Lady is the only place in town any 18-year-old kid (or 40-year-old corporate executive) with a quarter can go and see live, gyrating, three-dimensional, Hustler -style beaver shots, inches from his face, for half the price of a donut. The two-bit pussy show is the Lusty Lady's signature commodity, and on "No Pink" Day the goods weren't for sale. Almost every dancer who worked that day took part in the action, and management responded to our newfound modesty by firing one of the participants.

The attempt to intimidate and divide us backfired: we retaliated by picketing the theater for the next two days and management fired back with a lockout. The company ultimately caved in, rehired the unfairly fired dancer, and finally began to cooperate at the bargaining table.

Management didn't agree to all of our demands, and there was talk of a strike, but we eventually ratified our contract in April of this year. There's still a sizable gap between profits for the company and wages for the workers, but we won rights, job security, and legal recourse if we're treated unfairly on the job -- from a company that never intended on reaching a contract at all, in an industry renowned for regarding its workforce as disposable. But the struggle's not over...

LIVE NUDE GIRLS UNITE!

For help organizing your club, call the
EXOTIC DANCERS UNION/SEIU LOCAL 790
at 510-465-0122 x461, email:fly@sirius.com

Jane was on the union's contract Bargaining Committee, and still dances at the Lusty Lady. She enjoys terrorizing recalictrant customers, and fomenting labor uprisings. Her turn-ons include illiterate and bossy men. Visit her in the Lusty Lady's Private Pleasures booth for nasty details about the on-going battle with management.

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