Hey, folks, not for nuthin', but I cannot think of a single reason that a pole dancer would necessarily not be a good sponsor.
We need to be careful of slipping into that kind of judgmental, sex-negativity and into making these kinds of totally bizarre assumptions.
I mean, seriously, where is it written that a pole-dancer can't be a spiritual person? Can't have good recovery? Can't have had a spiritual awakening as the result of doing the 12 Steps and/or can't perhaps be the best person in the world to pass that on to someone else?
This kinda stuff bothers me a lot. I hear this crap from sponsees all the time...and the only thing that pisses me off more than hearing them say it is the way they just assume that I'm gonna co-sign it, no questions asked: like somehow being a recovered person necessarily means that I'm never going to have sex again -- unless I get married again -- to a man-born-male -- and suddenly develop a weird obsession with the missionary position; like because they perceive me as a spiritual person, I am some kind of sex-negative ***** 2 seconds away from joining the convent (not that I necessarily think that all nuns are sex-negative, but this seems to be the assumption on which most sex-negative people are operating).
Just last week I was going over 4th Step directions in the book with a sponsee, and when we got into the sex inventory part, she says to me, totally nonchalant and offhandedly, like it is the most to-be-expected comment in the world: "I really need for you to teach me how to be a lady when it comes to sex!"
...and my first thought is: 'WTF?????'
...except that I am totally familiar with WTF-it's about because I deal with this kinda of sex-negative BS all the time with sponsees, so my second and third thoughts are: 'Not again!' and 'Oh, sweetie, if that's really what you want, you really need to get a different sponsor!'
...and finally, because God is in charge and I do have an unfortunately sad amount of experience dealing with this kind of trite, not-at-all-thought-through, knee-jerk morality and sex-negativity from sponsees, what I actually said is:
"Well, let's do the inventory first, and, when we get to your 5th Step on this part, we'll talk about that...about what your values and ideals are around sex and sexuality and what you need to be doing to live according to those, rather than just some free-floating nonsense you might have absorbed from the culture you were raised in..."
..at this point they usually look at me like I'm speaking ancient Greek, so the rest goes something like this: "...because we just read about how only God can be the arbiter of our sex conduct. So, this all depends on how you understand God...not on how your neighbor, or your mom, or patriarchy in general, or sex-negative people in recovery, or the church you grew up in understands Him -- on God as you understand Him...and we just read that the no-nos here - just like in everything else -- are acting out of dishonesty, fear, inconsideration, and selfishness.
It doesn't say anything anywhere about being 'unladylike,'...so you probably need to think a little about -- and maybe take it into prayer and meditation, too -- : What does being 'a lady' mean to you? And then what does that have to do with your sexual identity and your sexual expression -- if it even ends up having anything at all to do with it....because that is for you and your God to decide...and you need to think about those no-no's, because those no-no's are the things that make a particular sexual situation 'wrong.' According to the book, it doesn't matter what you're doing or who your doing it with, what matters is are you being selfish, inconsiderate, dishonest or fearful?"
So, yeah, let's not be trying to arbitrate, or assuming we have the right to arbitrate, the sex conduct of pole-dancers...because it's silly to even assume we know what it is on an individual to individual basis!
freya