The Ugly Thunder I saw from Down Under
Quick background… I am an intersectional feminist who believes that stripping and other sex work should be considered legitimate professions that are protected and regulated to help the workers. I also understand that when you are in Las Vegas you shouldn’t have high standards for basically anything. My friend and I did see the Chippendales 10 years ago when we were in Vegas and had a great time. Now in hindsight, the Chippendales show feels super PG…
This last weekend my friend and I were in Las Vegas for a conference and managed to land ourselves a couple of free tickets to a Thunder From Down Under show. We had been wanting to go see this show for the last 10 years; after seeing the Chipndale’s we wanted to compare… thinking it would be the same thing but with Australian accents and maybe more cowboy hats.
Perhaps I should start by stating the couple positive things I liked about the show.
- The performers were in incredible physical shape
- The performers were fairly good dancers (who did a good job doing the shuffle to the LMFAO song “Party Rock”)
- The performers were able absolutely amazing at their gymnastic feats
I had high hopes for the show at the start since one of their first group dance acts was to the Beyoncé song “Who Runs the World (Girls)” making me think this was about to be a pretty legit fun, feminist friendly, empowering, male strip tease.
Unfortunately, the show left me extremely disappointed, heart-broken, and outraged.
The show alternated between group dance numbers and solo acts. Many of which focused heavily on being overly masculine and portrayed SWAT teams, police, and the military. The costumes used were not cutesy or fun by any means, but rather serious in nature. One skit included the performers dancing around in black leather with red baseball caps which felt both like a portrayal of strength and (hopefully accidental) political statement. These specific portrayals of power immediately made me uncomfortable and nervous.
Many of the skits included one or more performers running out into the audience to dance around on tables or in the aisles…and also included them grabbing women audience members to kiss or rub their necks, rub their genitals up against, or grab their heads to draw into the performers thong wearing crotch.
Each solo skit included having the performer pick one or more audience member to be an innocent “volunteer” who had no clue what they were getting themselves into. Each “volunteer” who made their way on stage got touched by the performers in ways that made me feel violated for them. The first of which seemed so embarrassed and upset when she got back to her seat I wanted to check if she was alright after what looked like a non-consensual public groping. My friend and I, along with many others, found ourselves cringing every time the performers came out into the audience for fear they would touch us more than desired or pressure us to join them on stage for an unknown varying level of public groping.
Note: To be fair, there were multiple bachelorette parties present a this show and they all seemed to be enjoying themselves and kept volunteering up their group’s bride-to-be to go on stage. One of the bride-to-be’s that made it on stage was overly embarrassed by being put on the spot to fake an orgasm in front of the whole audience.
All the performers minus the host (who ultimately participated in a skit as a performer at the end) were white. One of the skits was supposed to be based in Africa and the (white) backup dancers wore dreadlocks wigs as if to imply they were Africa natives. My friend and I (and it seemed some of the other black audience members) found this rather offensive and racially insensitive. The SWAT act was with all white dancers as members of the SWAT team and performed to Michael Jackson’s song “They Don’t Care About Us” which felt offensive given the song is about police brutality and racial tensions.
I noticed many audience members, besides my friend and I, were also upset from what they were seeing. And by the end, the last volunteer they wanted was hard to find. They tried to pick my friend first who gave them a hard “No” and their second pick also declined to go anywhere near the stage. The second pick’s friend ended up caving after the whole room of women cheered pressuring for someone to go up — “Do it! Do it!”. She unfortunately found herself having to participate in a skit they informed us was called “Gang Bang.” Once the four (white) men in black hoodies pulled over their head came out on stage, the poor volunteer turned around to look back into the audience toward her group to basically give them a “WTF” regarding the situation she had found her way into. This volunteer had the four men dancing up all on her and touched her, and then the host came out in secret to give her the final dance of the skit. After revealing himself the host ended the skit with forcing the volunteer’s hand down his pants. This whole skit was the most offensive and horrifying to watch as it was minimizing the terror women go through, the regular fear women have of being raped by any number of men (but a gang rape being one of the worst), and then trivializing all those feelings by turning it into something they want people to think is sexy. It’s not sexy. It’s terrifying. It’s not funny. It’s not a joke.
Another one of the solo skits had their volunteer in a chair while the performer took off his belt and wrapped it around her mouth, pulled her head back with it and then proceeded to kiss her on the belt. This felt like such a trigger to any woman who’s experienced sexual violence with strangers or intimate partners. Sexual violence is not a joke and is not funny and is not sexy.
The show only lasted a little over an hour but it felt like it would never end. Every solo skit caused extreme anxiety. Many of the group acts of overt masculine power were high anxiety filling and triggered my “flight or fight” . I was rather fearful of the skits making military authorities out to be something sexually alluring. I wanted to walk out at multiple points in the show and was relieved when it ended so we could make a quick exit from not just the theatre but the whole Excalibur hotel.
Thunder from Down Under seems to be a bunch of hot guys who dance around and perpetuate violence against women. I was extremely disappointed and very upset leaving the show. I felt outraged and concerned for each “volunteer” from that night. I felt that I had spent an hour being overly on guard for what I expected to be a silly, fun, laid back strip tease like The Chippendales.
Maybe I should have researched the show more before agreeing to go. Maybe I should have guessed it would have been something like this. Or maybe… just maybe, no show in 2018 should be allowed to have shows sexualizing or normalizing the violence against women. I am extremely glad we didn’t pay for these tickets as I would have been all the more outraged if we had directly financially supported this nonsense.
2018, we are better than this.
