Celeb Mashup: DebraJean Danger

I met DebraJean Danger almost as soon as I became a stripper in April of 2006. We both danced at Cabaret on Burnside, in downtown Portland. I didn't know who she was at all. She was one of the founding “Suicide Girls” models, and also a filmmaker. She did a project with Jim Goad some years ago. She was a friend of Sophia Amorusa before ShopNastyGal and her stupid “girl boss” term was created. DebraJean was always very nice to me, and protective of my naivete at work. She would always check in on how I was doing and listen to me. She was a few years older than me, and I more or less looked up to her as a “cool” older-girl-relative archetype.

I was so naive in the beginning, that I continuously stored my money in an unattended bag on the locker room floor as I made it throughout the night. I didn't think I needed to invest in buying a lock for the lockers, and I don't like carrying a bag around with me at work. On my 20th birthday, near the end of the night, I opened my bag to discover that someone stole all of the money out of it. While I do enjoy stealing from corporations and retail stores, it never occurred to me that one of my coworkers would steal from me, because I would never do something like that to any of them. I was very upset about it. In order to make me feel better, DebraJean got me a box of VooDoo donuts with birthday candles in them. I can look at my 20th birthday two ways. I can be angry that someone stole all of my night's earnings out of my unattended bag. I can also be thankful that someone as kind and accepting as DebraJean went out of her way to make my first birthday in my new life feel comfortable. Since that night, I either carry a bag around with me, or I lock my valuables in a locker.

DebraJean Danger did not shave her armpits or body hair, and it made me feel comfortable enough to be myself at work. She always had a casual, confidant, hipster manner about herself that emitted an aloof kindness. She put me into contact with some Suicide Girls photographer, and offered to have me model on the site. I decided not to go forward with that, because I dislike the fake-subversive, misogynist, poser nature of Suicide Girls culture, and I didn't want to be a part of it. DebraJean and I worked at another club together in Portland, but mostly never talked. We never really became friends.

A couple of years later, I was in the Fred Meyer bathroom on Hawthorne in SE Portland. I was sitting in one stall, when I noticed a fur coat on the ground in the stall next to me. Whoever was in that stall was taking a shit, straining, and making noises. As I sat in my stall, I wrote a note that said “Fur is Murder,” and put it on the fur coat while the person was pooping. A few minutes later, after I was out of the bathroom, DebraJean came out of the bathroom wearing the fur coat. I was shocked and nervous to realize it was her from the stall. I think we both got on the same bus too, coincidentally. I'm not sure if she realized that I was the one from the stall next to her, but she didn't say anything to me on the bus. She might not have even recognized me from having worked together in previous years.

DebraJean isn't that big of a famous person, but I still enjoyed meeting her and finding out about her work in the entertainment industry. There are a lot of indie-famous or internet-famous people who work in the strip club industry. I wanted to make this DebraJean post to highlight and celebrate the pattern, and let DebraJean be a representative of this type of a dancer. I don't know what she would think of my labor rights stuff these days, but I doubt she would like it. Back then, I used to say things to coworkers such as, “we should have a union,” without even knowing what misclassification is, or why contractors can't be represented in a traditional way that employees can be. I didn't understand any of the legality of the issue whatsoever, and didn't realize that there are some people who dislike unions. Judging from DebraJean's friendships with libertarian yippie types who love the work of Ayn Rand and Sophia Amorusa, I doubt she would like my opinions, and that's ok. I don't like her fur coat. I still remember her fondly despite our differences, and am happy to have met her.