And maybe I'm just a huge asshole, but knowing that lots of burger-flippers probably despise their jobs doesn't stop me from buying burgers, so...
well, yeah, me neither. being unhappy with an economic system isn't going to stop you from participating in it in order to get what you need. i wouldn't go into a mcdonalds to be entertained though, you know? like i would probably be looking around thinking 'wow what a shit hole. but it's real cheap and i am hungry'. i'm not going in there to have fun, i don't think anyone does. food, clothes, video friggin games - whatever. i don't enjoy shopping, it's a means to an end and it's an end i couldn't really meet in any other way.
that's different from going to a strip club. a strip club is entertainment, so you actually are there to enjoy yourself. the people you are watching perform might actually come out better off at the end of the transaction, like what drule said about rich strippers, but even if it's the best, most fair and least disgusting strip club in the world it can't really change what transaction that is going on. it is paying for basically a performance of really softcore porn - tell me if you see it differently, because i can't, really. what i think makes it worse than porn is that it requires an actual person to do the same performance over and over again for you, and the assertion that it qualifies as legitimate entertainment. i watch porn, but you aren't going to hear me call it 'adult entertainment', or ever pay for it. i won't even defend it, i don't think. it is just a way for me to get my stupid little kicks that i think is the easiest and least ugly way to do it. even then it's still pretty ugly.
it isn't the same as going to see another kind of entertainment like film because films are (or can be) made with some thought, care and can be important to the people who make them - when they aren't, a film isn't fun anymore! even aside from the problem as to whether the stripper is having any fun, why the heck would the customer be having any fun? the only reason i can see is that they are satisfied having their entertainment being very shallow and thoughtless, and don't mind the very real possibility that what they are doing is exploitative and the only reason anybody is there is money and tits.
it just seems like a real ugly kind of place to be.