One Man is Responsible for Tampa’s Many Strip Clubs
Not all strip clubs are created equal, but they are created by the dozen in Tampa. However, new residents to the area have noticed there are quite a bit of them just littered through the area. So people have started looking for answers, and the man known as Tampa’s Strip Club King has revealed why.
Joe Redner is the owner of Mon’s Venus, the first all-nude club in Tampa. It is the most popular strip club in all of the Bay area. Joe believes he is the reason the club scene is what it is, and at 81 years old, who gonna argue with him. In the Bay area, there are 40 strip clubs and over half are in Tampa, and it’s because of Joe’s influence. Joe owned a bar back in 1975 called Deep South, and he was reading a newspaper that said the Supreme Court declared Nudity protected by the 1st Amendment. That’s when he got the idea to open on Mons Venus.
“I tried to get people around town that had clubs to go nude. All of them said no, so I started a club with a bondsman who had closed his beer joint. It was a good thing because I really needed the bondsman.” Redner said.“It was just crazy. That’s when everybody else took notice in Tampa,”
Joe Redner brought a booming industry to the Bay area. When the success of Mons Venus took off, everyone wanted in on Joe’s success, and then you saw more and more clubs pop up. But it wasn’t an easy battle, no. 1999 the city decided to respond to the industry by banning lap dances. Redner fought the long hard battle going to jail at least 150 times by his account of the story.
“Strip clubs have been here, just always. As long as there’s men lusting for women and women lusting for men, there’s strip clubs. You can blame that on God.”
Joe doesn’t believe he’s created an immoral place in Tampa. No, it’s just amoral if you ask him. He believes that there is no dignity police in Tampa that if you need to make a buck he’s got the place for you to do it. [Source Axios]
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