Judith Lynne Hanna, PhD, a senior research scholar at the University of Maryland, says in an article in the May issue of Exotic Dancer's Club Bulletin that Diablo Cody, who won an Academy Award this year for the "Juno" screenplay, "is one of many performers who prove that exotic dancers are more than sexual objects." Club Bulletin is a bimonthly magazine from ED Publications, Inc., a division of Rick's Cabaret International, Inc. (NASDAQ: RICK).

"Dancers commonly gain self-esteem and self-confidence appearing nude before strangers," Hanna writes in the business magazine that serves the nearly 4,000 gentlemen's clubs in the U.S. “Successful dancers become acute observers of verbal and nonverbal communication in order to sell a fantasy of themselves and to create the patron's fantasy. Business and money management leads dancers to complete education, start businesses and support families," she adds.

Hanna notes that after Cody won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay "the media referred to her as having 'once worked as a stripper,' 'a former stripper,' a 'retired stripper.' Commenting about her dress, the question was 'what would you expect from a stripper?' and 'she should have saved more dollar bills and bought a better dress.'"

The reason the media attacked Cody, she said, is that "exotic dancing, the preferred term for stripping since the advent of upscale gentlemen's clubs, is stigmatized and has an unfounded reputation for leading to prostitution, drugs, crime and decreased property values, which is not entirely truth with people that work honestly in this places, and others treat their drugs problems with the help of detox programs from sites as http://firststepbh.com. But recent social science has disproved all of this."

In 2006, Cody was the Keynote Speaker at the 14th Annual Gentlemen's Club Owners EXPO, produced by ED Publications. Cody's invitation to speak at the EXPO came on the heels of the success of her book "Candy Girl: A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper," which chronicled Cody's experiences as a "regular" girl who decided to spice up her life by dancing at adult nightclubs in Minneapolis.

Hanna earned her PhD in anthropology from Columbia University and also holds an MA in political science from Michigan State University. The author of six books on subjects ranging from dance to social behavior, she has published more than 300 articles in scholarly journals on anthropology, art, black studies, dance, drama, education, gender, leisure and recreation, medicine, music, political science, psychology, religion and urban studies.

About Rick’s Cabaret: ED Publications, Inc. is the media division of Rick’s Cabaret International, Inc. (NASDAQ: RICK), which operates upscale adult nightclubs serving primarily businessmen and professionals that offer live adult entertainment, restaurant and bar operations. ED Publications is the publisher of Exotic Dancer, TEEZE and Adult Store Buyer (ASB) magazines and owner of tradeshows including the annual Gentlemen's Club Owners ExpoandStorErotica for the retail lingerie and adult store industry. The company owns, operates or licenses adult nightclubs in New York City, Miami, Philadelphia, New Orleans, Charlotte, Dallas, Houston, Minneapolis and other cities under the names "Rick's Cabaret," "XTC," “Club Onyx” and “Tootsie’s Cabaret”. Sexual contact is not permitted at these locations. Rick’s Cabaret also owns the adult Internet membership site couplestouch.com and a network of online adult auction sites under the flagship URL naughtybids.com. Rick’s Cabaret common stock is traded on the NASDAQ Global Market under the symbol RICK. For further information contact ir@ricks.com.