George led an unassuming life. Until he became Andrea the militant stripper...

It's getting rough being a stripper in Las Vegas these days. A couple of months ago, Kristina Tolman was on her way home from Cheetahs Topless Cabaret when she was, she believes, overpowered, robbed of her day's earnings and arrested by police officers who surrounded her on a desert street.

The police accused her of soliciting – she was seen asking directions from a passer-by – but she believes they had a more sinister motive, since she had just received widespread publicity for her organising efforts as a founding member of the Las Vegas Dancers' Alliance, a burgeoning union for lap-dancers and strippers.

The police have been busy inside the clubs, too, arresting 124 girls at one giant venue, Jaguar's, and 30 at Sapphires. According to the Dancers' Alliance, their standard procedure is to ask leading questions about obtaining sex, then slap on the handcuffs at even the most timid of replies. On one occasion, a cop pretending to be a Texas estate agent grabbed a girl's behind. She told him to lay off; he told her she was under arrest.

The club owners do not like the police raids, but they are so nervous of the consequences of unionisation – such as being forced to put strippers, now treated as "independent contractors", on the payroll with full benefits – that they too are turning against the dancers.

At Cheetahs, organising posters were ripped down, while at another club, the Spearmint Rhino, the Dancers' Alliance people were not even allowed in the door. Dancers suspected of political activity are harassed or fired; those involved have to keep their activities completely hidden.

"Strip club owners have a never-ending supply of labour, so it's all the same to them if a handful of girls gets busted," said Andrea Hackett, the flamboyantly outspoken 49-year-old dancer who has been the Alliance's driving force from the start.

What is emerging is a fascinating clash of interests in which dancers are struggling for better working conditions, strip clubs are struggling to hold on to their customers in the face of aggressive lobbying and competition from the big casinos, and Las Vegas itself is struggling for its soul – deciding whether it really is a no-holds-barred Sin City or whether it would really prefer to keep its vices under tight control.

Round one of the battle began last summer, when the County Commission, cheered on by the casino owners, issued an ordinance banning lap-dancing – or at least making the practice well-nigh impossible with a tangle of rulings governing just how high up the thigh a dancer could swivel and how exactly a customer is supposed to tip his hostess without actually touching her.

Ms Hackett has just launched a signature-gathering campaign try to get the ordinance repealed. Dancers in short skirts are even now sidling up to residents to ask them to sign the petition.

Next she wants the Nevada Labour Relations Board to redefine strippers as employees, so they no longer get charged upfront "house fees" or fines for cutting shifts short. From there, the wish list includes full health insurance (via a provider who already works with the porn industry), union recognition and the evolution of showgirls into a fully fledged political lobby group capable of toppling hostile politicians (including, notably, the county commissioner who came up with the lap-dance ban, whom Ms Hackett describes as "a perfect evil witch").

Ms Hackett has a colourful background – as George Hackett, she worked on the Boeing production line for 17 years before deciding he/she would have a lot more fun getting a sex change and taking her clothes off for a living. Now she is determined to fight what she sees as the influence of the moralistic Christian right on Las Vegas's free-wheeling spirit.

"This is a one-horse town," she explains over several Lucky Strikes cigarettes, held between impeccably manicured nails. "We don't have a Microsoft or a Boeing. We have adult-style entertainment. Any effort to do anything else is misguided."

Taking on the scuzzy strip joint owners is not without its risks. During the last major unionisation push, in 1983, two dancers disappeared and were never heard from again. Ms Hackett herself has received three death threats to date, but she is undeterred. "Life is not a dress rehearsal," she says. "Either you do it – or you don't."