Sexy vs. Not, Woman vs. Man, and other things

[kho]

This is all brought on by last night's 30 Rock. It was talking about women and women's own views on women and women comedians, etc. And it, ya know, it was really interesting, because I'm kind of one of those woman-hating feminists that makes no sense? LOL. I don't hate women in general, just, ya know, most of them. No. I'm kidding. I don't

Comments

[duckgirlie]

The thing is that it's all a catch-22 situation.There are more men in comedy, and that results in fewer women entering comedy, for various reasons. There's that they don't think they'll be welcomed (which is true, because there's a huge amount of pre-judgement that goes on against women in comedy before they've even opened their mouths) but also that as an environment, it's not very woman-friendly. If you want to work the stand up circuit, there's an awful lot of continuously putting yourself in an almost all-male environment, many of whom think sexist jokes are par-for-the-course, and lots of whom would probably be completely okay with jokes that go past 'moderate' sexism. It's not a comfortable environment to be in (I've never been on the stand-up circuit, but the debating circuit in UK/Irl is similar) It can just wear you down. Because you're constantly with people who don't respect you (or don't act like they do) and playing to audiences that immediatly think you're not funny.

And the thing is? There are loads of male comedians

[kho]

Oh undoubtedly the lack of good women comedians is a self-perpetuating cycle. Just like the lack of good politicians and the lack of good journalists. Those that make it are more of the same, and the new guys don't make it because they aren't willing to play the game.... but once they've played the game, we don't want them anymore because they're just more of the same

[duckgirlie]

I think, in general, UK/Irl comedians err more on the side of being storytellers, and often have more of a surrealist bent then the US ones. There are very few US stand-ups that I like, because most of the ones I see are part of that very aggressive style of comedy, very JOKE!! JOKE!! JOKE!! and that just doesn't appeal to me at all. Though I presume there are lots that aren't like that.

Thing is, I think the answer for that is for moderate feminists to identify themselves as feminists and try and turn the tide back, not just to accept that perception is stuck that way.

[kho]

The whole "UK likes satire, America likes crass" thing? LOL. Yeah, that's still true to some extent, but I've never really subscribed to that. Then again, I had a teacher introduce our class to Rowan Atkinson at a fairly young age (7th grade, what, 13 years old? 14?) and Mr. Bean and since then I've been exposed to lots and lots of British humor, British comedies, and British movies/tv shows, so that's possibly shaped my palette

[fleegull]

Feminism is, and always has been, the belief that women deserve the same shot in life as men. That's it. No man hating at all. The belief that if a woman does a job, she get the same pay as a man provided they are doing the same job equally as well. Now that's a difficult thing to quantify when it comes to something like comedy or singing because we all have different ideas of what constitutes funny or pleasant sounding to the ear. The fact is that pop music today also plays heavily to a visual medium so an attractive male or female with a good voice is going to have a rosier future in it than a plainer looking person, it's not fair but neither is all of life. One could argue it's much better to be born into a wealthy family than a poor one or it's better to be smart and we could kill ourselves trying to make the world a totally fair place.

Thing is: feminism is not about hating men, or about whining about who has it easier, it's about wanting us all to be treated with dignity and as much fairness as we can muster.

[kho]

I agree. I hope you didn't think I meant that feminism SHOULD mean man-hating, only that thanks to the countless loudmouths that get up and whine loudly in ways that I believe TRIVIALIZES (in a boy who cried wolf when it was a fly type of way) what a true feminist sentiment should be, feminism has come to be synonymous with Man Hating Lesbian Nazi-Feminist. And women who are honest to god, true feminists, now don't want to be associated with that stereotype so they are reluctant to be called a feminist. That's what I meant.

[soho_iced]

The only female comedian I really like is Catherine Tate, who may also be teetering on the comedian/comic actress boundary. (Personally I think that she is extremely funny but may be an even better actress, but I don't actually watch a lot of comedy.) If you wanted to try a UK female comic and haven't already, I'd recommend her.

[kho]

Oh, I adore Catherine Tate.