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"I don't like it when girls do disgusting things. Girls will sometimes come up and do something disgusting and I am like, 'Urgh!' Girls shouldn't do that kind of thing. They should leave that stuff to the guys." - Johnny Knoxville
This whole quote is sort of explainable put in the context that he gets women who come up to him and hit him and, well, I can understand him being ticked off. But it's made me think about something.
There seems to be this weird mentality among creators that women are both "too good" to like crude humor but in a way "too dumb" to get it. Kevin Smith, as much as I like him, seems to be an advocate of this mentality. I remember on the Clerks II DVD he made some sort of, "Yeah, we have, like ... three female fans, and that's it." And I'm just thinking, "I was AT the second Stash Bash. There were more than three women in my section, and I'm assuming a huge amount more women who won the whole contest. They can't ALL have entered it for their husbands." And there's definitely more than three women asking him questions on the Evening DVDs.
And yet while he considered his "dick and fart joke movies" above women's notice, and also said in his introduction to the first Twisted Toyfare trade that "No woman would ever involve herself with this" ... he was also singing Rosario Dawson's phrases for being a rare geek girl (and a pretty geek girl! She's a fucking unicorn!).
It seems like this happens a lot with creators who are also into crude humor. When Trey Parker and Matt Stone used to talk about their fans, they always used the word "boys", even though I could probably name more female South Park fans off the top of my head than male South Park fans, and yet they would say in an offhand comment how "Somehow fat women do the best Cartman impressions." I read an interview from a few years ago where one of the head producers on the Simpsons said the show was "guy humor" and that the Marge and Lisa episodes were negligible and how women really "brought down" the camaraderie of the writer's table. (The female interviewer was not amused.)
But ... the thing is, these creators KNOW they have female fans. They've seen them. They've talked to them. You could say they're a minority ... but they really seem to be a significant one. Why all the insistence that they're not only not there, but that they're too good ... which probably means "too prissy and stuck up" to get it.
It's just frustrating, because there was a time when ... well, any of these people's jobs would have been my dream job. It seems to send the message that women don't belong in the clubhouse ... which is I guess what Johnny Knoxville is saying.
And it's depressing, because I want a lady to come along and make a "Robot Chicken" or a "Venture Brothers" for us (and by "us" I mean enjoyable to both sexes). Granted, Sarah Silverman seems to be coming close but ... mmm, I wish I liked her better.
(ETA: Actually, now that I think of it, Daria might count ... alas, I was too young to watch at the time.)
But still, I don't get it. What is their deal? Why do they do this? I can only think it's self-denigration. But if it's self-denigration ... why the message that women just don't get it. Is your work too stupid for women or are women to good for your work? And what way do you want it? What are they afraid of?
(This is probably going to upset some people but ... hell, I don't give a shit.)
This whole quote is sort of explainable put in the context that he gets women who come up to him and hit him and, well, I can understand him being ticked off. But it's made me think about something.
There seems to be this weird mentality among creators that women are both "too good" to like crude humor but in a way "too dumb" to get it. Kevin Smith, as much as I like him, seems to be an advocate of this mentality. I remember on the Clerks II DVD he made some sort of, "Yeah, we have, like ... three female fans, and that's it." And I'm just thinking, "I was AT the second Stash Bash. There were more than three women in my section, and I'm assuming a huge amount more women who won the whole contest. They can't ALL have entered it for their husbands." And there's definitely more than three women asking him questions on the Evening DVDs.
And yet while he considered his "dick and fart joke movies" above women's notice, and also said in his introduction to the first Twisted Toyfare trade that "No woman would ever involve herself with this" ... he was also singing Rosario Dawson's phrases for being a rare geek girl (and a pretty geek girl! She's a fucking unicorn!).
It seems like this happens a lot with creators who are also into crude humor. When Trey Parker and Matt Stone used to talk about their fans, they always used the word "boys", even though I could probably name more female South Park fans off the top of my head than male South Park fans, and yet they would say in an offhand comment how "Somehow fat women do the best Cartman impressions." I read an interview from a few years ago where one of the head producers on the Simpsons said the show was "guy humor" and that the Marge and Lisa episodes were negligible and how women really "brought down" the camaraderie of the writer's table. (The female interviewer was not amused.)
But ... the thing is, these creators KNOW they have female fans. They've seen them. They've talked to them. You could say they're a minority ... but they really seem to be a significant one. Why all the insistence that they're not only not there, but that they're too good ... which probably means "too prissy and stuck up" to get it.
It's just frustrating, because there was a time when ... well, any of these people's jobs would have been my dream job. It seems to send the message that women don't belong in the clubhouse ... which is I guess what Johnny Knoxville is saying.
And it's depressing, because I want a lady to come along and make a "Robot Chicken" or a "Venture Brothers" for us (and by "us" I mean enjoyable to both sexes). Granted, Sarah Silverman seems to be coming close but ... mmm, I wish I liked her better.
(ETA: Actually, now that I think of it, Daria might count ... alas, I was too young to watch at the time.)
But still, I don't get it. What is their deal? Why do they do this? I can only think it's self-denigration. But if it's self-denigration ... why the message that women just don't get it. Is your work too stupid for women or are women to good for your work? And what way do you want it? What are they afraid of?
(This is probably going to upset some people but ... hell, I don't give a shit.)
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From:
no subject
I thought her show on Comedy Central was just terrible. Way over the top, and it just wasn't so *thinks* icky in animated format as it was non-animated.
I love the Simpsons, South park, Kevin smith, etc..
From:
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I think Family Guy is all about throwing all kinds of stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks. I like it generally, though, but it's not the top five.
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no subject
I agree - the manatee episode of South Park that guts Family Guy is a perfect example of why South Park works and Family Guy doesn't.
For every 8 episodes fo Family Guy there are about 2 mins that work (I'm thinking specificly of gags like the whole Stewie/Brian "So how's that novel comin' along..?" bit) the rest of it is way way posture-ish.
Drawn Together suffered from the same thing that most Saturday Night Live sketches do - no ability to recognise a joke or when they have managed to find one, to see when one is over.
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no subject
Oh God, yes. I'm reminded of one time I watched. The gang is trying to find a parking space and they drive into one that looks empty, but they crash into something not seen anyway, and then Wonder Woman runs up and starts screeching at them.
It was funny.
Then Foxxy Love shouted at her, "Park your invisible plane somewhere else!"
And it was no longer funny.
From:
no subject
I, being a stickler for worst-case scenario, wonder if there's a semi-conscious effort amongst guys established in the business to project the idea that there is no viable market to women so that none will be inspired to break into the business, as far as when they discuss it in a mainstream setting. 6_6
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Lots of fanboys compare the sizes of their "nerd-cocks" - it's a way of establishing a hierarchy
I'm only *partially* joking about this, but I have a story that may be apocraphal. Some of this is extremely disturbing.
I was at a birthday party for a friend of mine who is really into comics and she had invited a wide variety of people from different social groups to her place for a "Superhero Party". The one hardcore geek/nerd in the crowd decided, for reasons that are beyond me, to challange me on how much geekier he was than me. Now, I didn't really want to get into this - partly because I deal with guys like this more often than I'd like to at the comic shop I work at, partly because I was there to spend time with my friend and meet new people and not to engage in a pointless game of trivia, and partly because, I'm man enough to admit it, even I like to think I know more about my fandom than some other people (it's the way we geeks or nerds come to terms with our geeks and nerdity). After he threw out a few jabs, I realised that it wasn't a friendly "do you know?" thing, but this strange kind of jousting match where I would have my awareness of the things I groove on ( my "nerd-cock", if you will) and he had his, and he was insisting on measuring the two and seeing who's was bigger. It was a disgusting display that I removed myself from at that point, that left him oddly frustrated. He doesn't get out much, that one.
For the same reasons that men are threatened by women they'd want to "do" who are funny as WELL, as soon as a fangirl shows that she knows anything about her fandom of choice, the usual "nerd-cockfight" battle of fanboys showing "how totally into their thing" they are leaves the fanboys confused and frustrated and oddly emasculated. I would actually go as far as saying that, much like the silly and vintage chestnut that women (or more specificly - sexually attractive women) aren't funny (see ref: Jerry Lewis and Andrea Martin at the "Just For Laughs Comedy Festival" a few years ago), a lot of fanboys can't see how women who are into the same thing they are could possibly be "fannish" because it threatens their sense of balance, however skewed that sense may be. Women can't have a "nerd-cock" - "why would you even THINK of that?" I would also suggest that a lot of those guys make their way into the industry professionally.
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Re: Lots of fanboys compare the sizes of their "nerd-cocks" - it's a way of establishing a hierarchy
From:
Knowing a lot of VERY funny women, many of whom are into fandom, this attitude bugs me
Actually, having done a little double checking, it was the ASPEN COMEDY FESTIVAL in 1999 where Lewis said:
"A woman doing comedy doesn't offend me, but sets me back a bit. I, as a viewer, have trouble with it. I think of her as a producing machine that brings babies in the world.''
and at the JUST FOR LAUGHS Festival some three or four weeks later was introduced by Andrea Martin and was a real bastard to her backstage (stil trying to find that article).
There's a long thread about it here.
I think, at it's core, it relates to what men are taught is "ladylike" (and often this is something men are taught by their Moms, not their Dads). And the notion of a funny woman, or one who is well versed in something like comic book fandom that is seen as the perview of guys (not men, really, but *guys*), then that falls into the "I never suspected I'd meet a/n [attractive] woman who was into this stuff" school of institutionalised sexism. This, sadly, also covers the "Fat chicks are really good at doing Cartman" thing, too, doesn't it (just as the whole "Denys Cowan doesn't draw BATMAN comics like a black man" thing would speak for it's own kind of institutionalised bigotry)?
From:
Re: Knowing a lot of VERY funny women, many of whom are into fandom, this attitude bugs me
Of course, we've all discussed it and come up with good theories why ... the whole idea of it just doesn't want to settle in my head, though. It's so far from my reality.
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Claremont's Law : It can work the opposite way too, sometimes - and that gets weird, too
I think the creators who are highly aware of gender relations (like, say, Joss Whedon, or Peter David, or Grant Morrison, or Darwyn Cooke) don't have this peculiar fanboy carryover of "Girls [sic] didn't like comics when I read 'em - why should that be different now" that comes from fanboys growing up into pros a lot of the time (although, by he same count I know that they all have met *actual* women as opposed to idealised versions of them).
I think there are creators who fetishise this kind of "Women don't usually like this sort of work" attitude too (and Warren Ellis and Chris Claremont both fall into two seperate camps as to how this can manefest itself - with the idea of idealization and the relative "funky-ness" of fangirls compared to "mundane women" being how that breaks down).
From:
no subject
Quote from the interview, you can read the rest here
It's nice to know The Simpsons' scriptwriters aren't aiming their stuff at a nerdy, intellectual elite. So can anyone join this gang? Women, for example? He confesses that there have never been many women on the team, "and right now, it's as male as it's ever been, there are no female writers on the staff". He justifies this by saying "the dominant characters tend to be male - Bart and Homer occupy a lot of the real estate - a lot of that humour's kind of guy humour."
I'm amazed. I've never felt excluded as a female. More to the point, Marge and Lisa seem crucial to the show's success. "Oh sure," agrees Maxtone-Graham with a patronizing smile. "The Lisa shows are great, you get the nice, sweet, observant stuff with her. Really there are two kinds of episodes, one with Homer playing the hilarious buffoon, the other softer thing with Marge and Lisa." I'm beginning to grind my teeth, here. No wonder women find it so hard work on The Simpsons - such a perception of the gender divide harks back to the last century. Maxtone-Graham insists it gets uncomfortable when there are female writers in the room: "We make awful scatological, sexual jokes. It's not like we sit around the table with our dicks out, but having a woman in the room... I think it changes the tenor."
So there goes my dream job.
Part of it may have been ire from the female interviewer, I admit but ... if she's quoting from the guy verbatim I can't blame her.
From: (Anonymous)
no subject
That's classic, old-school, borscht-belt & comedy club "Women Aren't Funny" stuff.
That's a carryover from the 1960's and mid-1970's.
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That's classic, old-school, borscht-belt & comedy club "Women Aren't Funny" stuff. That's a carryover from the 1960's and mid-1970's where guys not only don't know how to write a funny female *character* (because, frankly, they don't understand how women think and as a result don't give a rat's ass to figure that out) but they also don't know how to write a female character *funny* (which is where female comedy writers really come to the fore - people like Alex Borstein or Lois Bromfield or Nicole Sullivan or Tina Fey).
Then again, there are only so many chairs around the comedy writer's table, and the same guys who are writing comedy are the guys who are geeky about THAT - and one more woman at the table, is one less guy - and you wouldn't see any of those guys putting their hands up first when the call came to quit their job on The Simpsons to let a woman on board to let Marge or Lisa be something other than "sweet".
From:
no subject
I also *love* it when creators claim that a funny female character just isn't possible ... and from writers who do "funny animal character" comic strips who you wouldn't think would need a gender but ... eh, Minnie Mouse was just Mickey's harpy foil with a bow on her head, so why change now?
and you wouldn't see any of those guys putting their hands up first when the call came to quit their job on The Simpsons to let a woman on board to let Marge or Lisa be something other than "sweet".
Well, the interview seemed to imply that women were there once, but weren't anymore. And of course, it was written quite awhile ago. But I can definitely see where the guys writing may have had some pre-written notion where, "Oh, we have to clean up around the girl!" and then when they left go, "Ha-ha, well they didn't work here anyway!" Sort of like deciding what would happen and then through their own action making it happen.
Or I could be off-base ... but I don't think I am.
From:
no subject
I think you're spot on the mark on the way that writer was behaving - do you think he'd have said some of that to a male interviewer?
Now, and again this is just from my own prejudices, I would also suggest that most comedians/ comedy writers aren't always the most sympathetic people you'll meet. There's a real anger to most comedians I've known.
From:
no subject
Berkeley Breathed addressed this very issue in a story arc he did for his strip 'Outland' back in the early 90's. I know I told you about this over LJ and/or IM, but for some reason nobody has the source strip anywhere online. =_=;
I think the point he was trying to get at was that it IS absurd to claim (Western) female characters can't be funny/independent of established male characters, but then that he himself was not experienced enough to bridge the gap.
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From:
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There is a *LOT* of truth to this. This is VERY true.