What is the job of a comedian? To make us laugh, you say?
I disagree.
Laughter is but one skill of their trade. Saying a comedian’s job is to make us laugh is like saying a taxi driver’s job is to turn a steering wheel. No. Like the cabbie, the comic’s job is to take us somewhere. A great comic can make us think afresh, help us to see the world and our lives from a different angle. Comedians are no different in that sense from novelists, painters, film-makers, poets or any other creative artists.
That’s not to say all comedy should deal in matters of political significance or philosophical profundity. The absurdities of our language, bodily functions or a trip to the supermarket are just as valid as Mark Thomas’s systematic 90 minute deconstruction of the machinations of a petrochemical multinational. But whatever their shtick , comedians should be (and usually are) aware that they are taking their audience somewhere, however happy, sad or dark that place may be. I don’t go to see Stewart Lee or Doug Stanhope to be taken to a happy place, and I don’t go to see Michael McIntyre or Patrick Kielty… actually that sentence ends there.
I believe comedians, like all artists, should take some responsibility for where their journey ends. Fare, please, don’t forget the tip.
My timeline this morning was filled with not one but two Twitter furores (Twittores?) about rape jokes. In an LA club, Comedy Central star Daniel Tosh had reportedly replied to a heckle saying rape jokes are never funny by pointing at the heckler and asking “wouldn’t it be funny if that girl got raped by like, 5 guys right now?” In a subsequent, and it must be said half-hearted apology, Tosh claimed it was out of context, adding in the obligatory 140 characters: “the point i was making before i was heckled is there are awful things in the world but you can still make jokes about them. #deadbabies.”
I’d scarcely caught up with that story when I heard the rumblings of a new Twitterstorm, this time with Richard Herring at the eye. Wait a minute… Richard Herring? Richard Herring? The impeccably PC, comedic scourge of discrimination and prejudice has made a rape joke? Really?
Well, to be accurate, Richard Herring had made a not-rape joke. In an interview with the Metro paper, he recalled a put-down he’d once used against an annoyingly loquacious heckler: “You’re the one woman in the world where a man would put Rohypnol in your drink and then leave you in the pub,” he’d said. What Herring meant, as he attempted vainly to explain to his Twitter followers, was that Rohypnol would be a handy way to shut the heckler up. The way it was understood, by at least some of his detractors, was ‘You’re so ugly you couldn’t even get raped.’ To return to our analogy, cabbie Herring intended to take his passengers to the station, but took a wrong turn and dumped them in the canal. I despise the modern trend of the ritual public apology but I’d like to believe, at least in private, Richard is thinking: “whoops.”
One of my favourite things on the internet is a YouTube channel called “If Websites were people” and in particular their delicious skewering of fauxminist magazine Jezebel. One of the best moments shows the Jezebel character in a restaurant. Her date says “I’m starving” and she eyes him suspiciously: “was that a rape joke?” she asks. Despite being genuinely concerned about humour which makes light of rape, or which trivialises or mocks the experience of victims, I’m also concerned about the McCarthyite zeal with which the evil rape joke is hunted down and its author persecuted into repentance and contrition.
I was in a comedy club just last week, and my favourite act by far was young and (I hope) rising pottymouth comedian. In her set, she made a joke about being fistfucked in her sleep by a violent, butch lesbian bully. I won’t reveal the punchline, because I think you should go see her for yourself if you can. Suffice to say I laughed like a howler monkey, and so did the entire room around me. I’d lay long odds that the South Manchester audience was 90% educated, leftish, pro-feminist Guardian readers, but how many got up from their seats in disgust, or booed or hissed or heckled? Precisely none. I doubt any of us stopped to think, hey, was that a rape joke? The answer, unlike Richard Herring’s effort, was an unquestionable yes, but we were too busy laughing to notice.
Context matters, not just in the intention but in the comprehension. You could grade rape jokes in order of acceptability according to who is being raped, who is doing the raping, and who is telling the joke: man; woman; victim; rapist.
One of the clichés of this debate is that the question should not be ‘is it offensive’ but ‘is it funny.’ I don’t think that is enough. From a moral and political view, it is not just whether the joke is funny, but where the humour takes us. The comedian I saw last week didn’t take her audience anywhere they weren’t happy to visit. Richard Herring took his somewhere that neither he nor most of his audience intended to go. Daniel Tosh, on the other hand, appears to have known exactly where he was going: he was using the cultural power of rape to take his audience, and a specified target in particular, into a slightly more fearful, hate-filled, uncomfortable world. For what my opinions are worth, I find that pretty loathsome.
All artists, in whatever medium, should be aware of their own responsibilities, but their primary responsibility is to their own art and their own consciences. It makes no more sense to me to argue that a comedian should never mention rape than it would to argue that a novelist should do the same. Comedy is an appropriate vehicle for any issue, but that doesn’t mean any joke is appropriate. In attempting to witch-hunt rape jokes out of existence, feminists risk stifling a popular medium, on a vitally important topic. I believe, reluctantly, that artists of all stripes need to be free to make the world a darker, nastier place with their writing, their work or their performance, but they should also be prepared to accept the inevitable response. Whether the topic is rape, dead babies or skipping to the supermarket, a joke is never just a joke – it’s a journey.
—
Epilogue
When I wrote and published this, I hadn’t quite anticipated just how big the Tosh story was going to get. It seems every man, woman and dog has now stated their piece about the case, with many good points along the way. In among the piles of pixels, there were two pieces in particular I saw which stood out for me. Lindy West again proved herself the jewel in Jezebel’s purse with How To Make A Rape Joke – which manages to be not only insightful but funny (see, it can be done) while poet/rapper El Guante cuts right to the heart of the issue in his blog here. Go see.
QUICK UPDATE
I’ve had a message from the comedian I was praising in the original edit of this article. She’s just got a new day job and has asked me to take her name off this. I’ve left the content in, but edited out her name. Hope no harm has been done and very much hope she doesn’t give up the night job!
I have to agree, and am reminded of an article I read a while back on what may be the only feminist rape joke. I cant remember where I read the article (Possibly DM feminazi) but I do remember the joke…
Man walks into a pub, orders a pint and says to the barman “I can have any woman in here ”
The barman asks “Really? What are you, millionaire, actor, TV celebrity?”
No replies the man, “I’m a rapist”
Knock knock. Who’s there? Thought Police.. you’re nicked sunshine.
oh dear
Comedy that draws attention to cultural issues that legitimise rape: likely fine (context dependant)
Jokes legitimising or trivialising rape: not fine.
pretty much the point of the joke I quoted, while I agree hard lines make bad laws it is usually easy to see the difference.
And when I say “fine” I mean likely not to raise anyone hackles
Hi D
Yes, I broadly agree although I’d be reluctant to lay down hard and fast rules, coz they’ll soon trip you up.
Totally. Feel free to make whatever art you want and I feel free to judge it as tasteless
I’m also concerned about the McCarthyite zeal with which the evil rape joke is hunted down and its author persecuted into repentance and contrition.
Well apart from the over-zealous use of McCarthy, – who is in a position to wield the kind of power and influence he had at the height of his influence? Certainly not the feminists who object to all rape “jokes”.
But isn’t that what you’ve done, and quite rightly, with Daniel Tosh, about whose “joke” you say, again quite rightly, For what my opinions are worth, I find that pretty loathsome.
I think the phrase ‘McCathyite zeal’ needn’t imply that the impacts are equivalent. It implies (to me and I think most reasonable people) a kind of reds-under-the-beds paranoia we sometimes see in hunting down the unquestionable evil of a rape joke – any rape joke.
And no, I don’t think I’ve hunted down Tosh with McCarthyite zeal. The whole point is that Tosh’s comments were not wrong because they were a rape joke, per se, but because they were cruel, vindictive and potentially highly traumatic to their target and others.
I repeat, it’s not about the subject of the joke. It’s about where the joke takes us.
About to add an update above to a couple of articles making similar points.
[…] the other day – and if you missed the action then I’d heartily recommend that you read Ally Fogg’s take on this latest round of Twittericuffs for its sensible, but sadly all-too-rare, discussion of the […]
hetpat
I think the phrase ‘McCathyite zeal’ needn’t imply that the impacts are equivalent. It implies (to me and I think most reasonable people) a kind of reds-under-the-beds paranoia we sometimes see in hunting down the unquestionable evil of a rape joke – any rape joke.
Except that McCarthy saw “reds”, not under the bed but in beds and every other item of furniture, in every place from the White House down. He really was an evil man who ruined countless numbers of lives and reputations.
So the point I’m making as you quite clearly missed it is that nothwithstanding the individuality of humour, you haven’t provided a single rape “joke” that’s funny, or even that you find funny, and as such I feel, as so often in the past, you have an ulterior motive for writing this article.
See the Lindy West article I linked to in the update above. That’s full of them.
hetpatAnd Ally you might like to contemplate this, about the accusations of rape against Julian Assange:ALLY WRITES:
Mr Bitethehand, I have no problem with you commenting on the content of this blog or the comments underneath. You are as welcome here as anyone else.
But I won’t allow you to use this space to dredge up your tedious spats with me or anyone else from literally years ago and pursue your stalky vendettas against those you think have wronged you in some way in the dim and distant past.
You’ve got your own blog to do that. I won’t have it here, not because I’m protecting anyone or stifling reasonable opinions, but because those posts of yours are the most brain-shrinkingly tedious comments I’ve ever encountered in my entire time on the internet.
No offence.
Not reading the comments, just replying to the post itself.
I appreciate your comments on Tosh’s half-hearted apology that he was strong-armed into making, and your comments about artists having a responsibility.
I disagree that it was a joke. The intent was not to be funny but to shut someone up and embarrass her. Which might be forgivable but for the way he did it, which was scary and threatening to me as I imagined being her. The subtext of what he was saying was not, “Rape is awful/absurd” as is the subtext of many successful rape jokes, but rather, “Shut up, you stupid bitch”. And strange, considering that, according to the club manager, he asked the audience what they wanted to talk about and she gave her feedback.
It’s similar to when someone says, “Do they make clothes in your size here? Ha ha, just kidding, you’re not fat.” or some other passive-aggressive remark, we know that saying, “Just kidding” doesn’t mean that the person was kidding. Likewise, standing on a comedy stage, contorting your face into ridiculous shapes, and saying something like it’s a joke, doesn’t make something a joke.
He targeted an individual with his statement and his words, at face value, were scary and threatening. Maybe he didn’t mean for them to be but they were too suggestive and sensitively-charged for him to be using without knowing how other people would take it—men in the audience who might be walking the same way home as this woman, or the woman herself.
Nothing she could have done would have made what he said okay, and that’s a conversation I’m not seeing taking place enough. Just like a woman’s outfit or coyness never excuses her being raped and need not even be discussed, neither does this woman’s heckling earn Tosh’s comment.
Men who minimise the trauma that such a comment could create are just cluelessly privileged.
Jessica Valenti’s article for TheNation.com was also excellent.
Hi Natasha
Welcome, and thanks for the comment. I agree that it is stretching the definition to even call Tosh’s comments a joke in any way. It was just sheer vicious bullying.
Lou McCudden is making a similar point in the Indy blogs today.
hetpat:
See the Lindy West article I linked to in the update above. That’s full of them.
Well I did read West’s article and the four “rape jokes” she lists aren’t really jokes at all but comments about rape. She even agrees with this about the fourth one when she says:
This isn’t a joke about women getting raped—it’s a joke about the way that rape culture, which includes rape jokes, makes women feel.
And if you’re saying that these four are what you find are funny I can only be generous and say you’ve got a strange sense of humour.
Indeed my reading of her article is that she’s actually saying there is no such think as a rape joke, only people who find rape something to joke about.
when is a rape joke not a rape joke? Your guess is as good as mine. I’d say a rape joke is a comment about the topic of rape that is intended to make people laugh. By that token, not only the four routines West mentions, but actually several of her own lines in the piece qualify as rape jokes.
None of them is in my view harmful or cruel. They don’t have the rape victim as the butt of the joke and they don’t trivialise the topic, but do the opposite.
So the issue is not whether or not a joke is a rape joke, but where it takes the audience. Which brings me right back to the point of the article.
hetpat
I won’t have it here, not because I’m protecting anyone or stifling reasonable opinions, but because those posts of yours are the most brain-shrinkingly tedious comments I’ve ever encountered in my entire time on the internet.
No offence.
Oh come on Ally it would take someone with a far greater intellect than yours to cause me offence. And even then they’d have to try really hard. And in over six years of posting on numerous sites it has yet to happen.
And as Natasha says:
I disagree that it was a joke. The intent was not to be funny but to shut someone up and embarrass her.
Good luck with this site Ally.
Not sure about this thread though. I think most people would rank ‘rape jokes’ alongside ‘torture jokes’ or ‘cot death jokes’
[EDITED TO REMOVE CLIQUEY SQUABBLING. AF]
Hi Chav45.
I think we can joke about torture and cot death too. Just with similar care about who and what we’re really laughing about.
Hope you don’t mind that I snipped your last sentence. Let’s not encourage things, eh?
@chav
Except that in your standard comedy audience there won’t be anyone who has been tortured, or who lives their life with a constant background fear of being tortured by the type of people sitting in the audience and standing on the stage laughing about it. If statistics on sexual assault are to be believed, this is not the case when it comes to rape jokes.
Not sure of the stats on cot deaths, but the difference is that comedians and audiences don’t cot death people.
‘Just with similar care about who and what we’re really laughing about’?
Can’t agree mate.
I knew a woman who woke up to find her kid dead in the cot. She turned the room into a shrine, never got over it. Marriage broke up of course.
I believe that torture and rape victims find it difficult to regain the old bounce too.
[…] an interesting analysis of how comedy can work when it examines dark subjects. Ally’s also blogged about how he sees it, and one thing that he’s captured better than I did in my last post was […]
Richard Herring didn’t mean the woman was too ugly to rape, he meant she was too talkative to rape. And by too talkative, I think he meant, heckled him.
The clue is in the fact he referenced a famous date-rape drug being usegent generic men on all women (all women in the world), in a pub. Rather than, say, a famous date-muting drug used by a man or a woman against a subset of men or women, not in a pub. Don’t know about anyone else, but I’m yet to hear of a case of a man using rohypnol to drug a woman so he can abduct them for a good chat.
The only thing worse than a clumsy not rape joke is a clumsy deflection of responsibility after telling a clumsy rape joke. IMO.
I do’t feel entirely confident in speaking up about this because although Mr Herring has already identified the only woman in the world who is too talkative, he has said she is the only one men would leave behind in the pub too. So I’m not sure what the criteria are for being just talkative enough to be drugged and taken home.
[…] posted a recommendation for Ally Fogg’s new blog a few days ago and yesterday sought his opinion about the recently most publicised rape story – […]