It says coed, but only women are pictured. Male gaze much?
And for those of you who have asked why a co-ed group never seems to have guys present, it’s because a) we don’t invite many, and b) those we do invite tend to be camera shy. But today we were joined by a friend who saw us beating the heat the prelapsarian way (reading! it builds your vocabulary!) and took the plunge alongside us. In the name of equality, we share.
I thought that she sounded a little insecure when her first advice to guys was "walk on by" and her SECOND advice was "sit down and read with us", but I understand where that comes from.
I don't get the below-the-waist nudity. In her other entries she talks about the right to go topless in public spaces. The nudist stuff doesn't jibe with that. Maybe she explains it in another entry that I missed.
I'm going to have to dispute you on this one. I didn't find it funny, and joking about Tosh getting raped trivializes it just as much as the other way around.
I'm going to have to dispute you on this one. I didn't find it funny, and joking about Tosh getting raped trivializes it just as much as the other way around.
It's not supposed to be funny, it's supposed to be poignant. That was my reading of it, anyway. It's basically showing how sick you'd have to be to laugh about that happening to a person.
The Tosh article makes three statements. One, rape is horrible and fucks your mind up for life. Two, Tosh's joke that "rape is always funny" is stupid. Three, rape can be funny if you present the idea of it properly (I thought the article was funny, anyway). D.T. just got put down and showed up.
That... wasn't funny. Like, at all. Sure, he's right in that a joke involving rape can be funny if you're very good and approach the joke the right way. But then he failed to approach the joke the right way, ever.
Want a funny routine involving rape? Here's one: You know why it can be funny and not painful? Because among other things, nobody actually gets raped.
This piece from Culturemap: Austin comes pretty close to my feelings on rape jokes, and why they're so much more hurtful than most other joke subjects, and therefore why you should never employ them without extreme caution.
That... wasn't funny. Like, at all. Sure, he's right in that a joke involving rape can be funny if you're very good and approach the joke the right way. But then he failed to approach the joke the right way, ever.
There is no right way to approach a joke. There are right ways to write preform one, I'm sure, but beyond that it comes down the style of the comedian and the taste of his audience. Everyone's sense of humor is different. However, I would posit that anyone who can make an entire crowd laugh in earnest about rape, murder, death, and disease is a skilled comedian. Carlin, The Onion, and Sykes all made people laugh over rape and never requested radio edits (to my knowledge). Tosh fucked up, lost his audience, and turned a heckler into a victim.
No. Both the Onion article and that Carlin routine trivialize rape in a very bad way, and that is actually not acceptable. If you seriously think that making most of an audience of lowest-common-denominator white men laugh is sufficient justification for the kind of fear and psychological pain a rape joke can cause for the women in the audience (rape survivors or not), I really have nothing more to say except that you're a terrible fucking person.
Linkigi, I agree with this article you linked, but I have to disagree with you about the Onion article. It didn't trivialize rape at all - it took the matter quite seriously. What it did was mock Tosh's "wouldn't it be funny if that girl got raped by like, five guys right now" comment. Why? Because in order to justifiably have that attitude, he would indeed have to be able to laugh through his own rape.
That Carlin routine I agree somewhat about, though I didn't find it very funny so I have no inclination to defend it anyway.
I found this article was a decent response to this whole issue, and I think most of the examples given there for rape jokes that work were pretty good ones.
Linkigi, I'd be much more interested in listening to your side of the discussion if I could actually hear you up on that high horse of yours. I can understand getting passionate about a topic, but starting off a point with "That wasn't funny" or "No" doesn't work in your favor all that well. Also, way to assume that George Carlin and/or Onion fans are "lowest-common-denominator". K thanks
Linkigi, I'd be much more interested in listening to your side of the discussion if I could actually hear you up on that high horse of yours. I can understand getting passionate about a topic, but starting off a point with "That wasn't funny" or "No" doesn't work in your favor all that well. Also, way to assume that George Carlin and/or Onion fans are "lowest-common-denominator". K thanks
I actually started to reply to him, but I simply had to stop - I like the guy, and it was pretty much just a paragraph of "What the fuck do you think you're doing, dude?" stated in various ways, each at a different level of insulting. But, I decided against it, because I'd rather not hurt the lad's feelings, when I can achieve the goal in a much more simple way.
Linkigi. Pull your fuckin' head in. You have a point buried in there somewhere, but it's lost among all the pretentiousness and judgemental bollocks.
First - You're not better than these people. You're just another person with a different opinion, and you've not the right nor place to judge anyone. You should know better - Social justice is about equality, and bringing everyone up to the same level, even the people you don't fucking like. Not about tacitly declaring yourself superior, judging people, and kicking them down so that some others might climb up, if they agree with you.
The path you're on is only three or so steps back from the really shitty side of the social justice movement, where it's considered acceptable, for example, to call the people you're ostensibly aiming to raise up "Special Snowflake" when they disagree - Because obviously, the social justice movement, even the shitty side, wouldn't use horrible terms like "Uncle Tom" or "House nigger". So they just came up with their own, instead.
Second - You don't deem what is acceptable and not acceptable. Full stop. You are certainly allowed an opinion, you've certainly the right to state your case, But you are not the final arbiter of what is right and wrong, and you'd damned well better stop acting like it, because it helps nothing and noone.
Third, and carrying on from the end of the last point - Carrying on with this pretentious, judgmental, high horse bullshit doesn't help the cause of social justice. In fact, it retards it, because people simply ignore you as a pretentious pillock, rather than listening to your ideals, which are good and just.
If you cannot learn to deal with things in a calm and reasonable manner, just because they are topics you are passionate about, or causes you think are just and right, then please, step back from the social justice movement, I'm asking you as a friend. Because I know you care about this, and frankly, if our roles were reversed, I think you'd rather see me step back and do nothing, or at least support silently, rather than retard the cause by acting like an arrogant pillock and throwing my weight around.
Like many people have said, I think its really all about how its done. My main issue is not the jokes being offensive, but of them reminding someone of a horrific event. I don't really give a fuck if a joke offends someone, but if a stupid joke reminds them of the pain they went though, I can't say I support it. I'm sure theres something to be said about the jokes taking the power away from the issue, and making it more easy to talk about, but again it's really all how the joke is done. And really, there are a lot of subjects that we joke about that could remind people of a horrible memory, though maybe not quite as bad. All that being said, I couldn't comment without posting this:
Black Bear Attacks, Rapes, Zookeeper
Grin and bear it! Barry, an 850 lb. black bear, got a little frisky with zookeeper Ron Gilks. The anal rape is believed to be the first inter-special coupling in Metro Zoo history.
Here's a little dog-bites-man tale we couldn't resist! Except replace "dog" with "850-pound black bear"! And "bites" with "anally violate"!
Yes, last Saturday a zookeeper at the Metropolitan Zoo had "claws" for alarm when he was attacked and raped by the same black bear he had raised from a cub! Geez, talk about gratitude!
"It was horrible, just horrible," sobbed an eyewitness. Guess she sure got an eyeful!
The bear, named "Barry," attacked zookeeper Ron Gilks as Gilks entered the cage to give him dinner. Barry lunged at his throat, goring him with his huge claws and razor-sharp teeth. Some of the claw marks were three-quarters of an inch deep. Ouch!
Then, astonished onlookers could "bearly" believe what happened next--Barry began to brutally rape zookeeper Gilks!
Frantic zookeepers rushed for rifles as others tried to divert the bear. But there was no stopping Barry! This bear kept "bearing down," and Gilks just had to grin and "bear" it! Maybe Barry was mistaking him for his "honey"!
Gilks was pronounced dead upon arrival at the hospital. A full quart of bear semen was extracted from his ruptured chest cavity. And that's no small Boo-Boo!
Barry's 27-inch phallus, armed with guard hairs as sharp as red-hot needles, shot through Gilks' rectum, shattered his lower spine and skewered his colon, causing his entire lower torso to "cave" in! Yikes! Bet that wasn't the type of "cave" you had in mind when you took up zookeeping, Mr. Gilks!
And can you imagine Gilks' surprise when Barry's putrid ursine semen flooded his ruptured chest cavity? (By the way, Mr. Gilks, whatever cologne you've been wearing, where can the public get some?)
Finally, zookeeper Eric Pulliam shot Barry with a tranquilizer gun and pulled Gilks from the cage. The unconscious bear was later destro. Hey, this "Yogi" made a major "Boo-Boo"!
"I have worked with dangerous animals before," zoo director Kate Donegal said. "But never have I seen any animal sexually assault a human being." "Barry"? Try "Scary"!
Meanwhile, Gilks was pronounced dead at an area hospital--but at least he died grinning and bearing it! No doubt, this episode gives new meaning to the term, "Do not feed the bears!"
Like many people have said, I think its really all about how its done. My main issue is not the jokes being offensive, but of them reminding someone of a horrific event.
Exactly, this is what I don't really get about any of this "joke about rape" stuff. People keep saying "well if it is done well then you can joke about rape". It seems that everyone keeps implying that if you do it well no one gets hurt. This is literally impossible. Someone will undoubtedly be offended by it. Think of all the bullshit that people get offended about that seems utterly absurd. Rape isn't "bullshit" or "absurd" but you see my point. There will always be someone offended by something, whether its a joke or not, regardless of how trivial or nontrivial the catalyst is.
Comments
I don't get the below-the-waist nudity. In her other entries she talks about the right to go topless in public spaces. The nudist stuff doesn't jibe with that. Maybe she explains it in another entry that I missed.
Yes, I'm being serious.
EDIT: People are going to find different things offense.
Want a funny routine involving rape? Here's one:
You know why it can be funny and not painful? Because among other things, nobody actually gets raped.
This piece from Culturemap: Austin comes pretty close to my feelings on rape jokes, and why they're so much more hurtful than most other joke subjects, and therefore why you should never employ them without extreme caution.
You probably won't like this then but I do like that he brings up the other, much less heard, side of the argument.
Lost it right there.
And this one too.
Good day.
That Carlin routine I agree somewhat about, though I didn't find it very funny so I have no inclination to defend it anyway.
I found this article was a decent response to this whole issue, and I think most of the examples given there for rape jokes that work were pretty good ones.
Linkigi. Pull your fuckin' head in. You have a point buried in there somewhere, but it's lost among all the pretentiousness and judgemental bollocks.
First - You're not better than these people. You're just another person with a different opinion, and you've not the right nor place to judge anyone. You should know better - Social justice is about equality, and bringing everyone up to the same level, even the people you don't fucking like. Not about tacitly declaring yourself superior, judging people, and kicking them down so that some others might climb up, if they agree with you.
The path you're on is only three or so steps back from the really shitty side of the social justice movement, where it's considered acceptable, for example, to call the people you're ostensibly aiming to raise up "Special Snowflake" when they disagree - Because obviously, the social justice movement, even the shitty side, wouldn't use horrible terms like "Uncle Tom" or "House nigger". So they just came up with their own, instead.
Second - You don't deem what is acceptable and not acceptable. Full stop. You are certainly allowed an opinion, you've certainly the right to state your case, But you are not the final arbiter of what is right and wrong, and you'd damned well better stop acting like it, because it helps nothing and noone.
Third, and carrying on from the end of the last point - Carrying on with this pretentious, judgmental, high horse bullshit doesn't help the cause of social justice. In fact, it retards it, because people simply ignore you as a pretentious pillock, rather than listening to your ideals, which are good and just.
If you cannot learn to deal with things in a calm and reasonable manner, just because they are topics you are passionate about, or causes you think are just and right, then please, step back from the social justice movement, I'm asking you as a friend. Because I know you care about this, and frankly, if our roles were reversed, I think you'd rather see me step back and do nothing, or at least support silently, rather than retard the cause by acting like an arrogant pillock and throwing my weight around.