Anyroads

I’m still waiting for someone to point out that Lindy West never actually said “don’t make rape jokes.”

What she did say was

- It’s possible to do it in a way that isn’t hurtful to rape victims (in her article on rape jokes)

- You have every right to make a rape joke, just like everyone else has the right to think you’re an asshole or a shitty comedian if you do it in a way that elicits that response.

Either way, the threatening comments she’s gotten are un-fucking-acceptable. I’m really tired of hearing people argue in any way that makes them remotely ok. Besides which, if a comic made fun of racial violence, anti-gay violence, or any kind of bullying violence, it would be an outrage, but making fun of a woman being raped is somehow different, and yet that’s fine? The difference is, comics rarely make jokes about traumatic things they haven’t experienced themselves, like racial discrimination or even the Holocaust, because it’s culturally unacceptable to take something like that lightly unless you possess insight from experience. Which tells us that rape isn’t taken seriously.

Because you wouldn’t have a white dude on stage making fun of a person of any other race getting beaten for being not-white. It’s a given that if you get up on stage and do that, your career may well end. And yet it’s OK for a man to get on a stage and make fun a woman as a rape victim. Because a woman doesn’t get the same respect. And that’s what this is really about. Look at the hate comments West got just for speaking her mind - not imposing anything on anyone, just having an opinion.

This isn’t about restricting speech, it’s about expecting comedians to be their best — if you can’t be funny at the expense of someone else, then you’re probably not that good at being a comedian.

Oh yeah, I quit my office job and today was my last day and I finally feel like I have a soul again. YAY.