Rethinking Sexual Humor

why is it okay

to joke about sexual violence how has it

become normalized and

how does this apply to me well i can’t

tell you the whole story

i can’t tell you this a few years ago my

family and i were vacationing in vietnam

we spent a few days in ho chi minh

before we traveled to a beach called the

nang just off the historical town of

hoyon

the beach had beautiful blue waters with

the sun glistening off the top of the

waves and little boats in the distance

one day my mom my sister and i were

walking down a sandy soy

shopping for groceries with shacks on

either side we turn into one somewhat

similar to an american mom-and-pop shop

there are two cashiers waiting who both

immediately stand the first

walks up to my mom and starts bargaining

the second walks up to me i take a few

steps back

the stranger turns their head to look at

my mom who’s turned her head to look at

some produce

before turning back to me and then as

the former president of the united

states

so eloquently puts it this stranger

grabbed me by the [ __ ]

i back up some more round a shelf and

we’re out the door within seconds

hi i’m kate i was sexually assaulted

when i was 10 years old

i was one of four hundred and thirty

three thousand six hundred and fifty

that year

and i have to be honest i don’t find it

funny

when people joke about it now i just

briefly referenced the

we’ll say unique donald trump footage of

him saying those comments as well as

some other very misogynistic ones

was released during his 2016

presidential campaign and discussed in

the following debate that took place

october 9th

and these tweets were tweeted in

response to that debate by a woman named

laura ingram

laura ingram has been an employee of fox

news since 2008

the news channel that my deaf

grandfather blasts

at max volume regardless of who’s

visiting

so this means that my 14 year old sister

my cousins who are 13 and 8

have been subconsciously learning that

this language is acceptable that they

can use it and they won’t be held

accountable

zero ramifications they might even be

praised

trump ultimately faced no repercussions

and the fact that he as a sitting

president was forgiven

amplified the idea that this kind of

language is excusable and ultimately

normalized sexual assault

and he wasn’t the only president

according to cnn president rodrigo

duterte of the philippines has made

comments

such as shoot them in the vagina and to

paraphrase the new york times

british politician raheem kassam told a

female colleague to tape her mouth and

her legs in response to a campaign

announcement

according to global news this past

international women’s day march 8th

lieutenant colonel taylor of the

canadian military resigned in response

to sexual assault

but not just the fact it was happening

it was the way it was being dealt with

brushed aside blown off taken as a joke

and that’s what happens when you joke

about assault you brush off the severity

of its actions

and while these examples don’t contain

sexual humor

when you continually watch or see

something that promotes

sexual assault the next step is to make

an insensitive joke

it’s a very dangerous game to play

has anyone here seen the breakfast club

basically what happens

is five kids get put in detention and

over the course of the day they become

friends

and two of these kids are bender and

claire and you can tell the whole time

there’s a little

something going on between the two of

them well in one of the scenes bender

comes into the library where the other

kids are

but he’s not supposed to be there and

then the teacher watching them

comes into the room as well so bender

hides under claire’s desk

but claire is wearing a skirt that day

so bender decides to pull a dick move

and he sticks his head in her skirt

between her legs and the rest of the

kids they laugh

they cover for bender and then they go

to the back of the room to smoke weed

and at the end of the movie bender and

claire are in the parking lot and she

gives him her earring and he puts it in

his ear

and he walks through the field and he

does the fist and the music plays and

it’s this totally iconic moment

that completely distracts you from the

fact that this film

romanticized assault it took me 60

seconds

to explain this scene and there’s a

chance that some of us didn’t realize

it portrayed laughter at claire’s

expense didn’t realize that bender was

laughing at his own joke

assaulting someone didn’t realize that i

made a satirical joke

and according to the rape abuse and

incest national network of the united

states within the now 73 seconds it’s

taken for me to explain this film

another victim has been assaulted

let’s take that in for a second

but it’s not it’s decades after the

breakfast club there are still tv shows

and characters such as how i met your

mothers barney stinson and michael scott

from the office who are just as

insensitive

throughout the course of their tv shows

both characters film naked women without

their consent that is literally assault

and it’s cueing a laugh track and it’s

what’s causing students

in isb hallways to say you don’t have my

consent

in improper incorrect and insulting

contexts

but it’s not just the entertainment that

hollywood creates it’s

also the people it employs harvey

weinstein is one of the most infamous

sexual predators in hollywood having

hurt nearly 100 victims

and facing 23 years in prison this man

is currently sitting in a jail cell

with an estimated net worth of 25

million

us dollars and yet british comedian

james corden had the audacity to say

for the women who watched harvey

weinstein bathe it must be weird seeing

them in hot water

aside from that this is an industry that

employed possibly hundreds of

accomplices

who stayed complicit about assault for

years

it’s an industry that honestly should

not be leading by example

now let’s be mindful it’s incredibly

beneficial to normalize the discussions

surrounding sexual assault just not the

actions

because that normalization leads to

insensitive jokes

because we joke about what we know what

we’re familiar or comfortable with

and whether you watch fox news once a

week or a hollywood movie twice a week

or the office every single day

you are familiarizing yourself with

sexual assault and you are subject to a

casual nature of sexual humor

so you make a joke and yes humor can be

a great tool can help people overcome

terrible trauma tina fey

amy poehler liza donnelly they all do a

great job of this

my english class spent i don’t know how

many weeks

learning about voltaire and candide and

satire and criticism

and blah blah blah but not every 16 year

old kid

can use satire in a mature fashion

because satire criticism

is not the humor we see out in those

halls i’ve seen boys and girls alike

calling each other pedophiles

for fun ostracizing any kind of physical

contact to the point of calling it rape

that’s not

criticizing our society you can be funny

without being offensive and if you can’t

make a joke

without making it at my expense you’re

just not funny

and the sad truth is there are so many

people out there with stories so much

worse than mine

it’s reported by the national sexual

violence resource center that 1 in 10

children are sexually abused before age

18 and that 50

percent of global sexual assaults happen

to girls ages 16

and below that’s my age now

it’s much more common than one may think

but you never know who that person is

that person could be your friend lupita

nyong’o your teacher

gwyneth paltrow or terry crews your

sister

and you just have no idea for years

nobody knew nobody thought that person

was me

thank you