Welcome to the 21st century.

[andrewducker]

I can understand why there's a stereotype of feminists as humourless.

I mean, if you're used to being able to make jokes about horrible things happening to women and then a group of people start telling you that they don't find this funny then your perception of them is going to be that they just don't have a sense of humour.  After all, you don't _seriously_ want bad things to happen to women, you're just having a laugh, right?

My old friend Ed went to this debate in which a controversial comedian debated whether it was ok to make offensive jokes.  Frankie Boyle used his moments on the debating stand to tell a series of increasingly unpleasant jokes - all of which got a massive laugh from the audience, except when they touched on a subject just a little too close to home.  My friend found himself laughing at all sorts of appalling things, until the subject was (coincidentally) turned onto his own situation, at which point he found himself thinking "but that's not funny".

Because it's never funny when it's about you.  It's only funny when it's about someone you don't care about. 

Or, at the very least, if you can pretend that nobody you know is like that.

It's much easier when you live in a nice insular environment, where you only really know people like yourself, and you certainly only socialise with people just like you.  Then you can bask in in-group/out-group socialisation to your heart's content.

Not to easy when you're on the internet, and people are likely to pop up at any moment and point out the flaws inherent in something you thought was innocent fun.

The question is - how do you deal with it when someone points it out?  Do you have to let the flaws ruint it for you because they offend someone else?  Do you have to argue that there's nothing wrong with the thing you love?

If you care (and nobody is going to make you) then some very useful hints and tips can be found here.  The flow-chart at the end is particularly good.

Comments

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

In support of this - I too find that the chilling effects on freedom of speech are one of the big problems of anti-prejudice crusaders.

For semi-related example, I was considering making a character in a future series black, after an inspiring post by theferrett. However, there's a strong argument that I'd just be asking for trouble and abuse in doing that, no matter how much research I did, and I'd be far better to stick to her being white. I still haven't decided what I'm going to do there.

[meihua.livejournal.com]

Ah, perhaps I am - sorry.

Then I think the thing to do is not consider even what you think should be done - but ask PoC what they would like to be done.

As per andrewducker's earlier comments in these threads, I think that PoC have spoken on this issue and expressed their dislike of what was done.

I'm gonna repeat something I said elsewhere, even though you found it unhelpful then, which is this: You don't get it. You may not be able to get it. Don't think you get it. Instead, if you want to help issues regarding racism, listen to what PoC are saying, and either support them or be quiet unless you are very satisfied that you have fully educated yourself on all the issues, you've taken part in many discussions, and many PoC have told you that you're getting it.

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

No.

The fastest way to avoid writing good fiction I know is to be entirely subservient to other people's opinion.

And the people of colour/gender/sexual preference/height/weight/appearance/intellectual or physical appearance I consult are almost certainly not representative.

[meihua.livejournal.com]

The advice in my comment above is advice which, if followed, would help one write fiction which isn't racist.

It's ok not to follow that advice; but accept that as a result, the fiction you write may (or may not) be racist, without you realising.

[meihua.livejournal.com]

LJ post on feminism gets enormous number of comments. Story at 9. ;)

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

In your opinion.

[broin.livejournal.com]

What's the difference between that and the SU banning a comedian from appearing (or the character - same diff)? Sure, it's a 'private' venue, but I don't think that's a strong argument.

The argument on RPGnet went that if one describes male circumcision as child abuse, one is saying all Jews (and many Americans) are abusers. Inherently. Inarguably.

[broin.livejournal.com]

I completely sympathise.

And I have to say, checking out your character with a dozen 'PoC' (really don't like that term) isn't going to help.

The other day, I was helping a blind guy through town. I asked him a couple of questions about how best to offer help to blind people. He explained that those who were blind from early on were usually more tolerant of people in their personal space. Those who became blind later on in life were usually less comfortable with people taking their arms etc. But it didn't really matter, as I'd offend some people no matter what I did.

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

I don't know. I'll probably pass the character by a couple of black people just to see if I've made any howlers - to take your example, the blind person you were helping did give you some useful advice. But yeah, I wouldn't be expecting doing that to avoid my pissing some people off.

[daisyflip.livejournal.com]

Hello. I can't be bothered to read everything as I have 2 seconds left on LJ before I have to return to doing work, but I am a comedian sometimes, and like most comedians have offended people and had it pointed out. If you don't actually believe in what you're saying, if you haven't thought it through, and someone points it out I suppose you could feel like a tit and retract your hilarious joke about Anne Frank. However, I would also say that generally people who get offended by jokes done in current comedy clubs (and bear in mind racism is tres 1970s) are very dull.

I have more to say but my 2 seconds is up so I'll leave it at that very unintelligent comment. But yeah, fuck all y'all bitches.

[zz]

Speaking personally, I'd say the Chinese/Asian elements in Firefly increased my awareness of Asia as a global power equal to the West

ditto. it reminded me that the future might not be inevitably entirely english-speaking (at least as a 2nd language).

[zz]

i tend to assume that if one can't *ever* (as opposed to having a temporary bad day/mood/etc) see the humour in a given topic, that that topic has a sufficient emotional hold that one won't be able to deal with it rationally either.

only partially relatedly, i find people being too (imo, of course) easily offended funny. :>

and i noticed the fedex arrow ages ago and completely forgot about it till i looked at the logo again.

[marrog.livejournal.com]

It's a little different ripping the piss out of a group of people who've chosen to dress and behave in a certain way and reinforcing stereotypes about a group of people who've been historically enslaved/butchered/etc due simply to the colour of their skin. Srsly, there's just no comparison. There's a big difference between racism and taking the piss out of babybats.

[marrog.livejournal.com]

Because it's never funny when it's about you. It's only funny when it's about someone you don't care about.

I dunno about that. Pretty much the only people who tell lesbian jokes are lesbians. It's that whole reclamation thing. I think what's funny and what isn't isn't quite as simple as that. I also think that there are some jokes that will always be funny because they will always be horrific.

Oh! Maybe that's it! Okay, bear with me. Everyone agrees that dead babies are tragic. Genuinely awful. As such, quite a sizable amount of people - certainly almost everyone I know - find dead baby jokes funny, the more horrific and often less coherently punchlined the better. The same can apply to child abuse although I do know people who don't find paedophile jokes funny.

But there are racists out there, and transphobes, and homophobes. And that's why jokes about race and transsexuality (not that I've ever heard a trans joke) and gayness are only allowable and funny in the context of closed environments of The Initiated, cf reclaimation. In a packed hall, a stand-up comic joking about Asians or gays or is going to offend because there's that feeling that there's someone out there in the audience who is gaining a sense of genuine justification for their own bigotry in the telling.

This is just a theory and I'm not sure how well I'm explaining it. What do you think?

[marrog.livejournal.com]

God it's always about feminism with you lot, isn't it?

[broin.livejournal.com]

Y'know, I spent three hours roleplaying a black character this evening. One of the players afterwards said he was a bit stereotyped. Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't.

But the idea I'd take the character and pass it round black friends for them to rubberstamp my portrayal? Fills me with horror. How completely embarrassing.

[chuma.livejournal.com]

Sure, there may be a big difference, but the problem is that I can only relate to any experiences through my own. I cannot know how it feels for a black person to be racially abused, I can only draw comparison as best I can. However there is also the world of difference between racism and making a joke about, lets say, dead hookers. All things can be said to have their differences.

[miss-s-b.livejournal.com]

I was feeling my way towards something similar.

[andrewducker]

I'm fine with people choosing not to allow other people onto private grounds for most reasons. If you wanted to come give a speech in my kitchen about the evils of gay people that wouldn't mean I had an obligation to let you.

The RPGnet argument sounds like the opposite of what their rules state:
"Complain about Christianity, but not individual Christians." would say it was fine to say things about "All Christians". If people are feeling sensitive and arguing the opposite then that's going to cause problems, but that's a problem a mod should be sorting.

[broin.livejournal.com]

And how should they 'sort it'? :)

The rule isn't *quite* like that. I can say modern paganism is, say, shallow and reactionary. I can't say pagans are shallow. I can't say you, a pagan, is shallow. Which is tortuous when I complain about a faith/culture/country, and someone takes it to mean I'm picking on each and every member of the faith/culture/country.

I mean, following my argument about circumcision, if I feel it's physical abuse, aren't I saying every Jew is an abuser?

[andrewducker]

Nope, because not all of them do it. Also, picking on one act performed by a group doesn't mean that group is eeeevil - it just means that they aren't perfect.

It does sound like RPG.Net have taken things too far, to be honest. As I said elsewhere in this thread, unless you're specifically advocating hatred/violence I fall on the freedom of speech side of things.

What I'm generally trying to say with the post here is that there are things you can say/do that are going to offend people, and that if you care then here are some useful ways of dealing with it without it spilling into flamewar territory. And that thinking about the effect of our words on others is worth doing.

[lizzie-and-ari.livejournal.com]

Slightly following on from Cairmen’s comment, Chuma may not be ‘female, PoC, disabled, not cisgendered, or something along those lines.’ But he is male. Men are starting to see massive accepted gender opression and stereotyping, particularly in popular comedy – I see what could be ‘seen as an arrow (which to me is subtly different to my seeing the arrow) in comedy clubs, in countless sitcoms and dramas e.g. Friends, Sex and The City, Buffy, Ugly Betty to name but a couple of the top of my head. Some of these go hand in hand with female stereotyping, but why is it worse with women? Put this hand it hand with the treatment of men in magazines and popular culture and sexist rulings at a legislative level - eg rules that groups or boards etc that specify that at least one woman must be appointed, but not at least one men, which means it is legal for a board to comprise all women but not all men – that is sexist.

AND men aren’t allowed to complain about it, because they ‘couldn’t possibly know’. Yes I realise that worldwide female oppression and stereotyping is a much larger problem but the hypocrisy of saying ‘you’re a man, you couldn’t know about what it is like to have a gender’ is, to me, sexism of the most extreme level.

Lx

[lizzie-and-ari.livejournal.com]

Incidentally, where do you draw the line between born with e.g. race, disability and people who chose certain behaviour?

What about religion? This is a choice, technically, but it difficult to pick and choose between your feelings and beliefs and this can be so closely linked to culture and upbringing. Some people are gay but make the ‘life choice’ not to be, they suck it up and date the opposite gender or remain celibate. And, in either case, miserable. With the possible exception of disability (most kinds) it is possible if you choose to cover up anything about your life in the same way as you choose to behave in certain ways. I don’t know enough about it, but suspect there are those who equate gothdom with being a kind of religion (and it ties closely to some religions). I totally understand your point – but where is the line?

[meihua.livejournal.com]

*nods* I don't deny that sexism against men exists, or that it's a problem.

However, there's one key difference between sexism as experienced by men and the prejudice experienced by the groups I mentioned; here in the west, those are not the groups in power.

Someone else (I think in this thread) said that the problem is "prejudice + power", and I think I agree.

It's one thing to experience sexism in some walks of life but be able to retreat from those areas at will.

The thing which I don't know to describe to someone who is in receipt of most forms of privilege is the experience of being in an environment of ubiquitous prejudice where even the idea of prejudice-free-space (such as women-only spaces, PoC-only-spaces) is still seen as radical by some.

To someone who doesn't experience that - I don't know how to describe how it feels. How much it amplifies the feeling of prejudice.

The key difference is that if you're white, male, cisgendered and above the poverty line, then most of the time when you experience prejudice you can walk away.

[drainboy.livejournal.com]

I agree, though obviously if a gay asian was making stereotypical gay asian jokes then they could quite well be funny. The context of the experience being more heavily defined by the one with the mic than by the audience.

Though I doubt few people who were racist or homophobic would go to to see a gay asian comedian.

In fact more than that, if you had a group of people laughing at one person telling a joke, it's quite possible that laughing at the joke would be completely acceptable, whereas telling that joke (i.e. going from being an audience member to comedian with exactly the same people, merely roles altered) would be completely unacceptable.

I occasionally make homophobic, racist or sexist jokes, but only amongst company that know I'm not homophobic, racist or sexist and deliberately over the top jokes which would be too ridiculous that anyone could consider me serious.

In fact I'd likely only make such jokes when there was a good amount of the (potentially) insulted party present, as however well people know you, making some racist, sexist or homophobic jokes amongst a group of white, male, heterosexuals would have difficulty coming off as non-bigoted no matter the intention or the content.