Every few days, it seems, Reddit has some thread asking the regulars there what horrible thing they would do if they could get away with it. And invariably someone says rape.
The good folks in ShitRedditSays recently highlighted one such comment, from a fellow calling himself nickfromredcliff. As you can see from the edits to his comment below, poor Nick felt somewhat embarrassed and even affronted by the attention.
When I checked his comment again this morning while writing this post, I found he’d edited it again. Gone was his plaintive plea for tolerance; in its place, a bunch of new rape jokes. (You can find a screenshot of his original comment here; at the time it had 39 upvotes.)
Let’s all use this as a learning experience.
And while we’re at it, let’s have a toast for the douchebag.
*and any, not and and
A nice young man who likes rape jokes and working with the disabled?
Yeah, sounds like a chilling combination.
Now that I think about it, he probably REALLY likes Almodovar’s “Talk to Her”.
@Molly- That actually sounds like a lot of fun. You could go jump on the beds in the Lincoln bedroom!
I’m that person. You know, the one who doesn’t laugh at the douchebag jokes that happen after disasters. Why? Because there’s nothing funny about human (or other animals) suffering. And I don’t buy for one minute the “dark humor/coping” defense.
The first time I really got a taste of it was the Challenger explosion that happened when I was in high school. Not long after it happened (like a few days later) the most popular joke was –
Q: What did Christa McAuliffe’s husband say to her the night before the launch?
A: While you’re gone, I’ll feed the dog. You feed the fish. Bwa haha haha!
After that, I became attuned to how idiots would rush to be the first to make horrible jokes when disasters occurred. It was like some badge of honor.
It’s not fucking funny! The same goes for rape jokes. They’re not funny. They’ve never been funny. The only people who find them funny are those who feel that it will never happen to them and somehow the person who was raped (or suffered some other type of devastating harm) deserved it because the joke maker is stuck in the “just world” construct.
As a beautiful woman who has been psychologically damaged (the ” rest of her life” bit is still up for debate), fuck you, sir. Fuck you in the ass with a pitchfork.
In other news, I was JUST thinking about how subverting tropes is way more funny than reinforcing them.
For example: How many feminists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A. That’s not funny!
B. That depends on whether or not they’re discussing the merits of Dworkin’s views on heterosexual sex and consent.
B is much, much funnier to me than A.
I do think dark humor can be a coping mechanism for someone after suffering through a trauma or disaster. After the tornado, I looked at my house and said, “At least I didn’t stain the deck like I had planned last weekend”. In my defense, I was literally in a state of shock and was not really processing everything I saw around me. I could not look at the destruction and carnage around me and deal with it, so I made a joke as a way to try to stay strong. My therapist told me that as long as a coping mechanism isn’t self destructive or harmful to the people around me, she wouldn’t judge me badly for that. One of my neighbors that survived was crying at the time, and my joke made her smile. A week later, I told her that her yard looked unkempt and we laughed together. So I wouldn’t be too hard on people that make jokes during and after a tragedy because it can a normal stage of grief.
RE: Gingersnaps
But how do they FIT in the lightbulb???
As far as making horrible jokes about horrible things, I’m sorta reminded of a friend-of-a-friend and a cancer survivor who apparently was known for making jokes like: “What did the cancer survivor get for Christmas? Cancer.”
I feel like sometimes I use humor in a similar (though generally private) way regarding my own sexual abuse and mental issues. It takes something huge and horrible and soul-sucking, and somehow by finding some horrible way to laugh at it, I manage to make it small and petty and something bearable.
I usually make Edward Cullen comics if I want to do that though.
Kendra, maybe to the people who survived a disaster. I can see that. But I’m talking about the douchebags who make a joke after a disaster and then get snippy when called on it. They say things like “Of course it was terrible. It was a tragedy! This is just how some people cope.”
Those people usually weren’t the ones who went through the disaster.
Next on the list would be stealing a lot of paintings like that guy in the Thomas Crown affair… and that’s how I realized I’d be a very bougise anarchist. XD
Ew.
I’m with Lady Zombie on this one — the people I know who use “dark humor” in defense of tasteless jokes usually do not have any kind of history with violence or trauma, and they use this in argument with people who have.
Not okay.
RE: Gingersnaps
I know! But it’s actually kinda therapeutic to scribble silly comics with Edward Cullen as an embodiment of Self-Hate sent by the Bureau of Loathing just to follow you around and make you miserable.
Ah, yeah, that kind of humor just gives me aggro. I had a guy say make a rape joke while READING MY AUTOBIO RAPE COMIC.
I really wish I’d found it in me to grab him, start guffawing and go, “You know what’s funny? I went to the cops, and I told them everything and… and… NOTHING HAPPENED TO HIM! AHAHAHAHAHA! He could be on the street with you any day! AHAHAHAHA! He could rape your daughter! AHAHAHAHAHA WHY AREN’T YOU LAUGHING AT MY FUNNY JOKE?”
I am that person too, Lady Zombie.
I have been known to make sarcastic remarks about my own misfortunes.
I have never grasped the humor in jokes about others misfortunes, pain, and suffering.
I don’t think this sort of jokester realizes that when people laugh at their “jokes” what they are hearing is more likely an embarrassed laugh than a laugh of appreciation.
LadyZombie: And I don’t buy for one minute the “dark humor/coping” defense.
No caveats? Then I disagree. You would not believe the coping mechanism jokes I made (and still make) and laugh(ed) at, regarding combat.
Telling me that I wasn’t/am not coping… you’re wrong.
Extended reply: I still make that sort of joke, about things which happened long after I left theater (and some which have nothing to do with being in theater, context is a funny thing).
It’s because the things I’m coping with aren’t done.
To quote The Oysterband, “What I can’t bear to remember, is what I can’t bear to forget.”
M Dubz: In NY it’s not illegal for a woman to be topless. It’s not always the safest of things (because assholes are everywhere) but it’s legal.
What have they done lately? Made someone who made (at the most charitiable) a stupid rape joke regret it.
If he learns from it, that’s to the good. It’s, arguably, more to the good than his blood donations, because it’s of benefit to everyone whom he fails to 1: offend, and 2: doesn’t see him getting away with it, and 3: all the people who won’t see him supporting rape culture.
But really, I have my doubts he really learned his lesson.
And I see he didn’t, he doubled down.
I can’t make Edward Cullen comics, but when it comes to Bella, Mary Sue gets ALL the jokes.
In other news, I just noticed that this blog’s theme is Mystique and I fangirled a little.
I guess I should clarify or adjust. People who haven’t lived through disasters, or in Pecunium’s case combat, but who make jokes about the disasters are the douchebags.
There’s a world of difference between a combat vet making a dark joke and the local watercooler sleeze making Haitian earthquake jokes.
All right then, in that case we agree. I was not making jokes as a way to be an asshole. I made jokes because I was trying to detach myself emotionally from my surroundings. I was trying not to show fear around my children, and I kept telling myself “Stay strong. Keep it together.” Like LBT described, the jokes were a way to take something I couldn’t handle and make it seem more manageable.
As far as other people not in the tragedy making jokes, then yes that is wrong. I read someone’s Tumblr post that his professor made the joke “Yeah, you know like that whole butterfly effect, a butterfly flaps its wings on one side of the world then creates a tornado in Joplin…oh that’s not funny…that’s quite terrible and sad…” That pisses me off. Following the joke with “Oops. Too soon?” does not make it okay either. I’ve also seen a video of a newscaster joke off the air “I’m not in Joplin anymore” as in the line from the The Wizard of Oz. He is a major league asshole, too.
Yeah, the thing about dark humor as a coping mechanism is that it only makes sense if you’re coping with something.
Arguably someone could be coping with the fear of living in danger of rape or disasters, even if they aren’t a survivor themselves, but I think the jokes they’d make then would be very different from “rape and tornadoes, haw haw.”
Why do people suck so much?
🙁
You guys don’t suck.
Lady Zombie: Ok, then I think we agree. I would extend it some. There are jobs (I’ve had several) which inspire black humor. It’s a bit infectious, because it’s a useful coping mechanism. There are a lot more things I make dark jokes about than there used to be.
But context matters. There isn’t any context to connect me to Joplin, so I don’t make jokes about it. Same for the World Trade Center; even though I now live in the area, and travel through the World Trade train station four-ten times a week.
The shit-stain who made this comment, wasn’t joking; and it would be hard to make a contextual joke about it. I don’t make the sorts of jokes I was talking about in the presence of people who have no context. It’s not appropriate.
I think we can all agree that the reddit guy was not coping with anything. Ergo, asshole.
Funny how when people react to outrageous statements with, you know, OUTRAGE, the people who behaved outrageously start getting butthurt about it. “But but but you’re making me feel bad for joking about rape! Can’t you take a joke?”
I don’t know, man. Can’t YOU take a smack with the logic paddle upside your head and realize that the reaction you got suggests your comment wasn’t funny and wasn’t a joke?
Also, dude, if what you’re really expressing is that you’d like to be able to take sex from anyone without worrying about that pesky consent bit, why offer the caveat about “and if it wouldn’t damage the woman”? The question was “what illegal thing would you do if you wouldn’t get punished,” basically. Not “if you could also magically make it so it didn’t hurt anyone.” If you really wanted it to not hurt anyone and you’re inserting magic into your answer, why not just make it so women found you attractive and you didn’t have to rape them to get laid? Why specify that rape is what you’d do if it weren’t illegal and wouldn’t hurt anyone? This guy makes me think that if he could he’d rape women and erase their memories and walk away feeling like that was totally okay.
Disgusting.