Dudes, are you finding that your attempts at humor are falling flat? Are your clever quips getting you written up regularly by HR? Are they causing your friends to get fired when they drunkenly defend your “jokes” on live television?
It’s possible that what you think is humor is not actually humor. Consider the following list of things that are not humor:
- Embezzling
- Punching a random dude in the face for no reason
- Pushing elderly people off of train platforms
- Lighting an orphanage on fire
- Sexually harassing a woman on live television by yelling “F her right in the P,” except instead of “F” you say a certain word that starts with “f” and instead of “P” you say a word that starts with “p” and ends with “y.”
Seriously, dudes. Stop it with this whole “F her right in the P” shit. You’re making life crappy for women and giving all aspiring funny men a bad name.
If you, dear reader, don’t know what the “F her right in the P” thing is, it’s this: dudes yell “F her right in the P” at female TV reporters doing live shots on the street. That’s it. That’s the whole thing.
As someone who doesn’t watch a lot of local news, I only became aware of this whole “F her right in the P” thing yesterday, when a helpful reader alerted me to the story of Shauna Hunt, a Toronto CityNews reporter who’s gotten so sick of the whole thing that she confronted a group of men on live television after one of their friends shouted the phrase at her while she was interviewing soccer fans. The men defended their friend’s actions as “hilarious.” One, obviously a bit drunk, told her she was “lucky” they didn’t have a vibrator. You can watch the whole thing above.
This “meme” originated more than a year ago in a fake news blooper reel that went viral online. Since then, female news reporters — covering everything from sports events to anti-austerity protests — have been dealing with dudes yelling the phrase at them on a daily basis, sometimes several times in a day. The dudes think what they’re doing is hilarious. They feel no shame. And they don’t expect there to be any consequences from sexually harassing a woman on live television.
Maybe that will change: several of the men defending the harassment in Hunt’s video — which itself has gone viral — have been identified. They’ve all been banned for a year from sports events featuring teams owned by Maple Leafs Sports and Entertainment, and one (the guy who made the vibrator joke) has been fired from his job. Good.
To any dudes who feel their sacred man-right to generate “humor” by making people deeply uncomfortable is being abridged, might I suggest you follow the lead of the three gentlemen in the video below?
These three manage to make pain quite funny indeed. What makes them genuinely hilarious, so unlike the guys harassing Hunt in the video above? Their originality, for one thing; they demonstrate an ingenuity that would make Rube Goldberg proud. And, just as importantly: the only people they’re actually hurting are themselves.
The thing that gets me about this is the “right in the P” part, as if getting your dick in the place you wanted is some kind of accomplishment.
While not a fan of the “Ow, my balls!” school of humor, I must concede that the three gents in that video are giants of the humor industry, in comparison to the “F her in the P” crew.
“Fight her in the pantry”?
Is this another ‘make me a sandwich’ thing?
It baffles me and somewhat terrifies me that these dudes thought they could do this, on camera, and that everything would be okay.
It slightly comforts me that there were actual repercussions.
This is exactly why you cannot talk to men.
Alan,
I read “Fight her in the pantry” in Winston Churchill’s voice. Thank you.
I’m waiting for the backlash against the action taken against the dickheads who did this…
I haven’t watched the second video but based on the title I assume it is a split screen, on one side showing the physical humor described, on the other side showing a man weeping quietly.
Vice’s response was spot on: http://www.vice.com/en_ca/read/men-do-comedy-good-fhritp-edition?utm_source=vicefbca
freemage,
I tried to watch this one and had to turn it off when he started crying. I can’t watch the videos of people being hurt. I swear, I can physically feel a little pain of my own just by seeing someone else get hurt. I’d be the world’s worst EMT.
Meanwhile, horror movies are my favorite things ever (after rainbows and kittens). Go figure.
I thought I heard about this before, but only in the context of a single dude in one place doing it a couple times. I had no idea this was a regular occurrence. Bloody hell…
I hope the rest of these assholes start facing similar repercussions.
Aaand I’ve just found out after reading marinerachel’s link that the thing I remember is the original hoax. Go figure.
I’m also annoyed by the reporting of this, which usually only mentions something like “a man said something obscene on TV”. It doesn’t really illustrate the sexual harassment in that trend. In the past year, I’ve heard many female journalists in Canada talking about having to deal with this every day.
The comments on the Vice article make me thankful for moderated comments sections.
I just don’t understand why someone would think this is an OK thing to do to a person who is just doing her job. Do I come into your office and shout vulgar things at you while you are writing emails? No, I do not. Because it’s inappropriate and I am a decent human being.
I also noticed that the guy who actually made the comment ran off immediately. He doesn’t stick around. The rest of the video is the newscaster talking to his friends, who, of course, defend him. I don’t know why he took off, but I like to think that it’s because he regretted what he did and went home to rethink his life choices.
Do the guys who think this joke is okay, would you yell “fuck him right in the ass!” at a male and heterosexual presenting reporter? If that would never occur to you, then yes, that “joke” is misogynistic and if you yell it, you deserve to lose your job or be banned from events.
I say heterosexual presenting man because I could see dudebros yelling this or something equally inappropriate to harass a gay man too. People who find misogyny funny typically find homophobia funny too.
I’m not watching the video right now because I’m on transit but didn’t that guy say “you’re lucky I don’t put a vibrator in your ear” or something like that? It was specific enough that it crossed the line into a sexual assault threat and not just drunken sexist idiocy.
@MaudLL:
That reminds me of this story about how the news minimizes misogyny and racism when reporting about fraternity issues. Major, major content warning on that one, as it indeed displays what the words “inappropriate” and “sexually offensive” can hide.
And yet the news uses hyperbolic language on non-issues, like describing a couple small incidents as a national and/or growing trend. It gets everything frikken backwards.
Good for Shauna Hunt. Every example of some dudebro doing this vile thing and experiencing the consequences thereof brings us a tiny bit closer to nobody doing it again.
And nothing of value will have been lost.
@Alan Robertshaw:
“Fight her in the pantry”?
LOL!
I thought “Flatter her right in the pantry,” but then I’m a romantic.
Admittedly, the first “FHRITM” was sort of funny because it was so unexpected and stupid (and, most importantly, scripted). Absurdist humour, you know?
But that was a year ago (and was consented to). Now, it’s not only unfunny sexual harassment, it’s played the fuck out.
*”FHRITP.” Not sure where the M came from. ಠ_ಠ
I can’t understand how anyone thinks this is funny. I’m glad that some of those men got what’s coming to them and hopefully we will be more harsher on the consequences so this garbage will never happen again.
Now this is funny
http://youtu.be/e3B1QsnT9iA
@kirbywarp:
“That reminds me of this story about how the news minimizes misogyny and racism when reporting about fraternity issues. Major, major content warning on that one, as it indeed displays what the words “inappropriate” and “sexually offensive” can hide.
And yet the news uses hyperbolic language on non-issues, like describing a couple small incidents as a national and/or growing trend. It gets everything frikken backwards.”
YES.
One is flabbergasted into a stupor by the nonchalant, and effectively dismissive, descriptions of such misogynist sadism as merely “inappropriate” or “sexually offensive” — the same terms used to describe, say, any depictions of happy sexual activity between consenting adults.
These terms do not begin to convey the horror of what they are describing; and yet they are used repeatedly and without reflection, showing so well how prevalent and normalized misogyny is in our society. Cuz boys will be boys, no big deal; it’s a satire, or a bonding exercise; and other fairy tales from the misogynists and their apologists.
The edgiest edgebros ever to have edged.
I’m so tired of “IT’S JUST A JOAK!”
These women are trying to do their jobs. I guarantee that none of these idiots would appreciate it if a bunch of women and gay men strolled into their work places and started yelling “FUCK HIM RIGHT IN THE ASS!” at them as they were trying to go about their work duties. Oh but shouting it at women is a-ok because, well, that’s what they should expect for doing something so scandalous as going outside, having jobs, and existing.
Also, fuck Christopher Hitchens. Let’s resurrect the fucker and make him defend his statement that women are just not funny after watching a parade of idiot men who think screaming shit like this at women is hilarious.