It’s an old comedic trope: Bumbling husband, sensible wife. From the Honeymooners to King of Queens, this trope is played out in countless sitcoms, old and (relatively) new. And no sitcom husband is quite so bumbling — and just plain dumb — as Homer Simpson, who couldn’t say or do a smart thing to save his life.
Some Men’s Rights activists think Homer’s stupidity is part of a vast plot against men. In a post on the Men’s Rights subreddit today, a regular commenter called zogins explained to his fellow MRAs how “The Simpsons opened my eyes to misandry and the way feminists use men.”
On the show, you see,
every man is a caricature in some way or another while women are most often level headed and smart, saving the day after some man has caused a disaster.
The aforementioned Homer
is dumb, a drunk, does not know how to look after his family and lets down his wife constantly … Bart is a criminal in the making, far behind in school and overshadowed by his brilliant sister, Lisa. … Mr. Burns is the epitome of male evil – he is a dyed in the wool capitalist, pollutes the environment and makes money off poor people.
He continues down the list: Principal Skinner is a “mama’s boy,” the Comic Book Guy “knows more about comics than about life,” Apu “cannot defend his own property against thieves,” and Police Chief Wiggum is a “bumbling idiot.” (“Fake ’em away, toys!”)
Zogins then notes ominously that on one episode of the show he recently saw, Bart joined a heretofore all-female feminist club.
When the feminists are talking among themselves one of them says, “But I thought that this feminist group was only for girls.” Another girl replies, “That does not mean that we cannot have male servants to use and discard when we have obtained what we wanted.”
Remember this, men, who help feminists: you are only tools to use and discard!
Dude, dude. It’s a joke about feminism, or at least about the public perceptions of it; it’s not a secret confession that feminists all want to exploit men.
We’ve met zogins before. Once, when he was trying to argue that topless women and girls oppress men by using their booby allure to get men charged with being “pedophiles and pervs,” another time when he railed against Thelma and Louise, “the ultimate feminist, man hating movie” in which, he complained: “every man … is a caricature of manhood.”
So is the Simpsons. as zogins believes, a man-hating work of feminist propaganda?
Well, not quite. For one thing, as a few commenters on the Men’s Rights subreddit have even pointed out, many of the show’s female characters are also bad and stupid. For example, Marge is a fussbudget and, while smarter than Homer, is not the sharpest knife in the drawer; her sisters are outright evil. Mrs. Krabaplle is a terrible teacher who doesn’t really give a shit. Even Lisa, probably the closest thing the show has to a positive role model, is smug and jealous.
But yes, the bumbling husband/sensible wife combo is a widespread trope in TV comedies, with Homer as a textbook case. Thing is, it’s not particularly a feminist trope.
For one thing, it’s older than modern feminism. The Honeymooners aired in the mid-fifties, a time of cultural retrenchment; second-wave feminism didn’t arise for another decade. By the time the Simpsons first aired in 1989, the bumbling dad was already a bit hackneyed.
For another, the role of the bumbling dad is often the best role on the show. In comedies, humor stems largely from stupidity, and the dumbest characters are often the stars. Jackie Gleason’s Ralph Kramden was the central focus and prime mover of the Honeymooners, not his onscreen wife. (Can you even remember who played her?) The King of Queens is titled, well, the King of Queens, not the Sensible Wife.
Indeed, the sensible wife is the straight man (well, straight woman) in the equation; and she’s rarely ever as funny or as memorable as her husband. Notably, in the one fifties show with a famous woman behind it — Lucille Ball’s I Love Lucy — she played the ditzy lead. Because that was the best role; her foolish antics are the main reason anyone still watches the show.
In newer and many ways more forward-looking comedies than the Simpsons, which is more than three decades old, the female characters tend to be as dumb and evil — and therefore as funny — as the men. Think Lucille and Lindsay on Arrested Development or Dee on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.
It’s not feminist to make the funniest characters on a sitcom, men; it’s not a plot against men to give men the best roles.
In short, Men’s Rights activists are as terrible at cultural criticism as they are at everything else. D’oh!
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Yet again, Dave is forced to explain comedy to people who don’t understand other people.
Old -Time Radio geek here: I think the Trope Maker for all those dopey sitcom dads was Chester A. Riley from the radio sitcom The Life of Riley (1944-1951); I used to listen on the old X-Star network until they were bought out by NPR in the mid-Aughts. Riley bored me, because as a late Boomer who’d come in as a second-generation fan, I was wearily familiar with his ilk; the character I liked was Digger O’ Dell, “your friendly undertaker.” Digger was something of a proto-PerkyGoth, gleefully seizing any opportunity to remind people of their mortality (usually involving groanworthy puns)—but he was wise and compassionate, and ready to help Riley out of whatever hole he’d dug himself into that week, before “shoveling off” to his regularly scheduled business.
Lisa Simpson? Smug and jealous? Maybe so, but she’s still my personal role model. Or maybe I’m her role model. I’ve been told I’m a lot like her.
Yes, so feminist that most of the biggest fans are men and it’s been on since the late Cretaceous. 1989 is before so many of these losers were even born!
Do the kids today even watch Simpsons? We gave up like 20 years ago except for the Halloween episodes. And I’m completely surprised every year when they put up the “Treehouse of Horror XXXVI” number.
Yeah, this isn’t some sort of new revelation here. I remember reading an article in Reader’s Digest probably 15-20 years ago written by a guy railing against the dumb husband stereotype.
However, if I remember correctly, he made a more convincing argument and didn’t blame it on feminism, merely complaining about the trope.
(Did the word “trope” even exist then? I might have to look that up…)
I mean, it’s the Simpsons, everybody on the show has flaws. And good points. Homer, for all his stupidity and as hard as it is to get him to admit it at times, really does care about his family.
@Full Metal Ox:
Undertakers having strange senses of humour is, of course, definitely a thing; it may even be a bit of a coping mechanism for some of them. I knew a guy who worked as a coroner’s assistant, and when asked what he did for a living, he would usually look around furtively and stage whisper, “I see dead people.”
@Kat:
Honestly I tended to see Lisa’s main flaw as being ‘needs to feel validation’. Both the ‘smug’ and ‘jealous’ bits are more side effects of that as she tries to make sure others see her as being the smart one. That said, it’s not as if characterization on the show is 100% consistent anyway.
@.45:
The word ‘trope’ certainly existed back then (Oxford English Dictionary says it dates back to the 16th century), but the meaning has shifted a bit in the last few decades of use. The original meaning was apparently more a poetic concept, using words or images for their emotional impact rather than literal meaning, so things like metaphors were a subset of tropes.
The bumbling husband is also a stereotype that gives cover for men who don’t do their share of household work. Men are clumsy and inept at those tasks, after all; better let the woman do it.
@GiJoel
I am reminded of a fan theory about King of the Hill that I see over and over: “Dale Gribble knows the truth about Joseph’s parentage.”
The entire argument boils down to “Dale Gribble is the most paranoid person in Arlen, who sees nonexistent conspiracies everywhere, but supposedly he is completely blind to the one real conspiracy centered around him. Really?”
To which I can only respond: “Yes. That’s the joke. Do you not understand what comedy is?”
(I often see this theory paired with the brilliant, insightful theory “Batman may have PTSD.” Oh, ya think?)
@Allandrel:
‘Ya think?’ pretty much sums up my reaction to that, too. Back in the… late 70s, I think? There was a story that used a bit of a retelling of Batman’s origin as he was making an annual trek down to Crime Alley on the anniversary of his parents’ murder. And ran into the woman (I think nurse) who had been the one person to work to pay attention to him and calm him down while the police were swarming the site.
She was being mugged at the time. The mugger swung his gun around to Batman when Batman showed up. Batman utterly lost it and started beating the mugger into a pulp, coming close to killing him before the same woman calmed him down again.
I mean, obviously, a lot of stuff like this depends on the writer. But yes, under decent writers, PTSD is definitely there. Certainly his level of obsessiveness isn’t exactly incompatible with that either.
I guess Donna Reed doesn’t count as famous anymore. : – )
But, seriously, there were quite a few female led comedies in the fifties, most of which aren’t well remembered these days despite how popular they were at the time.
@Michael Suttkus:
I guess Donna Reed doesn’t count as famous anymore. : – )
But, seriously, there were quite a few female led comedies in the fifties, most of which aren’t well remembered these days despite how popular they were at the time.
Right off the top of my head:
I Married Joan (with star Joan Davis billed as “America’s Queen of Comedy.”)
Our Miss Brooks (one of the first with a heroine who worked outside the home, although Connie Brooks’ unrequited pining for fellow high-school teacher Philip Boynton was a persistent plot theme.)
The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show (a husband-and-wife team; Allen’s ditzy Cloudcuckoolandish character was not even remotely the straight woman.)
If Breitbart is interested in deconstructing tropes, may I recommend ‘Feminist Frequency’ to them? I seem to remember Anita Sarkeesian explaining how tropes can be harmful.
@Allandrel:
I am reminded of a fan theory about King of the Hill that I see over and over: “Dale Gribble knows the truth about Joseph’s parentage.”
The entire argument boils down to “Dale Gribble is the most paranoid person in Arlen, who sees nonexistent conspiracies everywhere, but supposedly he is completely blind to the one real conspiracy centered around him. Really?”
To which I can only respond: “Yes. That’s the joke. Do you not understand what comedy is?”
And do they not understand that even real people can be incredibly arbitrary, cherry-picking, and self-protective about their combination of beliefs?
(And thank you for bringing up King of the Hill; Hank is an earnest stodge obsessed with maintaining normality (and the narrative acknowledges this),but he’s also usually the Designated Adult and moral compass of his friend group—and clearly determined not to be the sort of husband and father Cotton was.)
@Daughter:
If Breitbart is interested in deconstructing tropes, may I recommend ‘Feminist Frequency’ to them? I seem to remember Anita Sarkeesian explaining how tropes can be harmful.
Let’s not—for Sarkeesian’s sake; she doesn’t deserve another round of dudebro hooting and poop-flinging.
IDK about kids (Finnish or otherwise) these days. From about 2000 to 2010, I thought the Simpsons had been discontinued because Finnish TV seemed to only show reruns of old episodes. Admittedly, I also gradually stopped paying attention to TV programming during that time. Then I found the US social media and references to new Simpsons episodes.
It seems reminiscent of the boomer comic trope “everyone actually sucks at their role”, which shows prominently in workplace sitcoms from Beetley Bailey to Dilbert.
@Full Metal Ox:
George Burns, in interviews, used to talk about the early days of the Burns/Allen act. Originally it was Gracie as the ‘straight woman’ and George as the ‘funny guy’ in his pork pie hat. He said that the act never quite landed as he originally thought it should, but that occasionally when Gracie made a bit of a ditzy quip the audience would laugh more than they did at his own witticisms. Realizing that they were doing this all wrong, they rearranged the act to its later and more famous form with Gracie as the comic and George as the straight man, and history was made.
Meanwhile, this 2014 Cracked essay by C. Coville and Christina Hsu lists six character types that men hardly ever get an opportunity to play; #5, The Wet Blanket, is the most relevant to the sitcom context.
https://web.archive.org/web/20140217184840/http://www.cracked.com/blog/the-6-male-characters-women-never-get-to-see-in-movies/
I would add “The Betty White Show” in the 50s. Had her name in the title!
That legend was the Queen of Sitcoms for half a century, and could do either ditzy (Golden Girls) or bitchy (MTM).
Yeah, I guess the dumb blonde and other stupid female roles don’t exist anymore… holy crap.
@GSS Ex-noob
Wait, are you telling me I’m as old as the simpsons?!? Geez. Time flies by…
@KMB: Listen, I was out of college by the time it came on. How do you think I feel? Your entire life, my adult life. If someone’s just now noticing Homer’s an idiot, they must have been remarkably clueless or in a coma for three decades.
@KMB:
Wait, are you telling me I’m as old as the simpsons?!? Geez. Time flies by…
I refer you to my nom de net; it’s my Chinese zodiac sign.
I am also a Full Metal Ox, so yeah.
It’s been on over half my life though, and longer than over 50% of all the people in the entire world have been around.
So, yeah, bozo, you’re massively late to the party. There’s 4 BILLION people walking around today who have never lived in a world before The Simpsons. I’m guessing this chucklehead’s one of them, and not real bright. People in the farthest corners of the Earth have heard of or watched them — certainly Americans have — and the patriarchy hasn’t diminished. My friends over 80 know who the Simpsons are, ffs, because they were in their 50s when the show was big.
Eat my shorts, bozo. (Bart’s voice is a woman, y’know)
@GSS ex-noob:
Eat my shorts, bozo. (Bart’s voice is a woman, y’know)
Not to one-up, but Nancy Cartwright is, in fact, from my hometown! (“Eat my shorts” was a detail she threw in; it originated as a Fairmont West High School marching band joke cheer.)
@FM Ox: yeah, but she’s also a Scientologist, so… meh.
Still, glad your old school cheer got famous.
Not to mention that feminists have also criticized the “bumbling dad” trope for perpetuating the notion that men can’t be expected to pull their weight around the house, which in turn places more burden on women.