4 ms·

Do you think there's a conflict between sexism and fun? As in, "Well, I'd like to stop making sexist jokes, but then it would be so boring here." I would rathe

Do you think there's a conflict between sexism and fun? As in, "Well, I'd like to stop making sexist jokes, but then it would be so boring here." I would rather work in an office where the jokes are of the funny sort, rather than the makes-one-person-feel-miserable sort. I really don't think there's any overlap between funny jokes and sexist jokes.

crusso 15y ago
> Do you think there's a conflict between sexism and fun? As in, "Well, I'd like to stop making sexist jokes, but then it would be so boring here." I would phrase it, "If everyone's humor had to be bland Disney G-rated fare, then a lot of fun would have been sucked out of our work environment."
- jamesaguilar 15y ago
  There's plenty of R-rated humor that's not degrading to women.
- pingswept 15y ago
  I think you should revise your perception of what is being gained by sexist humor. It seems that you get some good laughs out of it-- no problem for you. For the people on the other side of the joke, it's not fun. From what Katie Cunningham writes, it's so unbearable that she's on the verge of leaving the profession she loves. With that understanding of the situation, sexist jokes lose their humor, at least for me.
  - crusso 15y ago
    >I think you should revise your perception of what is being gained by sexist humor. It seems that you get some good laughs out of it-- no problem for you. Where did I defend sexist humor? I think that Katie Cunningham is putting up with some nonsense and she should take direct action. My question to Katie was just regarding the line between humor and offense and how she drew a distinction? She apparently didn't get offended and answered me quite frankly. There's really no need for you to jump in and mischaracterize my position. Lots of white knights in this thread that she doesn't really seem to need to take care of her.
    - pingswept 15y ago
      I agree that there's no need for mischaracterization, but there is a need for people to jump in and say what they think. I'll try to explain why I thought you were defending sexist humor. This is the line that made me think you were defending sexist humor: "I would be sad if my relationship with my coworkers couldn't handle, let alone thrive upon, humorous interactions." Maybe you meant non-sexist humor that erroneously came across as sexist?
- strix_varius 15y ago
  Agreed.
- sophacles 15y ago
  There is a lot of humor to be had that is both appropriate and not G-rated. Humorous personal stories about awkward situations or odd situations, jokes about things that happened to people on the team (like the time susan brought the server down, or bob's ridiculous obsession with 80s pop), movie references, sexual innuendo (thats what s/he said is usually not sexist), political jokes, topical news jokes, and on and on. I'm so sure you are going to come back with some "blah blah politically correct blah blah" disingenuity, I will adress it now: No, it's not all about PC and rules and whatnot, it's about genuine respect. Making comments and jokes centered on a person which aren't about that person, but about their membership in a class is generally not cool. It's called othering (and sometimes objectification). Othering is exclusionary, and a good joke for the target (but sometimes a good joke to the in-crowd, it solidifies their superiority!). Basically most jokes are OK, if they don't hinge on "and that's why that group is inferior and different from us".
jberryman 15y ago
Completely agree. As a man witnessing the slightly sexist crap, and watching women have to sort of jokingly deflect it, is just incredibly uncomfortable. And the "joking" is never funny. I'm going to be better at calling that shit out from now on.
guard-of-terra 15y ago
Well, male coworkers pick on each other all the time. Even when they have absolutely no incentive to hurt, once there's an awkward situation and they can say something smart - they'll fire. Most if nor all of humor revolves around something bad happening to someone. That's what funny. (In normal workplace setting women are actually shielded from that friendly fire because men don't feel as comfortable/can't predict what's OK and what's not) You want jokes, you have to acquire certain skin thickness. If you don't, then I don't want to work with you. Fun is fun.
- pingswept 15y ago
  I agree with your description of how humor typically happens, and because of that, I don't enjoy working in most places. While it seems "fun is fun" for you, the same fun sucks for me. But I'd suggest that an alternative exists-- you can actually be hilarious without knocking other people down. I think that's a worthy goal.
  - guard-of-terra 15y ago
    Well, neither am I comfortable working with people as fragile as Ming vases. Received autism is not a virtue. Some people seem to be honing their internal conflict and blaming it on people whose jokes (or anything, really) touched it accidentally. A person without serious internal conflict would not be hurt by a mild nerd humor. Hate there isn't, just some reflection on the awkwardness of human existence.
    - pingswept 15y ago
      Agreed that we should strive to be less fragile. I think Jon Postel put it well in RFC 793: "TCP implementations will follow a general principle of robustness: be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others." http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc793#page-13 http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc793#page-13
- wpietri 15y ago
  Your notion of what's funny is sadly impoverished. But even within that context, there's a line between saying something funnily negative that the person can take and saying something that hurts them. If you've attempted a joke that fell flat because it was hurtful, then the problem isn't the target being too thin-skinned; the problem is you having poor judgment (or a taste for cruelty).
strix_varius 15y ago
There's definitely an overlap between funny jokes and 'sexual' jokes. The OP seems to have a hair trigger for 'sexist,' to the point where I suspect her co-workers weren't sad to see her leave.
- pingswept 15y ago
  I don't think that the examples given in the blog post are examples of a "hair trigger." For one, it's repeated behavior; even a small annoyance is worse when repeated for years. If I were one of her male coworkers, and I had to watch that kind of behavior continually, I would quit. I want my coworkers to be able to do their jobs without being tormented. Also, I think you're missing the distinction between sexual jokes and sexist jokes. There are plenty of funny sexual jokes. There are even plenty of sexist jokes that the joke-teller finds funny. That opinion is not shared by the butt of the joke, and that makes them crappy jokes.

crusso 15y ago

> Do you think there's a conflict between sexism and fun? As in, "Well, I'd like to stop making sexist jokes, but then it would be so boring here." I would phrase it, "If everyone's humor had to be bland Disney G-rated fare, then a lot of fun would have been sucked out of our work environment."

jamesaguilar 15y ago
There's plenty of R-rated humor that's not degrading to women.
pingswept 15y ago
I think you should revise your perception of what is being gained by sexist humor. It seems that you get some good laughs out of it-- no problem for you. For the people on the other side of the joke, it's not fun. From what Katie Cunningham writes, it's so unbearable that she's on the verge of leaving the profession she loves. With that understanding of the situation, sexist jokes lose their humor, at least for me.
- crusso 15y ago
  >I think you should revise your perception of what is being gained by sexist humor. It seems that you get some good laughs out of it-- no problem for you. Where did I defend sexist humor? I think that Katie Cunningham is putting up with some nonsense and she should take direct action. My question to Katie was just regarding the line between humor and offense and how she drew a distinction? She apparently didn't get offended and answered me quite frankly. There's really no need for you to jump in and mischaracterize my position. Lots of white knights in this thread that she doesn't really seem to need to take care of her.
  - pingswept 15y ago
    I agree that there's no need for mischaracterization, but there is a need for people to jump in and say what they think. I'll try to explain why I thought you were defending sexist humor. This is the line that made me think you were defending sexist humor: "I would be sad if my relationship with my coworkers couldn't handle, let alone thrive upon, humorous interactions." Maybe you meant non-sexist humor that erroneously came across as sexist?
strix_varius 15y ago
Agreed.
sophacles 15y ago
There is a lot of humor to be had that is both appropriate and not G-rated. Humorous personal stories about awkward situations or odd situations, jokes about things that happened to people on the team (like the time susan brought the server down, or bob's ridiculous obsession with 80s pop), movie references, sexual innuendo (thats what s/he said is usually not sexist), political jokes, topical news jokes, and on and on. I'm so sure you are going to come back with some "blah blah politically correct blah blah" disingenuity, I will adress it now: No, it's not all about PC and rules and whatnot, it's about genuine respect. Making comments and jokes centered on a person which aren't about that person, but about their membership in a class is generally not cool. It's called othering (and sometimes objectification). Othering is exclusionary, and a good joke for the target (but sometimes a good joke to the in-crowd, it solidifies their superiority!). Basically most jokes are OK, if they don't hinge on "and that's why that group is inferior and different from us".

jberryman 15y ago

Completely agree. As a man witnessing the slightly sexist crap, and watching women have to sort of jokingly deflect it, is just incredibly uncomfortable. And the "joking" is never funny. I'm going to be better at calling that shit out from now on.

guard-of-terra 15y ago

Well, male coworkers pick on each other all the time. Even when they have absolutely no incentive to hurt, once there's an awkward situation and they can say something smart - they'll fire. Most if nor all of humor revolves around something bad happening to someone. That's what funny. (In normal workplace setting women are actually shielded from that friendly fire because men don't feel as comfortable/can't predict what's OK and what's not) You want jokes, you have to acquire certain skin thickness. If you don't, then I don't want to work with you. Fun is fun.

pingswept 15y ago
I agree with your description of how humor typically happens, and because of that, I don't enjoy working in most places. While it seems "fun is fun" for you, the same fun sucks for me. But I'd suggest that an alternative exists-- you can actually be hilarious without knocking other people down. I think that's a worthy goal.
- guard-of-terra 15y ago
  Well, neither am I comfortable working with people as fragile as Ming vases. Received autism is not a virtue. Some people seem to be honing their internal conflict and blaming it on people whose jokes (or anything, really) touched it accidentally. A person without serious internal conflict would not be hurt by a mild nerd humor. Hate there isn't, just some reflection on the awkwardness of human existence.
  - pingswept 15y ago
    Agreed that we should strive to be less fragile. I think Jon Postel put it well in RFC 793: "TCP implementations will follow a general principle of robustness: be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others." http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc793#page-13 http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc793#page-13
wpietri 15y ago
Your notion of what's funny is sadly impoverished. But even within that context, there's a line between saying something funnily negative that the person can take and saying something that hurts them. If you've attempted a joke that fell flat because it was hurtful, then the problem isn't the target being too thin-skinned; the problem is you having poor judgment (or a taste for cruelty).

strix_varius 15y ago

There's definitely an overlap between funny jokes and 'sexual' jokes. The OP seems to have a hair trigger for 'sexist,' to the point where I suspect her co-workers weren't sad to see her leave.

pingswept 15y ago
I don't think that the examples given in the blog post are examples of a "hair trigger." For one, it's repeated behavior; even a small annoyance is worse when repeated for years. If I were one of her male coworkers, and I had to watch that kind of behavior continually, I would quit. I want my coworkers to be able to do their jobs without being tormented. Also, I think you're missing the distinction between sexual jokes and sexist jokes. There are plenty of funny sexual jokes. There are even plenty of sexist jokes that the joke-teller finds funny. That opinion is not shared by the butt of the joke, and that makes them crappy jokes.