To think This Is Going To Hurt is awful to women?

[justanoldhack]

Watching the show and can't help but shake a really uncomfortable feeling that its writer just...really doesn't like women.

I get that doctors are super overstretched, so tired, giving the job everything at the expense of their personal lives. I also get that it's a 'comedy' and not real, although it is based on his true life experiences.

But the way the women are portrayed as silly, a nuisance, stupid, battleaxes, or simply a vessel that 'covers his pubes in blood'... feels so off. These are women at one of the most vulnerable moments in their lives, but they're just props, the butt of the jokes. I can't shake the feeling that Adam Kay really, really doesn't like women. Definitely does not respect them.

Thanks goodness, I guess, that he's not longer practicing medicine. And not surprised either to learn that when he was younger he wrote 'comedy' songs about babies with Down's Syndrome and women from the North.

Yes, that's why Kay is being given a few pass to make cheap jokes about how stupid he finds women

But he doesn't do that. He's writing about people. Some people do stupid things - women aren't immune to that.

@DePfeffoff

Yes, that's why Kay is being given a few pass to make cheap jokes about how stupid he finds women

But he doesn't do that. He's writing about people. Some people do stupid things - women aren't immune to that.

Exactly this

I think it’s fair to examine things carefully, as let’s face it, there’s plenty of low-level / normalised misogyny about, but I just can’t see any evidence that this was an example if it

For anyone wondering whether Adam Kay is a misogynist irl, here's a song he wrote with his "comedy" partner Suman Biswas about northern women.

"This is a national service announcement for all men
If you go to Bolton
If you go to Manchester
Or crewe
Newcastle, or Scarborough
York, or Scunthorp, Bradford, Barnsley too
Or Grimsby
Listen up to what we have to say
Northern birds are lazy ugly whores who smell of burgers
So don't have too much to drink
Or you might fuck one
And end up getting aids
There's nothing fun
To be found off the M1
Northern birds are lower class
Slags who take it up the arse
They're in the sack
After one cider and black
But they're fucking awful rides
and your dick won't touch the sides
Da-da-da-da-da-da
Da-da-da-da
Northern Birds
Da-da-da-da-da
If you really have to
Go up north then follow our advice
Fight away the women
Or you'll find yourself with Pubic lice
And herpes
Your much better staying in the South
Northern Birds
Are desperate ugly hippos dressed in Burberry
With a peanut for a brain
And an accent that makes you want to die
Now you've been warned
They're all physically deformed
Northern birds
Are all obese
And they're riddled with disease
Try to escape
Northern sex is worse than rape
Stay down south and mark my words
Stear well clear of northern birds
Northern birds
Northern birds"

Seems like a lovely chap with absolutely no issues regarding women.

To be absolutely clear and in context.. that song is to the tune of 'More Than Words'...

It is clearly a 'offend as many people as you can' pisstake, written by students. It isn't particularly clever, but nor is it grade A evidence that Kay is an evil misogynist (I mean... none of that can be his personal experience now can it)...

Or is it fair to judge EVERYONE on the planet, based on what they thought was funny when they were in their early 20's.

The fact they (because Kay did not write that on his own!) wrote some pretty crude offensive songs back then really doesn't prove this TV show is full of misogyny.

I know I've changed a smidgen since then, there were things I said and did I certainly wouldn't do now. Shall I decide not to write a book now, because I said something really fucking offensive in 2004? Because I know I definitely did.

@widdlindiddlin Thanks for your insightful analysis. I had no idea it was an "offend as many people as you can pisstake"! I thought it was a completely serious attempt at art
And it's to the tune of More Than Words? Well that changes literally nothing everything!

Personally I don't think it's a coincidence that a man who wrote a song mocking and dehumanising women also wrote a bestselling book that mocked and dehumanised women, leading to a TV series in which women in intensely vulnerable situations are repeatedly made the butt of jokes.

But that's just me.

It was a complete piss take!

You haven’t watched the TV series, have you @anEnglishTERFinBerlin?

Absolutely she didn’t

@anEnglishTERFinBerlin

For anyone wondering whether Adam Kay is a misogynist irl, here's a song he wrote with his "comedy" partner Suman Biswas about northern women.

"This is a national service announcement for all men
If you go to Bolton
If you go to Manchester
Or crewe
Newcastle, or Scarborough
York, or Scunthorp, Bradford, Barnsley too
Or Grimsby
Listen up to what we have to say
Northern birds are lazy ugly whores who smell of burgers
So don't have too much to drink
Or you might fuck one
And end up getting aids
There's nothing fun
To be found off the M1
Northern birds are lower class
Slags who take it up the arse
They're in the sack
After one cider and black
But they're fucking awful rides
and your dick won't touch the sides
Da-da-da-da-da-da
Da-da-da-da
Northern Birds
Da-da-da-da-da
If you really have to
Go up north then follow our advice
Fight away the women
Or you'll find yourself with Pubic lice
And herpes
Your much better staying in the South
Northern Birds
Are desperate ugly hippos dressed in Burberry
With a peanut for a brain
And an accent that makes you want to die
Now you've been warned
They're all physically deformed
Northern birds
Are all obese
And they're riddled with disease
Try to escape
Northern sex is worse than rape
Stay down south and mark my words
Stear well clear of northern birds
Northern birds
Northern birds"

Seems like a lovely chap with absolutely no issues regarding women.

Wasn't that a parody of West End Girls by the Pet Shop Boys?

I read this during the first lockdown. I felt iffy about it but haven't thought about it really but since Ive just had my first baby, I really hate it and what he said about women now!

@Theluggage15

That’s a fucking awful poem. And once punched his wife in the face but he loved his mum!

yes, i wonder how a woman would have written such a poem. might be a bit different maybe. he's trying to make a point about not generalising, nobody's perfect etc, but, but...

just heard i think it was a GP on LBC saying this tv show is so realistic, he views it as almost a documentary.
was talking about the lack of doctors; he said no wonder, the conditions are dire, as this portrays.
not sure what to make of that.

so if someone is actually trying, intending to offend as many people as possible, then we should not be offended by it, because he was so clever as to have succeeded in that ? ??
i must be very old.

it still does not commend it to me.

Doctors are Olympic champions at complaining about their working conditions. Maybe Adam Kay just didn’t have enough of a vocation to cut it and didn’t really want to be a doctor but mummy and daddy pushed him into it? As Shakespeare wrote “No profit grows where is no pleasure ta'en: In brief, sir, study what you most affect”.
That “poem” is beyond the pale. It shows hatred and contempt of women, poor people, northerners all in one fell swoop.

@alexdgr8 I think pps are getting confused about 'Poem' by Simon Armitage, Poet Laureate, and the lyrics of Northern Birds which Kay and Biswas wrote when they were students, inspired by Tom Lehrer. TL was a Harvard Maths professor with a sideline in writing new lyrics to different types of traditional popular songs.

Pp quoted the Armitage poem because the series brought it to mind. It was in the GCSE Anthology 20 odd years ago. Used to generate some vg class discussion. I'd guess a fair few of my pupils had witnessed DV. Are you saying that it's misogynist of S.A. to have written it?

I don't know the context of Northern Birds. For all I know, based on Tom Lehrer's comedy style, they were satirising the sort of rah rah public school halfwits who'd be obnoxious enough to come out with those opinions. Similarly, the trisomy song isn't mocking the Down's syndrome baby but the sort of woman who no doubt turned up at his clinic thinking she could put off having babies till she'd pursued her career or had her fill of a child-free life. Kay and Biswas were 19? 20? Clumsy and insensitive and, yes, enjoying the shock value, like Ben Elton, or Ricky Gervase, but not really a hanging offence.

Like the series, this whole subject is a lot more nuanced than ' man criticises woman = misogynist. Won't watch it.'

I heard the GP on LBC. He represents GPs on the GMC. He mentioned the AK series and said it should be thought of as a documentary because he recognised it as an attack on those who've let the NHS get in such a horrific state that there's a serious problem in recruiting and retaining GPs. My copy of the paperback ends with an open letter to Jeremy Hunt.

Please don't put people off watching it. It's an important message. They can make up their own minds.

[quote anEnglishTERFinBerlin]@widdlindiddlin Thanks for your insightful analysis. I had no idea it was an "offend as many people as you can pisstake"! I thought it was a completely serious attempt at art
And it's to the tune of More Than Words? Well that changes literally nothing everything!

Personally I don't think it's a coincidence that a man who wrote a song mocking and dehumanising women also wrote a bestselling book that mocked and dehumanised women, leading to a TV series in which women in intensely vulnerable situations are repeatedly made the butt of jokes.

But that's just me.[/quote]
Oh you do like to pick apart other peoples words and mock them, but no one else is apparently permitted to do same with people whose opinions and ideas they disagree with are they?

I pointed out its to a tune, words to fit 'northern birds' scans the same as 'more than words'. Lots of people have got the wrong end of the stick confusing parody song writing with poetry.

20 years ago I wrote a disgusting parody of Dolly Parton's '9 to 5', but that doesn't mean I can't do my job well today, nor does it mean I am the same person I was then.

Evidently you've always been exactly as you are now eh.

I don't think the book did mock and dehumanise women, it mocked some, disagreed with some, painted a grim picture of some... men and women alike.

Ditto the show - was the drunken happy twat pissing in the corner NOT a mockery of a certain type of bloke? Or the bullish, bullying twat of a consultant?

Both consultants in fact were bullies in the TV series, one was nicer to Shruti than the other but they were both pretty awful people - but thats ok because they mostly bullied Adam?

Adams mother is cold, hard, rude and disinterested, but thats ok because she's a woman right?

Even poor Shruti, pressured from her parents, her exams, Adam, patients, consultants... found herself bullying the person below her, being harsh on patients, leaving the guy who asked for a date hanging around for hours...

I highly doubt you've watched it though.

Theres SO many more levels to it than 'its misogyny writ large' and 'adam kay is a cunt'.

Theres SO many more levels to it than 'its misogyny writ large' and 'adam kay is a cunt'.

There may be but that doesn't mean that it isn't misogynistic or that Adam Kay can't be a cunt. Cardiac Arrest it isn't, much as it tries to emulate it. (and yes I've listened to his interviews both before the book and the tv series, listened to the adaptations of the book, read the book and watched the two episodes broadcast of the tv series - I still think he is a misogynistic arsehole).

It actually disturbs me how people (including women) will excuse such blatant and damaging misogyny.

“He’s only telling the truth”
“He doesn’t hate women, he hates PEOPLE who just happen to be women”
“He was just a student having a laugh”
“NHS workers have dark humour donchknow” my sister is an A&E nurse and she would NEVER be as vile as Adam Kay is.

If he was being racist, there wouldn’t be these excuses, so why is it always OK to be hateful towards women and we just have to put up with it and laugh along?

@Ionlydomassiveones have you read the book?

I’m amazed people miss the misogyny in it.

I’ll ask you this - is it ok if he was racist and talking about ‘idiot black people’?

Also which women in his books were idiots please? It just seemed to me they were women having babies and wanting the best experience possible.

There are genuinely heinous things going on in society right now that are grossly misogynistic - this book is not one of them

I don’t think you understand how misogynistic cultures work. It isn’t because of people shouting the words l HATE WOMEN - it’s the subtle things we accept, popular culture, literature, everyday sexism that we don’t question because it’s not so overtly sexist. But it weaves into our narrative and out every day, and all of it is damaging.

Also which women in his books were idiots please?

Well there was the racist one who threw sharps at him - going to defend her? Or the one who decided to trim her own labia - is that a sensible thing to do?

@Blossomtoes oh so we ARE horrified by racism but not misogyny

I wouldn’t call someone who self harms and has MH issues an idiot, no. Would you?

Try harder

Yes, I would actually. She was attempting to make her vulva look like those she’d seen in porn. Frankly I have very little sympathy. But you’ve made up your closed mind and won’t be shifted so it’s pointless wasting words on you.

You don’t sympathise with someone who self harms due to deep rooted misogyny in our culture that says genitalia has to be perfect?

Pardon me if I don’t take posts from you seriously then, I don’t engage with woman haters

I don’t think you understand how misogynistic cultures work. It isn’t because of people shouting the words l HATE WOMEN - it’s the subtle things we accept, popular culture, literature, everyday sexism that we don’t question because it’s not so overtly sexist. But it weaves into our narrative and out every day, and all of it is damaging

How condescending 😂 That’s right, anyone who has a difference of opinion simply doesn’t understand, they’re just a little bit basic, that’s all.

The fact is, there is not definitive evidence in the book of misogyny (or at least no one has presented any yet that I’ve seen - and I read the book when it first came out). Clearly there is some stuff in there - stories about patients etc. - that lead some people to question whether the author is misogynistic. But it’s speculative. Had he worked in male genito-urinary ward, presumably his anecdotes about patients wouldn’t have featured many women at all. Perhaps we’d be discussing whether he is a misandrist (and perhaps not, because misandry is not an issue this society suffers with in the same way as misogyny).

Fair enough if you believe the way patients are portrayed to be motivated by misogyny, that’s your opinion, you’re entitled to it. But pretty lame to write off anyone who does not hold the same opinion as uneducated and lacking any concept of the insidious ways systemic cultures work.