To think women hitting men is not funny

[jm9138]

At the theatre last night with my daughter. Group of teenage school girls (about 20) in front of us clearly on a school trip. I would estimate maybe 70% of audience female.

It was a comedy and very funny. Lots of slapstick. A running joke is that two of the characters are in a relationship with each other. There is a scene where the male in the relationship finds himself accidentally on top of another female character who wraps her legs around him and starts kissing him. In the context it is very funny.

The woman in the relationship walks in on them, pulls him off and punches him in the face so hard he falls over. Everyone screams with laughter. The two women (his girlfriend and the woman he was kissing) then get hold of him as he staggers up and together bang his head on a table knocking him out. Everyone screams with laughter.

AIBU for feeling uncomfortable watching this and seeing lots of young girls laughing at this or is this just a nothing? I have tried to convince myself it is a nothing but I cannot get out of my head that if the genders were reversed it would not even have been considered as a scene. And if that is the case then are we saying it is ok (even funny) to see women beating up a man? If we are then why is that?

This is not a post equating DV between men and women and women and men. I just am genuinely interested as to why I felt this way and whether I am in a minority.

It’s not funny. I don’t know why they laughed.

I mean I can see why they laughed because it was over an hour in and people had been laughing all the way through and so it is just another gag. Amongst the many thoughts I had as I was trying to work out if I am just a killjoy on the long drive home was how would I feel if I was a man who was hit by his female partner and I would be in the audience. But I hate trigger warnings and something can always upset someone because of their experiences I guess.

Not my humour but then again neither was Book of Mormon 😖 worst thing I've ever seen and completely inappropriate.

not funny

Not even slightly

I mean I see your point but I do still find comedy violence funny.

I did enjoy and still do enjoy the comedy violence in the tv show bottom.

And that is male to male violence.

Actual violence is obviously not funny.

This isn't about violence to me, I think that's an unwelcome distraction from what's really going on.

The interesting thing to unpick there for me is "why is this funny to a lot of people?" I think it's important to set aside personal opinion, acknowledge that truth and then examine what it means

I think it's viewed as funny because patriarchy and inequality. The higher status man is humiliated and dominated by the lower status, weaker woman. Comedy, in order to amuse, has to involve some element of exaggeration and/or unbelievably about it. This has both, according to popular social attitudes. Exaggeration is over the top physical violence, and unbelievability is a woman beating up a man. Something that would be considered humiliating and therefore to some extent unreal

None of this represents my views of the real world, it's just my attempt to understand why it's seen as funny. That quite a lot of those who find it funny are women is also worth thinking about, if what I said resonates with you 🤔

A lot of slapstick is violent though. Most of it is physical comedy that would hurt in real life.

Think of Charlie Chaplin type comedy - people turning round holding a plank of wood on their shoulder and smashing the other guy in the face. Falling out of windows and downstairs.

Aiming for the first person who ducks and punching the second person behind in the face.

It's the nature of that kind of comedy. Hitting people isn't funny if it's real but slapstick is suspension of disbelief.

Oh god yes. I saw that with such high hopes and whilst there a couple of good songs I just didn't think it was funny and it just seemed to be aiming so low it was unbelievable.

Yes that is what I was trying to unpick.

I think that is why if it had been just her hitting him (slapping maybe) I would just have laughed along. He wasn't really a high status male in this (in fact she was the high status female in many ways as part of the comedy was other people fancied her and she thought she was better than some of the other women and a bit aloof) and he was completely inoffensive as a character. There were other male characters that were a bit more stereotypically overbearing but he was not one of them.

It was also really unclear why the other woman had hit him. There was no set up of 'this guy is a git and got what was coming to him'. He wasn't a big man either (certainly smaller than the other woman who hit him).

I think you explain why so many thought it funny really well (and to be fair the big bearded man next to me was in guffaws about it) but I just wonder if in this example it isn't quite that, unless the man just represents 'generic man' I guess. Although the 'people think it is unbelievable that women hit a man' got me thinking about the man who might be in the audience who is beaten up by his girlfriend/wife.

Maybe the simple truth is jokes are not funny when they are explained.

@BackITD it's not as binary as that, though. You have to look at every scenario individually and assess why is this funny. That's one of the difference between good and bad physical comedy 🤷‍♂️

Using your argument anything unacceptable normally is fine if you make it over the top and silly. Following that logic sexual assault, rape and many other things are all fine so long as you try to make sure it looks over the top and silly. Clearly no-one thinks that, right?

That is interesting because the other slapstick elements were so over the top and all just silly accidents. (think walking into doors or planks hitting faces). This just felt different because it was more real and sort of what you would expect to see if someone was being beaten up. I think maybe if she had picked up a plank and hit him with it somehow I would have found that funny.

It’s the subversion of the norm. Worm eats bird, cat eats dog etc.

It’s funny because it’s unexpected, the opposite of the usual dynamic. And it’s slapstick. When a man hits a woman and she flies across the room, that’s the violence of the blow. When a woman hits a man, unless she’s an unusually good hitter, he barely moves. So for him to fall over under a blow etc it’s all slapstick jammed up comedy.

Even a woman on each arm isn’t going to move a man that doesn’t want to be moved.

All that said- that’s the theory- and actually it’s not really like that at all. Like women, men get surprised and caught out, Freeze, and are vulnerable too.

So I’m on the fence. I wouldn’t enjoy it, I wouldn’t choose, write or direct it. I don’t entirely blame those who do.

There's a lot of conversation at times (rightly so) about the messages we receive and the cultural climate of how male violence is tolerated or encouraged. Less so about the messages about what's acceptable for female behaviour. What messages was that play sending out about female violence? We are all constantly subject to things on all manner of subjects. Makes sense to question them.

Cannot say anything about the play specifically because have not seen it. Which one was it?

You don't need to keep comparing it with a man hitting a woman to decide whether you think it's appropriate or not. If you think it was inappropriate and not funny, that's enough, surely? All this business about if the 'genders' were reversed is just a false equivalence and creates a 'poor men' narrative that is so often used to distract from the issue of male violence against women and girls.

How many comedys can you think of where the joke is a man hitting a woman though?

So because the man is less likely to die its ok to hit him?
Moronic post

Punch and Judy?

Sounds like a weird play and difficult to say if it's funny without seeing it.

Not sure why you want to use this particular scene to make a general point about women hitting men other than to try and get a load of dreary old toss answers along the lines of "what if the roles were reversed? Wouldn't you all be whingeing then?" - although actually the difference is that when roles are reversed men end up killing women. Or uploading footage to pissing porn sites.

No it's not funny. But it's not as simple as 'if the genders were reversed' due to the history of male power and the power they hold today. However that doesn't render something like this funny. I would find it grim.

I had to turn off Bridgerton because I was so appalled about how they framed what was essentially rape of a male character.. like it was OK in the context.
So I certainly do not think violence of any type against women equates directly with violence against men.. so I'd never say 'if the genders were reversed' but that doesn't mean I think violence against men by women is acceptable.. certainly not funny!
And it just feeds into general misogyny that women are so feeble that any violence they commit is just hilarious and silly..

He wasn't really a high status male in this (in fact she was the high status female in many ways as part of the comedy was other people fancied her and she thought she was better than some of the other women and a bit aloof)

Sounds like something an incel would say.

The assumption is that women's violence is ineffectual and funny - a demonstration of her lack of composure and outrageous behaviour and a cautionary tale about how weak men are castrated by over-emotional women.

I agree - it's not funny but I think you are mistaken if you think men are the only butt of this joke.

Yea @jm9138 I think things like someone holding a plank, turning and knocking someone to the ground is generally playing on the notion of incompetence, that could apply to any sex or ethnicity, or at least appears to if you take it at face value. I think examination of appearance and behaviours can reveal links to various beliefs, but they're subtler. Nothing about performance art is done "just because", a lot of thought goes into every detail

I'm blown away by the few things I've read explaining seemingly unimportant details about some films

How many comedys can you think of where the joke is a man hitting a woman though?

It happens in slapstick. Lots of examples, here's one:

Not many, because despite the fact a lot of men do it, it's still a taboo amongst them with most being reluctant to demonstrate anything but outrage at the idea of harming the weaker beings they believe they should protect, so there really wouldn't be the audience who would openly laugh at it. Interestingly, this doesn't extend to sexual assault, where there is a long history in slapstick of men 'hilariously' groping, chasing, snatching the clothes off and otherwise forcing themselves on young women.

Horrible I agree