BBC comedy panels and Jason Manford's criticism

[LastOneDancing]

Sorry if this has been discussed but I was interested in feminist views on this.
independent article

Is JM right? Should it have just been done by the BBC & not made public? Is the move a good one or a meaningless gesture?

Is JM getting involved appropriate, and is it a help or a hindrance?

I am slowly learning about femenism (through MN) and what it means for me but I am an absolute beginner at analysing things like this and these are all genuine questions which have popped into my head.

They'd have had to make it public, else someone would have leaked it.

Besides, one woman on every comedy panel is not equality.

Victoria Coren Mitchell wrote a piece about female comedians when that rule was introduced and said "Too often, productions translate "at least one per show" into "one per show"."

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jul/27/female-comics-tv-comedy-tours-katy-brand

Article above, for some reason I could only paste one thing per post!

I think because it's only one it does feel tokenism and he's right..she'll be sitting there feeling like "I've been brought in because a vagina was needed".

It would have been better if they came up with a target through out the season of 50% representation. There will be times when certain comedians are available and they mix well together and are all male.

Annd there will be shock fucking awe times when actually a group of hilarious women are available and no men are needed. But one person, how is that equality?

While they are at it, they could try and make sure people of colour people with disabilities are proportionally represented.

And if their casting person really can't find a 2 or three funny women for their show they aren't very good at their jobs. So sack that fucker.

What Groundhog said. Possibly with more swearing

This was mentioned ages ago on an episode of QI. They had 3 women on it (as many as they could i guess without sacking Fry or Davies) and they mentioned that there was a cut off. I can't remember what it was off the top of my head but I think it was about a third i.e. you never see more than 33% of a panel being women...and often yes, more often than not it's just one.

I just nodded along in agreement with the Katy Brand article, every word of it

The News Quiz on Radio 4 seems to have a good representation of female and male, although I haven't kept stats. Plus they have the excellent Sandi Toksvig as host.
If they can do it, why not all?

Good article by VCM.

I think he's right that announcing it was unnecessary. QI has been increasing the female panalists for a while but didn't make a big deal of it. as a PP said, The News Quiz manages it. And then Mock the Week has its token woman each week and it's just not as good.

And agree 50% over a series would be better. Then they could have all male weeks and weeks that were mainly female (because apart from The News Quiz which panel show has female regulars?) and it would be interesting to see if the nature of the show changed as a result.

I think that either Sandi Toksvig asked for the change, or someone on her team did, because I can't remember the News Quiz being anything other than 50/50 since she took over.

"Besides, one woman on every comedy panel is not equality."

Tokenism isn't equality either. When women are put into positions purely because they're women, I'd say that that was sexism.

Equality is when everyone is where they are on based on their merits.

So do you think male comics are just better, go wether?

Because that's the logical conclusion of what you are saying, that female comics simply don't merit being there.

And did you read the linked article about how being given a chance on TV means you hone your skills for the comedy clubs, and vice versa? How do you know how good any aspiring talent is, if they don't have a showcase?

I read another article months ago from a radio producer, I can't remember what he produced, but probably also on Radio 4. He made a conscious choice to have one woman and one man, and one wildcard who could be anyone (I seem to remember, I might be wrong on the wildcard) when they were finding people for whatever his show was, and he felt that it improved the quality - that otherwise people got lazy and just booked what was easy, whereas actually having to go out and search for people who fitted these simple criteria led to unexpected discussions and a more interesting show.

It sometimes feels like toddlers eating their veg. Yes, they should consider the food on its merits, and eat an equal quantity of the pie and the veg, but in practise, unless you require them to eat the carrots until it becomes a habit, they'll just eat the pastry.

"When women are put into positions purely because they're women, I'd say that that was sexism. "

When men are put into positions purely because they're men, that's just because men are simply better.