Is Woman Face offensive?

[Sunflowersforever]

Saw two interesting stories today. One on the revisionist work around the Apu character in the Simpsons; and one on the human Ken Doll Rodrigo Alves dressed up as a woman.

This has got me thinking.

With the strong British history of men dressing as women (panto, Dick Emery etc) is it time to say that, no, dressing up as a woman is offensive now just as 'blacking up' would be? If we challenged the black and white minstrel show, why is it ok for Ken Doll (his term) to do this?

Women are routinely treated as second best and suffer violence and discrimination on a scale unheard of for most groups, so why is it funny or acceptable for men to dress as women?

I found Dick Emery and the like baffling as a child, I couldn't understand why it was considered funny. The laughs were at him doing an exaggerated catwalk type walk and falling off his shoes. What was that laughing at?

I don't understand why the Mammy character more recently is considered so funny?

Melissa McCarthy playing what’shisname?

I think some of this does depend on your sense of humour. Someone mentioned Hinge and Bracket, which I did like. So much of comedy acting is caricature.
Where do we draw the line?

I keep telling him how deeply offensive it is, but he just keeps going.

Yawn. Jog on.

Don't feed!

sorry!

It's quite a British thing I suppose, this whole men portrayed women in a comedy caricature way. Apart from Dame Edna, and the Sean Spicer (think that was it) not sure if other countries do this as much.

I do wonder, with all the peak trans interest, if we will look back with wonder at how accommodating everyone was to 'woman face'.

Lots more women are playing men these days. It's maybe not televised but there's a lot of it on the fringe. 'Drag Kings' like Lucy Jane Parkinson aka Louis Cypher and the Pecs collective, plus the likes of Zoe Coombs Marr, a comedian who performs some shows as a male character. I think some of their portrayals of men are negative, because they are designed as feminist critique of patriarchy, but some aren't.

I have always struggled with the notion that man in dress = hilarious because the reason it's funny is because it's so ludicrous to think of a man lowering himself to being 'like a woman'.

I'd forgotten about Kathy playing Kevin and his mate. I haven't seen/ heard of the other women playing men.

Kathy played Kevin’s friend, Perry.

@MoChan the point you make about how it's funny because it's a man lowering himself to be a woman rings true. It isn't like Cate Blanchett being Bob Dylan, which was challenging and empowering.

athingthateveryoneneeds Ian McEwan explained it well:

“Girls can wear jeans and cut their hair short and wear shirts and boots because it's okay to be a boy; for girls it's like promotion. But for a boy to look like a girl is degrading, according to you, because secretly you believe that being a girl is degrading.”

fruitlovingmonkey exactly.

“I can't think of any women playing comedy male characters.”

French and Saunders had several male characters.

I have always struggled with the notion that man in dress = hilarious because the reason it's funny is because it's so ludicrous to think of a man lowering himself to being 'like a woman'.

Yes this is exactly how I feel.

I think it can be a bit offensive when it feels like they're caricaturing women - I mean not seriously, but just makes me a bit uncomfortable.

When I watched "The Danish Girl" I really didn't like it, because I felt that Ed Redmayne was mincing about. Almost like he was doing an impression of a woman. I don't see many actual women mincing around like that, saying "am I pretty?" Perhaps that was the point.

I never found Dick Emery, Les Dawson etc funny as a kid, perhaps just personal taste though. Lily Savage (and other similar drag acts) were great characters, well performed and such a parody that I never felt they were meant to be actual women. However, the Ru Paul variety of drag artists make me feel more uncomfortable - I think there has been some debate about Ru Paul not wanting trans identified men taking part, which kicked up quite a storm.

The images of trans identified men that we tend to see are either exceptionally glam and hyper-sexualised, or men who simply would never pass as a woman - ever. For me, claiming to genuinely be the opposite sex is appropriation of the worst kind. My own trans child (ftm) cannot see the irony in lecturing me on how offensive it is to wear a sombrero if you're not Mexican or for a white person to have dreadlocks...

I have always struggled with the notion that man in dress = hilarious because the reason it's funny is because it's so ludicrous to think of a man lowering himself to being 'like a woman'

I don't have particularly strong feelings one way or another. I don't however think of it as a man lowering himself.

In the context of the RuPaul/ Courtney Act type of acts I can't see any element of lowering or ridicule. They are creating ultra- glamourous fantasy figures. They don't pretend it is easy- far from it- and I don't think their style of drag is remotely a gold bar standard which women are expected to achieve.

In the context of the Les Dawson, Mrs Brown style acts I'm struggling to see this as "lowering themselves " their either. I don't find that type of act remotely funny but the joke is surely that they look so unconvincing as women- they are trying terribly hard and failing.

Tbh I find the talk of "lowering themselves" a bit problematic. I doubt that the actors/ entertainers themselves think of it that way. Is this society seeing men as lowering themselves or a certain type of feminist mindset which thinks society sees this as lowering themselves?

So far as the human Ken Doll- he looks made of plastic in either gender.

*“I can't think of any women playing comedy male characters.”

French and Saunders had several male characters.*

My first thought.

Catherine Tate played Male characters didn't she?

Janette Krankie.

Not comedy but you get "trouser roles" in opera written for contraltos and mezzo sopranos.e.g Cherubino in The Marriage of Figaro, the Composer in Ariadne auf Naxos Octavian in Der Rosenkavalier and Arsace inSemiramide

It's ver interesting.

When we have vocal public figures such as Owen Jones warning about being on the wrong side of history, maybe we already are. I wonder if he has ever dressed up in drag?

I think it's really obvious which of the drag artists are misogynists and who are not. That is what makes the difference for me. I could watch Lily Savage, or Dame Edna or numerous panto dames, and be entertained, their portrayals, for me, were done within a context of actually liking real women. Some of the other drag acts I've seen, eg. On Rupal's drag race, are horrible caricatures being created by men who really dislike women.

I think we know when we see contempt for women, even when it's dressed up as comedy / entertainment.

It doesn't bother me - a) because I've normally found drag queens and transvestites to be ok human beings b) because it's mickey-taking in both directions : not just parodying women but mocking the men's inability to really look like women. Certainly that's true of pantomime dames - a point rubbed in by the fact that the sexiest thing on stage is never the man dressed as a woman, but the woman dressed as a man!