From: dgross@zeus.calpoly.edu (Dave Gross)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Offensive Jokes
Date: 10 Oct 1992 19:53:32 GMT
Organization: Manumission:  The Campus Men's Forum
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: remarque.berkeley.edu
Originator: muffy@remarque.berkeley.edu

In article <1992Oct6.172605.25758@panix.com> mara@panix.COM (Mara Chibnik) writes:
>In <1992Sep30.203548.144919@zeus.calpoly.edu> dgross@zeus.calpoly.edu wrote:
>  >(A quoted anecdote):
>  >>In a company-wide meeting, the vice president of our division made a
>  >>remark that was sexist and bordering on sexual harassment.  When some
>  >>people hissed, he expressed surprise at the negative reaction.
>
>We have no information about the person at whom the remark was
>directed, but note that it was a *large* ("company-wide") meeting.
>If we accept the anecdote as accurate, which I certainly do for the
>purpose of the argument, a person in a position of power targeted
>someone (an employee?  It isn't clear) for harassment in front of
>the assembled company.

	First off, you are holding this anecdote to a much lower
	standard than mine.  "a remark that was sexist and bordering
	on sexual harassment" is translated by you to "target[ing]
	someone for harassment in front of the assembled company."
	My reading of the anecdote doesn't suggest that this
	interpretation is any more likely than one which says that
	the vice-president made some comment that was not directed
	at any specific employee but was about women in the
	abstract.  As you well know, such behavior IS considered
	sexual harassment these days.  (e.g. when someone puts up
	a centerfold at work and the company is then sued for sexual
	harassment, the argument is NOT that the pinup was a
	picture of a naked employee, but of a naked woman, and
	therefore is offensive to women in general)

>Dave's example-- to show that the street runs both ways-- is this:
> >	I'm in the women's studies minor at Cal Poly.  One quarter, I
> >	was taking a WS class, and the professor would occasionally
> >	start the class with a joke.  These jokes usually targeted
> >	men, and on a couple of occasions the jokes were very
> >	offensive.  One I remember was about a flasher who asked a
> >	woman "Well, what do you think?" and she responded, "It looks
> >	like a penis, only smaller..."
>
>Now, it may be that the teacher managed more seriously offensive
>jokes than this one, but it's not my example, it's Dave's.
>A flasher is someone who tries to get attention by exposing his
>penis in public.  The behavior is generally considered out of line;
>I consider it so and I assume that Dave does too.  (He doesn't say
>otherwise.)  It's an infantile way of getting attention, and of
>exercising power.

	Disingenuous, to say the least.  You can analyze the joke
	all you want and remark that hey, it doesn't target "men"
	at all, just "male flashers with small penises."  But it
	doesn't wash.  If the vice-president from the previous
	anecdote had addressed his company, starting his remarks
	with a joke about a prostitute that ended with the punch-
	line, "Are those boobs or ballast, honey?" I can imagine
	employees considering it sexual harassment.  If Clarence
	Thomas had said such a thing, for instance, you can bet
	it would have been presented that way at the hearings.
	The joke, of course, is not about women in general, but
	only about prostitutes with saggy breasts.  But you get
	the point, I'm sure, that telling such a joke in a company
	meeting (or a classroom) would be considered offensive
	to women.  Honestly, what would your reaction have been
	if my anecdote had been about a male professor telling
	the "boobs or ballast" joke to start off his freshman
	English class?  What if you knew he regularly started off
	class with a joke that had a woman as the dupe?

-- 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- dgross@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
"I claim that rape exists any time sexual intercourse occurs when it has not
 been initiated by the woman, out of her own genuine affection and desire."
		-- Robin Morgan, current editor of Ms. Magazine, in 1974


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