As a stand-up comedian, I incessantly spew out my most vulnerable, passionate opinions about gender, anxieties, politics, and the philosophy behind Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Recently I was ranting about sexual objectification, just to get a workout going, and one of my friends said, “Just calm down, you’re overreacting.” They were trying to make me feel better, attempting to placate me (and weirdly, not with bunnies). But I wanted to feel my emotions, at their full radioactive strength level. It’s painful to be told the intensity of your emotions is invalid. Every time I talk about objectification and misogyny, it seems like someone kindly tells me to calm down. My least favorite piece of misogyny this week is the dismissal of emotions.
I hate being told to calm down about misogyny. I do not think I need to calm down about misogyny! That’s just one difference between misogyny and kittens pretending to read books. I react strongly to being shamed for my sensitivity and feelings, because when I hear “your emotions are inappropriate” it sounds like “your existence is inappropriate. Feel shame for that.”
In an article a few years ago, Yashar Ali wrote, “Gaslighting is a term often used by mental health professionals (I am not one) to describe manipulative behavior used to confuse people into thinking their reactions are so far off base that they’re crazy… And this is the sort of emotional manipulation that feeds an epidemic in our country, an epidemic that defines women as crazy, irrational, overly sensitive, unhinged. This epidemic helps fuel the idea that women need only the slightest provocation to unleash their (crazy) emotions. It’s patently false and unfair.”
One time I was in Seattle at a comedy show, and a woman in the audience left in tears after a comedian did a joke about “bigger girls.” Some of the other comedians attempted to dismiss her as crazy, which would absolve some guilt. “She was overreacting, wasn’t she? She was wrong to cry, right?” No! She felt a strong emotion, and if that vigor was uncomfortable for them, too bad! Emotions don’t have to be comfortable because emotions are not bathrobes. They’re bath towels tied around our necks like capes!
Whenever someone says to “calm down” about misogyny, I’m like, oh your wizard powers are working in reverse! Try rewiring that unicorn hair. I can handle my feelings; you cannot handle my feelings. Also, I bet there are other people out there with similar feelings about sexism. That doesn’t make us weak—that makes us passionate. If we allow ourselves to be silenced, we won’t be happier, we’ll just feel guilt for our emotions. And guilt doesn’t help anyone, except Julio, the monster who eats guilt.
We are human beings and we have feelings and while they might not all be strictly logical and rational, nothing is. We are entitled to feel whatever we want and we deserve to feel our emotions as strongly as we want, because that’s what it means to be alive, to be a person. Sometimes it’s amazing and sometimes it hurts, but that’s because we’re full awake alive people. I’m not saying people who contribute to gaslighting are bad people. I’m just saying, if you’re a victim of this, please know that you’re not alone and that you are right to be upset or delighted, or a rainbow, or a bear, or a minotaur, or even—gasp—a woman. And if you do feel attacked for some reason by the strength of my passion, well, calm down, sweetheart, I’m just overreacting. That has been my least favorite piece of misogyny this week, tune in next week to see where this tortoiseshell brick road leads!
MY.DEAR.SWEET.LORD.SHUT.UP.
(For some reason, a hyperlink was added to my text. It leads nowhere. Like this post.)
Blabby, how dare you! I for one look forward to each new post in this series contrived of unfunny but quirky-for-quirky sake non-sequitors intermixed with non-critical observations of perceived injustices suffered by a white female member of the creative class in the pacific northwest in her 20s.
Have you considered that people aren’t telling you that your emotions aren’t invalid, but that the manner in which you choose to express your emotions is making them feel uncomfortable?
Not everything is about you. You somehow think that it is perfectly fine to make those around you feel uncomfortable, but when they tell you that you’re making them feel uncomfortable, they’re inappropriate for making you feel uncomfortable. You can’t get it both ways.
If you don’t like Barb’s column stop reading it. Or better yet, keep telling her to “shut up” and “stop being selfish” because that’s precisely the kind of whack putting-women-in-their-place that necessitates this kind of weekly column, for which I am thankful.
Hey, we are just expressing our emotions and its our right to be troubled that this unfunny column now appears to be a regular thing.
In other words, don’t tell me I can’t be a minotaur or a shoe, or a golden wombat (see, this sort of writing is not funny)!
What’s your favorite piece of misogyny this week?
You were ranting and your friends told you to shut up. Big freakin deal. Keep it up though, otherwise your friends will have to find a new reason to talk shit behind your back. Oh yes, they do talk shit.
my my, all these privileged men do seem to have taken quite a bit of offense to this column.
“I don’t like it so it must not be good”. Someone should tell them to calm down.
In misogyny this week that is honestly impactful; the state governments in North Carolina and Texas have been working on enacting laws that dramatically limit women’s reproductive health rights.
http://www.texastribune.org/2013/07/12/tex…
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/12/us/north…
Other more pernicious misogyny this week, it was revealed that the California Department of Corrections forced at least 148 women to get sterilized.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/0…
Graham:
No one is going to read those if you don’t include at least one kitten or unicorn reference. C’mon.
Meanwhile, one of the bravest people on the planet, 16 year old Malala Yousafzai addressed the UN today. I hope no one told her to “calm down” because I couldn’t bear it if such a young person suffered the evil that is American comedy club misogyny.
While it would seem the provided links address a more severe grade of misogyny, your entire post is a well-crafted red herring. It is a canard to suppose that the article writer’s claims are invalid because they are not to your personal standards or that the article writer is incapable of caring about her topic as well as the topics of your links. Nice concern trolling though.
@Tim Burr: Myself and many other people have already clearly addressed most of the supposed aspects of the author’s claim at a misogynist act against her (namely that a friend asked her to cool it when she started ranting at them). No one really seems to be claiming that her experiences are invalid or that misogyny isn’t a real thing; just that the piece as presented doesn’t really hold water.
Perhaps if she had spent more time examining the methods with which women’s voices are systemically silenced throughout the media and also in inter-personal communications (the anecdote about the comedy club was a good start; then there’d be some juice for the squeeze. I want these discussions and arguments to happen; fuck, they desperately need to happen. But when the arguments being made are so poorly constructed, it makes the over-arching narrative of the need for feminism look bad.
Sometimes I wonder why we don’t have more female commenters, and then I look at comment threads like these and I say, “Ohhhhhhhhh. Okay.”
Thank you, Barbara, this was a helpful and pleasant article to read. Sorry there are so many douchebags in the world! And that they all read your column!
Barbara, you rule. Keep writing this column. Wm. Steven Humphrey, please keep supporting this column. Lady commenters in the HOUSE.
the men that commented above negatively about Barbara are dicks. Barbara is an amazing voice not just in the comedy scene, but in the world at large. Women are silenced. It’s no joke. I’m also a female Portland Comic… and it ain’t easy. People are prejudiced against women, and scared of the sacred feminine divinity they don’t understand. They don’t wanna hear woman be funny or have voices at ALL, and definitely can’t deal with a sexually confident woman who is unafraid and unwilling to suck their patriarchal cocks. Even though female comics are hilarious. People also shun and silence disabled people, and anybody they are scared of or don’t want to see. (like old people). This is BECAUSE THEY ARE DICKS. I hope they end up sucking and choking on their own dicks. and that karma fucks em up the ass. BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHHHA -fuckalicious
I’m giving you a bunny of empowerment: http://dailybunny.org/2013/07/11/bunny-loo…
@Babygorilla Why do these entitled feminazis even bother to complain about anything in their own lives when there is stuff going on in Afghanistan that is, like, considerably worse? The only time white women should get a say on IMPORTANT ISSUES is when they are presuming to speak for brown women or anyone else whose life might be construed as sadder than theirs, according to the official heirarchy of injustice.
Holm – if this rant was what you were told to calm down about by your friend — they were right.
Listen to them.
And listen to Graham, maybe he can help you write an actual article about misogyny.
@babygorilla, Malala is indeed a hero and an inspiration to us all.
Jesus, shut up and make me goddamn sammich already!
All this bickering is really making me hungry.
Thanks for this Barbara.
The lesson: If this column offends you, learn to own your feelings, not attack the person making you uncomfortable.
Guys: just calm down, you’re overreacting.
I don’t think that the comics dismissing the woman for running out was “gaslighting,” she was already gone before the next comic hit the stage. I’d wager it had more to do with the tumultuous task of managing the audience, basically saying “it’s okay, it’s funny, this is comedy. Don’t get bent outta shape, these are jokes,” and keeping the show going. The last thing you’d want in that scenario is to have everyone’s rhythm staggered by an audience outburst.
Why did Joss Whedon include a picture of you in his tweet about your act? Is that misogyny?
“the sacred feminine divinity” == awesome lolz
@william. You have no ability to discern how may of the commenters here are of the female variety. You’re being sexist.
@william. You have no ability to discern how may of the commenters here are of the female variety. You’re being sexist.
AHHH, I see… I’m guilty of the dreaded “reverse sexism.” You really got me there! I hereby apologize to every man who has ever existed. We’ve all had it soooo rough! Women could learn a thing or two about suffering from us, right, fellas?