They Used to Call Me Snow White . . . But I Drifted: Women’s Strategic Use of Humor

6. "It's Hard to Be Funny When You Have to Be Clean": Sexual Differences in Humor Appreciation/ Differences in Sexual Humor Appreciation

6 "Itfs Hard to Be Funny When You Have to Be Clean" Sexual Differences in Humor Appreciation/Differences in Sexual Humor Appreciation Are You a Man or a Woman? Send Stamped, Self-addressed Envelopefor Answer Nicole Hollander, whose "Sylvia" cartoon series is widely syndicated , has drawn a two-frame summary of the differences between what men and women find funny. The first frame shows, simply, a clipboard with the phrase "Gender Differences in Humor" written across it. The second frame shows us Sylvia. Sylvia is, of course, in the bathtub, her hair wrapped in a turban; the perpetual cigarette dangles from her lips as she hits the keys, having conveniently located her typewriter on a board across the bathtub. Sylvia, that mistress of logic, has devised a quiz to settle all questions of sexuality. "Are you a man or a woman?" she asks. "Check the things you find funny: 1. Larry, Moe, and Curly. 2. Men dressed as women, but with their hairy legs showing. 3. The disparity between the ideal and the real." She then instructs us to enclose a stamped, self-addressed envelope 145 146 • They Used to Call Me Snow White for the results. By taking the differences in humor as a definition of gender, Hollander exaggerates but nevertheless illustrates the way in which our differences inform our responses. But what are some of the reasons why men and women find different things funny? Help! Why Don't I Laugh at Benny Hill? When I lived in England, I was shown The Benny Hill Show the way visitors to the Tibetan mountains would be shown footprints of the abominable snowman—given the near impossibility that such a thing actually existed, proof was necessary. I watched my first Benny Hill openmouthed and unlaughing. I saw my first episode with a group of medical students in the hospital canteen, and they kept turning to me to see whether I was finally going to giggle, wanting me to appreciate the absurd —but to their eyes lovable—skits. I wanted to laugh too, especially since my date had been the one to suggest the idea that I would be the one American to find Benny Hill funny and so redeem a national reputation. He was counting on me. He was looking at me the way a gambler looks at a greyhound at the starting gate, uncertain but hopeful. One of the problems was that I'd already given them a whole routine about women who faked their laughter. My boyfriend was pretty much in tune with my reactions—even if I could pass in front of his friends, he'd know if I was not really enjoying myself. It's nearly impossible , as we all know, to let go under pressure, but for me it was totally impossible to laugh at Benny Hill. Now, I was always the first one to laugh at any and all Monty Python sketches, even the one where the grotesquely fat man explodes in the restaurant after eating too much ("Have a mint, sir? It's only wafer thin"). I liked The Life of Brian. I loved Rowen Atkinson, and had even smiled through a theater evening of No Sex Please, We're British when somebody else paid for the tickets. All of this was evidence enough that I was capable "It's Hard to Be Funny" • 147 of laughing when something was funny and proof that I was even willing to be a good enough cultural ambassador to laugh when I knew I was really meant to. But laugh at Benny Hill? Big-bosomed women in halter tops bending over melons while the shopkeeper made comments about firmness and ripeness? Men dressed as schoolgirls bending over a desk to be hit by a big-bosomed teacher who holds an enormous ruler? Jokes about using garter belts as dental floss? None of the women had more than two or three lines. They were represented by their body parts, like chickens in the supermarket, all breasts and thighs. The sophistication level of the dialogue made the book Truly Tasteless Jokes read like P. G. Wodehouse. It just wasn't funny. Like Queen Victoria, I was not amused. I tried to be, but I wasn't. When I asked a woman friend in the group who was clearly enjoying herself whether she really liked the show, she unhesitatingly replied yes. She liked it because it was...