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

3. Putting a Punch in Your Punch Line: Strategies for Dealing with Aggressive Humor

Putting a Punch in Tour Punch Line Strategiesfor Dealing with Aggressive Humor When a man looks you in the eye after telling you an offensive and not even particularly funny story, and says, "It was only a joke," what he is really saying, according to Joanna Russ, is '7 find jokes about you funny. Why don't you find jokes about you funny?" He might be genuinely puzzled. He might believe that the phrase "It was only a joke" means he can say anything and get away with it—a carte blanche for bad taste or hostility, a sort of "007" for offensive behavior. One thing is clear: very few jokes are "only" jokes. Most of them are emblems of larger issues, which is the reason it is important to see their social and psychological function. We should also remember that even the "No, that's a weewee " jokes that make men bite their lower lip and drop their hands quickly can't hold a candle to the conflagration of antiwomen jokes we've all heard from the cradle onward. The idea of humor-as-disguised-hostility is one of the reasons women have for so long been told they themselves can't laugh at a good 71 72 - They Used to Call Me Snow White joke: we've been hearing the underlying hostility of those jokes and have often been unable or unwilling to overcome our distress . It's difficult to hear the "funny part" when what you're really hearing is an attack. "It's only a joke" is an indirect accusation that we don't like to laugh at hostile jokes directed at groups of which we are part. There are three ways aggression and humor can work together : Aggression in humor can be directed at you, it can be deflected by you, or it can be directed by you. Women's humor directs some of its most powerful material at men, questioning their authority and indicating a certain amount of aggression, but studies have shown that men's humor is much more hostile than women's. What strategies do we have for dealing with such humor? The Booby-Trap Joke: Aggression Toward You During the second week of my first job, I was having a chickensalad sandwich in the official "old boys" lunchroom where the senior members of my department regularly gathered, rather like a herd around a kill. I was the only woman in the group, the only person under fifty, and the only new kid on the block. As you might imagine, being the new kid, I was eager to be accepted and liked, happy to be among these gentlemen, pleased to be listening to their talk, although I was not enormously eager to add to it myself. A pleasant, friendly atmosphere was then suddenly and subtly altered when one of the oldest, most respected of them started telling what he would have called an "off-color joke"—a joke with an obviously sexual innuendo. The men all listened and laughed, and I gritted my teeth, not sure how to respond. Do I laugh along—do I complain? This was clearly a test, whether or not it was stated as such, of my position in this group. The joke was undoubtedly offensive to women. I sat with a quiet smile and raised eyebrows, miserably Putting a Punch in Your Punch Line • 73 unsure of what to do until the joke teller turned to me and with a sweetly paternalistic edge to his voice apologized for "telling a dirty joke in front of a lady." The rest of the group waited, sandwiches held aloft and poised in mid-bite, for my response. Although I had been uncertain until that moment about how I should handle the situation, once he made the comment I knew what to say. I looked him in the eye and smiled broadly. "In fact, you did not tell a dirty joke in front of a lady," I replied in my most kindly professional tone, "you just told a dirty joke to a lady. Big difference." The rest of the group now laughed with me and at their respected colleague, and the tension in the room noticeably decreased. We all finished our food quite happily and had our coffee. On the way back to the office I was congratulated several times, with obvious sincerity, on my handling of the situation...