Who’s allowed to make lesbian jokes?
November 23rd, 2009
Everyone has heard jokes that negatively stereotype lesbians, writes Eddie Acorn Edmondson. Lesbians move in on the first date. Lesbians are dungareed fashion disasters. Lesbians – despite being sport crazy - are overweight. Lesbians like nothing better than styling their hair like that ‘lady off of the horse racing’ (Claire Balding). And, my favourite: Lesbians hate men.
Stereotypes are sweeping generalisations about groups of people and are sometimes based on a grain of truth. Some lesbians are indeed overweight, others do like wearing dungarees. Whether lesbians do or do not follow these stark generalisations is not the issue.
The real question is: who’s allowed to tell these sorts of stereotypical jokes? Can gay men make jokes about lesbians? Can a straight women? Behind closed doors these jokes are perceived to be harmless enough bits of banter, but what happens when these jokes seep into mainstream media and are broadcast as the ‘norm’? Should we lighten up about these sorts of ‘harmless’ jokes?
For an example of such a ‘harmless’ joke, look no further than Graham Norton. After showing a picture of women in jumpsuits on his show in September 2009, Graham commented “I don’t know why they’ve got some lesbian to be the model for this.” When challenged by his guest that the woman might not be a lesbian, he made a joke about the model’s ‘lesbian’ hair.
The comment received complaints from viewers, and the complaints were upheld on the grounds that Norton ‘perpetuated a negative stereotype.’ This type of joke is certainly not the first, nor, last time Norton will crack a joke like this. In this instance, should we not just smirk and understand that Norton is part of our community and no offence was meant?
Peter Lloyd, news editor of Gay Times and Pink Paper thinks that this kind of humour is sometimes expressed by the gay community but it is certainly not a serious issue. “When you have people that are part of a sub-group, there’s a certain freedom of expression within that so it’s much easier to make comedic references about other people within that community because it’s much safer,” he explains.
Lucy Masoud from website Love Girls disagrees with this opinion and describes “All this in-fighting means we are not fighting together for things that are important.” The problem is identifying when a joke moves from being a joke, to becoming something that is offensive and damaging to a community.
A more serious case off lesbophobia featured on a BBC3 program entitled ‘The Most Annoying People of 2008′ (broadcast in December 2008). The program included comments from a BBC DJ who described lesbians as ‘munters’ and said female Hollywood superstars should be ‘saved’ for heterosexual men.
In an article for Diva magazine, Jane Czyzselska wrote that this sort of negative stereotyping creates “repetitive negative messages about ourselves…” which are “likely to contribute to low self-esteem.” Czyzselska even goes as far to attribute these repeated negative stereotypes (used by gay men and hetrosexuals in media) as a reason for “increased incidence of mental health issues among lesbians.”
But surely generalisations such as Czyzselska’s merely treat the audience as a thoughtless mass – as though by being exposed to something enough times on television we will believe it. ‘Lesbians having low self esteem because of what some bloke says off of the TV’ is not one view that I personally agree with. Of course, some women will be affected by these sorts of comments. But it will be a minority, not all.
No matter who is making jibes about who, negative stereotypes about lesbians are rife in media and society. Lesbophobia is alive and real - the comments made on ‘Most annoying people of 2008′ are certainly vile and grossly offensive. Perhaps it is more acceptable for people within the gay community to make jokes about one another in media, as Peter Lloyd suggests; however, when these jokes are received by bigoted straight audiences is the good natured meaning lost? Can these types of representations really create low self esteem in lesbians? We will never really know.
Stereotypes and put-downs are something that will always be used, the trick is realising when something has gone too far. Balancing what is a damaging negative comment and just a ‘fun’ put-down is near impossible. But, let’s be sensible about it. Let’s not be stereotyped as humourless lesbians as well.
I think the issue is not so much the lesbian jokes, (though BBC3 one was disgusting) but rather the lack of balanced representation.
When lesbians are not widly represented in the media these negative jokes become the only depiction of our community. I think if there were more positive representations of lesbians in the media I would have accepted my sexuality a lot sooner.
These jokes are okay within our community because we have enough positive examples of lesbians to know that they are just jokes based on stereotypes. When they seep into wider society however the lack of positive representation means they can have a more negative effect. Ignorance after all often leads to homophobia.
Jess ∼ November 23rd, 2009 11:11 amI agree: The lack of representation is boardering on ridiculous. It’s hard to find any sort of role model. I think we should be able to laugh at ourselves though, and norton making a joke is fine by me - I bet he’s had a fair few from us!
draft ∼ November 23rd, 2009 9:53 pmI think that the key point here, as Claire rightly points out, is ‘identifying when a joke moves from being a joke, to becoming something that is offensive and damaging to a community’.
interested ∼ November 24th, 2009 5:09 pmNorton is a homosexual man and not a homosexual woman, which essentially means that he is not part of the community that he is stereotyping. If he were part of that community one would expect that he would engender some of the stereotypical attributes that are mentioned: dungarees, being overweight and a particular kind of hair-style. The fact that Norton doesn’t engender these stereotypes isn’t because they only apply to a minority of lesbians but because Norton is not a lesbian. Therefore, he is permitted to stereotype gay women, with their consent under the protection of the term ‘gay community’.
The idea of consent is also an interesting one here. At which point was Norton permitted to perpetuate negative stereotypes of gay women in front of his guest, the live audience and to the nation? I am not implying that the playful satirizing of particular traits within particular social groups is wrong; however, Norton not only makes these comments from outside of the lesbian community but to a social demographic outside of the gay community. This doesn’t’ appear to be ‘freedom of expression’ within a ‘sub-group’ (as Peter Lloyd interestingly terms his own community). Is this not Norton appropriating homophobic language in order to ingratiate himself with a heterosexual audience?
Chances are that this was an off the cuff remark that warrants little of the attention that it gets. However, it is extremely dangerous to condone socially harmful stereotyping from particular persons and not others, when those remarks are clearly not made playfully from within. Gay women would do better to align themselves with women of other sexual orientations in order to stand against seemingly socially acceptable misogyny.
I agree, to an extent, with interested.
I do believe that we do condone certain jokes from certain people, depending on where they stand in society.
However, someone an example like Chris Lilly (creater of Summer heights High) Stereotypes, sends up and humiliates teachers, disabled people, Tonga’s, young people, gay people. This is acceptable? Why? I think it is. I think his series is hilarious and not damaging. It uses negative stereotypes and sends them up and the sophisticated viewer understnad this.
I don’t understand the difference between this, and graeme norton cracking an age old joke, that a sophisticated audience will understand.
I think the divide between gay men and lesbians is a real shame and jokes will always be shared - do we belittle the audience as a mass and assume that they do not understand the playful use of the stereotypes in his joke? Or, play to the masses, who have a little giggle at the negative stereotyping of the lesbian, but, who ultimately understand that lesbians aren’t like this.
Ramble over.
draft ∼ November 25th, 2009 6:17 pmThe trouble is, draft, is that this “sophisiticated audience” is a lot smaller than you seem to think. Most of the people I know do not “ultimately understand that lesbians are not like this”. I don’t think I can count the times when I’ve been told I “didn’t look like a lesbian” because of hairlength or dress or similar. To me at least, it seems the majority of the audience believe all the stereotypes as if they are law.
Plus, pray tell where the sophistication was in Norton’s “lawl, dyke!” comment?
Eth ∼ November 28th, 2009 12:53 pmAnd these homophobes are making a tv series about the lives of lesbians, ripping off a community project.
Emma ∼ January 29th, 2010 6:22 pm