I Smell a Rant: Were the Oscars Really Sexist? or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Take a Joke


By: Heather Seebach

I have tried to avoid the controversy surrounding the Oscars for the past two days, but I just cannot hold my irritation in anymore. The uproar over all this is WAY funnier than anything MacFarlane said on Sunday night. Here is a summary of the controversial moments:


Look, I totally understand why people wanna punch Seth MacFarlane is his stupid, smug face, I get it! The last funny thing he made was Family Guy in its infancy - since then it has sunk into nothing but lame "Remember the time when...?" jokes and forced pop culture references. I knew all along this Oscar ceremony would be ASS, and it should have come as a surprise to nobody that his jokes were crude. But this uber-feminist backlash is ridiculous. 

So he sang about actresses' boobs - BIG FUCKING DEAL. Unfunny though it may be, it is still a joke. People seem to conveniently forget it was part of a larger bit wherein Seth was shown an alternate reality where he sang a horrible sexist song and ruined the Oscars. So the objective of the joke was to offend, people. Is this really a new concept? Have you ever watched ANYTHING Trey Parker and Matt Stone have touched? What about "Springtime for Hitler"?


Today I learned of this Tumblr which is a response to the song: http://wesawyourjunk.tumblr.com/. How is that ANY different from Seth's song? If you truly consider his behavior sexist, why direct it right back at all those actors? Since when does sexism only work one way? And how many cock jokes has Michael Fassbender had to endure at every movie event since Shame came out? He doesn't cry that he's being oppressed, he laughs along because it's a FUCKING JOKE.

I know many women were particularly offended by the fact that some of the boob scenes mentioned were rape scenes. Again, those people are missing the point, which was to make the song as distasteful and offensive as possible. Speaking of people not being able to take a fucking joke, this happened: 
  
In case you live under a rock, The Onion is a satire publication. Listen carefully: This. Is. A. JOKE. And a pretty funny one, I thought. See, she's this adorable, sweet little girl that nobody could possibly find fault with, and see what the Onion did here was use they used the opposite word to describe her than you'd expect! Hence, satire! Crazy! Replace Wallis' name with a puppy and maybe you can follow along without getting too wrapped up in feminist bullshit. 

This New Yorker article even goes so far as to call the red carpet ceremony sexist. One reason is Kristin Chenoweth, whom the author implies is not as "human-looking" as Hugh Jackman's wife. So now we're blaming the beautiful lady in the nice dress for being too much like what is "asked of women." /facepalm


So, aside from the boob song, other bits that pissed everyone off:

- The joke about Quvenzhané Wallis being too young for George Clooney. Not an invitation for statutory rape, you idiots, just the usual rag on Clooney for dating younger women.  

- Oh my god, someone cracked a joke about Chris Brown hitting Rhianna for the BILLIONTH time. Is it tasteless? Absolutely, but by no means an indication that Seth or the Oscar producers condone what Brown did.

- Seth saying it doesn't matter what Salma Hayek says because she's attractive. Guess what? He also included Javier Bardem in that joke, but apparently nobody noticed. 

In summary, it wasn't a particularly good ceremony, and Seth MacFarlane remains as unfunny as ever. But this huge outcry over it being misogynist is bullshit. It does not hinder women, or discriminate against them, it's just humor. Poor, unfunny humor perhaps, but still humor. And the more people get butt-hurt over it, the more they become targets for it. This reaction is exactly why Seth and comedians like him continue to thrive on this brand of comedy. Want him to stop? Stop giving a shit, and watch comedy that is on your sensitivity level (try CBS).
 


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