“I don’t know what it feels like to not be a man, but I do not know what it feels like to have what you’ve accomplished and how you perform not matter because of what you are.”
I’m fat.
I’m fat but this is not about that.
I’m fat and sometimes that’s all I get to be. At a restaurant. On an airplane. At a doctor’s office.
At work. I’m my own comparative study; for nearly a decade I was a college instructor with a high courseload; hundreds of students were giving written evaluations of me almost all of the time. Show me a random sampling, I can probably pinpoint the year of the evaluation.
I’m fat, but I wasn’t yesterday. Yesterday I was not fat but I was the day before. I can determine the year of student comments because Yesterday I was “confident, charismatic, and passionate.”
The day before yesterday I was “overbearing, unsettling, hard to watch.”
I was fortunate at an early age that people treated me as if I were smart. My particular bundle of skills suits the classroom and I had parents who valued what I had to say. So as long as I can recall, no matter what other negative thoughts about me existed in my brain, I always thought I was bright.
And then I got fat. And then, apparently, dull.
I was on the job market for about six months not that long ago; I’ll ask you to accept without proof that the most proficient club in my bag is my in0class demeanor. I got very close to a few tenure-track classroom positions that included multiple rounds of interviews. It did not surprise me that the job for which I got hired was a virtual one, in which the interviews were Skyped from the neck up.
I’m fat. And sometimes, that’s all I get to be.
This is not about that.
I won some money on a game show about a decade ago; I was on multiple episodes and appeared prominently in the credits of the program. Included in the winnings was a trip to ESPN to see how the sausage got made. I had wanted to be a sports analyst since the first time I walked into Candlestick Park with my grandfather and was never able to make that happen; so to have succeeded in a game show on that network and to be invited to sit in on a production of Sportscenter was validating.
I was in the ESPN hallways and passed by a B level anchor who is still with them. He “joked” –
“The cafeteria is that way.”
About an hour I ran into him again. He made the same joke. ‘Cause, you know, double the funny.
I’m fat. And sometimes, that’s all I get to be.
This is not about that. This is about the Oscars.
Celebrities are unsympathetic plaintiffs. Sally Field isn’t a powerful figure in her industry, not really, but she’s not Norma Rae either. You don’t see them as marginalized, as voiceless.
But they sat there, invited to a ceremony that presumably matters to them, to acknowledge that they are, at least for a moment, at the top of their craft, and from the stage they were told that really, all they are is tits.
I don’t think the Oscars are a cathedral; it’s a TV show to celebrate movies. I don’t look for reverence.
But there’s probably some distance between that and saying “hey, ‘member when Jodie Foster did that rape scene based on a true story in the Accused? Tits.”
It’s hard to be funny. If you can find funny, I’m disinclined to tell you to press the delete key. My taste in funny is “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” as opposed to “Modern Family”. I don’t think offensive and funny are inherently incompatible. “Sunny in Philly” did a fat joke for a full season. Sometimes I fast forwarded through those scenes because they made me uncomfortable. I think that’s okay. I wasn’t required to watch and they didn’t invite me to the set.
I’m hawkish on the separation of church and state, particularly when it comes to public schools, and the main reason is the audience is captive. If I’m sitting in 9th grade Biology, hearing that there are “two sides” to the origin of our species, evolution or the Biblical account of creation in Genesis, the problem isn’t the message (I mean, the message is that either (1) the overwhelming weight of the evidence or (2) the one specific type of magical thinking favored by the teacher is the full range of discussion about how we got here, so the message is a problem, and, full disclosure, this isn’t a hypothetical, this was from a Bio class I took, but not in high school – in college, I absolutely had a college Biology professor present evolution as if it were a debate, and that was 1990, before we got dumb), it’s my inability to leave the room. If “I Saw Your Boobs” is on a Family Guy episode, Charlize Theron can just turn the channel, but at the Oscars she had better play along, ‘cause otherwise she’d be called uptight and probably given an even more unflattering anatomical label.
I don’t know what it means to be a “good man” outside of what it means to be a good person, but probably acknowledging that you have a significant degree of structural privilege just by the nature of not being a woman is a good place to start. I’ve spent a good portion of my adult life discounted because of my weight; had I not lived a life where my fluctuating size perfectly correlated to the way I was treated, I don’t know that I’d appreciate that distinction – I don’t know that I’d understand that it doesn’t matter how many graduate degrees you earn or how well you performed on a television show, sometimes all you are is fat.
I don’t know what it feels like to not be a man. Good or otherwise.
But I do not know what it feels like to have what you’ve accomplished and how you perform not matter because of what you are. To be just a thing like all the other things. And that’s what happened at the Oscars Sunday.
Photo–Flickr/CloteeAllochuku
“I don’t know what it means to be a “good man” outside of what it means to be a good person, but probably acknowledging that you have a significant degree of structural privilege just by the nature of not being a woman is a good place to start.”
Fantastic point.
No, it’s a terrible point. Men get privileges in this society. Women get privileges in this society. Men are constantly told to be aware of their privileges. Women are allowed to be completely and utterly oblivious of their privileges. Men are taught to be ashamed of ‘wage gaps’ that don’t exist. Women are taught that the custody of a child is their god-given right. Men are taught that women have to be treated with deference at all times. Women are taught to never worry about consequences, because it’s unlikely that they’ll be held accountable for their actions. Men are well… Read more »
It is a sad day indeed when making fun of millionaires who spend more on dresses to wear for one night than most of us make in a year or ten is placed off limits. It is also disingenuous to argue that on screen cock and on screen breasts are the same thing. A more reasonable analogy would be cock and labia. The Oscars are a venue for the rich and famous to show off assets–physical, monetary, and romantic–that reflect their status and Seth McFarland–gasp!–had the nerve to make fun of some of the untouchables. Boo hoo.
McFarlan is one of those untouchables. A man in a position of privilege making fun of women in a position of privelege. Woop-ti-doo.
He could always sing about Arnie’s “junk” in Terminator….
To be fair, even if Jim Jividen completely missed to point on McFarlane’s boob song, his larger point is still very true (and the boob song actually backs it up). Often people will regard others as if their most obvious feature is their only feature. Any amount of critical thought would reveal that obviously real world humans are going to be 3 dimensional characters with a long list of qualities you’ll never know from your first meeting; however most people don’t like to engage in critical thought when they don’t have to. Actually it may well be genetic, the brain… Read more »
I thought the song was frankly hysterical and obvious that the actors mentioned above, were clearly in on the joke. Agreed only to avoid the risk of being identified as another part of the female anatomy? Oh come on. None of us know how many other performers were invited to be in on the joke, but said no. Seth McFarland did a great job firmly planting his tongue in his cheek. I loved it.
Since when did we all become such easily offended, high minded ween-ettes.
The victimization culture has obviously dumbed down many folks to the point that they cannot seem to get past their reflexive reaction of being offended to look past the surface and determine if there is actually a deeper message for the audience. The commenters here are like those watching Colbert and thinking he is really a hard-right conservative. Ridiculous.
Melonie and Jessica, thanks for maintaining your intellectual abilities!
Jim, freaking awesome piece. These two comments really jumped at me and were incredibly insightful and thoughtful. THANK YOU so much! “If “I Saw Your Boobs” is on a Family Guy episode, Charlize Theron can just turn the channel, but at the Oscars she had better play along, ‘cause otherwise she’d be called uptight and probably given an even more unflattering anatomical label.” “I don’t know what it means to be a “good man” outside of what it means to be a good person, but probably acknowledging that you have a significant degree of structural privilege just by the nature… Read more »
This is poignant, however, I am wondering what people’s feeling are on the fact that the actresses mentioned were in on the joke. The moritified expressions on the actresses during the “Boobs” song were prerecorded (note all the hair, clothing, makeup and people sitting next to them are completely different). Does this make Seth McFarlane’s attempt at comedy more or less offensive? Are the women who participated (Naomi Watts, Charlize Theron and J.Law) hurting women? Are we being sensitive because perhaps some viewers were not perceptiive enough to see that the women who were “embarassed” were clearly acting? Just curious… Read more »
What a great question, Jessica. I struggle with this kind of conflict a lot. My gut reaction is this kind of casual objectification of women is not good, even if the woman agrees to it. But then, I like being objectified by my boyfriend. I like when he looks at my cleavage or my butt, you know? So, is it damaging because Seth McFarlane, while having the women’s consent, created a performance that pretended NOT to have their consent? Thereby pushing forward the idea that objectifying women is okay, even funny, without their consent. That’s how I feel about a… Read more »
Your bf doesn’t objectify you for looking at your butt. I see a major problem with some people using the term too loosely to imply any innocent action, any viewing of a woman’s body parts as objectifying. He has to ACTIVELY see you as an object, not just see you as a sexually attactive human being. Please don’t conflate the term with normal, non-degrading, healthy interactions between humans.
So I finally got around to seeing the Saw Your Boobs. Wow. First off some of those women he was pointing out were not happy (namely Naomi Watts and Charlize Theron). I won’t try to declare that McFarlane was or was not going for satire but I think he missed. That song came off like the song and dance numbers that his Family Guy characters break into sometimes. Why wasn’t the song “We Saw Your Junk”? Because men don’t have to do a full frontal in order to win an award. – Or because a guy’s “junk” is considered a… Read more »
Right look, I don’t mean to be argumentative…but no. The REASON we don’t have a “we saw your junk,” video (except as a YouTube parody) is because men do not need to strip to make in showbiz. Women are expected to get naked in front of the camera, and what’s more that nudity is taken in an entirely different light than it would be were they male. Even when a man does go full frontal in a movie, it isn’t assumed that he’s somehow lost something in some sexual war. A woman shows her breasts and we all laugh at… Read more »
Well at least you didn’t say you don’t mean to come in and just declare that you are right and then condescend to me. Women are expected to get naked in front of the camera, and what’s more that nudity is taken in an entirely different light than it would be were they male. A light that says a guys “junk” shouldn’t be seen. Even when a man does go full frontal in a movie, it isn’t assumed that he’s somehow lost something in some sexual war. Because it’s assumed he’s already lost by being male. That same dynamic just… Read more »
Why shouldn’t a guy’s “junk” be seen? That’s a little unfair. I’m sick of always having to put up with seeing boobs and butts and other naked woman parts in movies. I’m straight. I like dudes. Show. Me. The. Dick. Just saiyan.
From the perspective of a guy that has been on the wrong end of a lot of body image issues I can agree.
“The REASON we don’t have a “we saw your junk,” video (except as a YouTube parody) is because men do not need to strip to make in showbiz. Women are expected to get naked in front of the camera, and what’s more that nudity is taken in an entirely different light than it would be were they male.” Actually very very rarely do you ever see junk at all in movies, boobs however are easily seen as they don’t usually send the censors into a frenzy like a penis or shaven vulva does (they usually wear the “merkin” to cover… Read more »
The thing is, the movie clips that were shown during the song? Nearly every clip of footage shown was from A RAPE SCENE.
Many of the clips show women crying, being vulnerable, maybe being attacked. They showcase the vulnerability that these women feel as they’re being victimized by men. And this dude just waves all that aside to go “lol boobs”.
For me, the only way that’s funny is if it’s laughing at a stereotype of guys.
I only saw the singers, you’re right to be annoyed at the rape scenes. That would be a problem, the song itself though is more light-hearted humor.
It is hilarious how many of you refuse to do the research here.
Those women who reacted badly? They were in on the joke. It was scripted. Their reactions were canned.
All of this has been known for like a week now. The critics simply refuse to acknowledge that.
This is brilliant. Reducing the achievements of female actors to ‘boobs’ is not satire. It’s lazy and not funny. To use The Accused as an example is not only offensive, it’s damaging. It’s refreshing to see decent human beings, of any gender, acknowledge that.
I’m going to disagree here. Does no one understand satire anymore? The point of the song was actually a skewering of an industry that will only award an actress an Oscar for being the best in her craft if she does it nude. We don’t have the same standard for men as actors. But for women to be recognized for achievement, they have to be naked or ugly. Why is everyone taking the song at face value and not examining the industry that sets the standard that it is making fun of? Why wasn’t the song “We Saw Your Junk”?… Read more »
I do think this piece has extemely valid points. But I agree with Melanie. I understand why other people may have found it offensive, but I took it as satire and intentionally in poor taste. Unfortunately for Seth Macfarlane, I think very few people understood it as that, even though I think that’s how he meant it. I’m not afraid to point out clear misogyny or even incidental ingrained misogyny, but in this case I think his bit was meant to criticize the pervasive misogyny that exists in Hollywood, but maybe it wasn’t executed clearly enough (i.e. people don’t get… Read more »
It won’t matter to him one way or the other. 99.999% of all people complaining hated him to begin with.
To be honest, I think the complainers understood the intent perfectly. It’s just that they were looking for an excuse to slam the man. If it wasn’t this, they would have drummed up something else. The professionally aggrieved don’t get paid unless they’re writing angry articles about something.
I just watched the video for the first time. 🙁 I think if his objective was satire, he could have done a much better job. He was trying to shock people by blatantly saying the word boobs over and over again, only alluding to how ridiculous it is that people are so excited about seeing them in movies. He relied a lot on how the word ‘boobs’ sounds funny. Family Guy’s “side boob hour” joke all over again. I don’t like his comedy at all.
Although he did have a nice singing voice.
I agree with Mel. But honestly, people are blowing this out of the water for no reason. It was a joke and a part of an opening sequence to the Oscars by the guy who created Family Guy. FAMILY GUY. It was childish and basically PG for what he could have said… The Onion, “Everyone else seems afraid to say it, but that Quvenzhané Wallis is kind of a c–t, right? #Oscars2013” Woah, too far. Joan Rivers, “The last time a German looked this hot was when they were pushing Jews into ovens.” WTF? Now, that’s offensive, but a musical… Read more »
Agreed, agreed, agreed with Melonie. I am of the firm belief that all nudity in movies is gratuitous. Actresses may be convinced that they’re baring all for art, or you’ll hear them talk about how comfortable they are with their bodies. But I promise there are plenty of men out there (and maybe some women too!) who watched The Accused just to see Jodie Foster’s breasts. I promise. People forget that everything in movies is done intentionally. Meaning that for every time you saw someone naked in a movie, there was a way to shoot that scene that would portray… Read more »
This is wonderful. Thank you.
In fucking deed!
Gorgeous piece.
This is so powerful. I have tears in my eyes. Thank you. You get it.
This is so powerful. I have tears in my eyes. Thank you. You get it. BTW I struggle with weight issues too.