Parental Advisory

[venta]

Does anyone know anything about The Vagina Monologues ?

I'd been told, by people who I'd regard as reliable, that they were extremely funny. Last night, I accidentally found a performance on the telly. The 2 minutes I watched seemed to consist entirely of a woman explaining how she'd "reclaimed" the word cunt, and then repeatedly saying it in different silly voices.

Which the audience seemed to find hilarious. Which I found incomprehensible. It's not like I found it offensive, it just... wasn't funny.

[One Notional Kudos Point to anyone who realises why I suddenly remembered about this :) ]

Comments

Re: Next time I shall have to be more clear...

[condign.livejournal.com]

Depends on the strength of the taboo: over here there's still a stronger taboo on 'cunt' than in a lot of places. Reminds me of one time I was having dinner with my high school girlfriend's family. They were from South Africa, having left the country in disapproval of apartheid. (You can imagine those dinnertime conversations, they being politically active and I being even more right-wing than I am now.)

I burnt my hand while cooking for them, and let out a startled, 'Oh BUGGER.' I'd only heard the word twice, in a movie, and had no idea the concept to which the word was related. (Indeed, I think I'd concluded it had something to do with insects.) They both looked at me like I'd done something horrible to the food.

On the other hand, in the US 'cunt' wouldn't have half so derogatory value (or indeed, reclamtory value) as 'pussy,' which is used in similar situations. Call a Chicago gang-banger a 'cunt' and he might look at you quizzically (though thanks to the internet and MTV, perhaps not), but call him a pussy and you'll get a reaction.

Re: Next time I shall have to be more clear...

[floralaetifica.livejournal.com]

Call a Chicago gang-banger a 'cunt' and he might look at you quizzically (though thanks to the internet and MTV, perhaps not), but call him a pussy and you'll get a reaction.
But that's because in recent years 'pussy' has come to have overtones of homosexuality, which Chicago gang-bangers want to avoid at all costs. It's not because pussy is generally a more offensive word. Interestingly I would say that it demonstrates contempt for women on two levels - the obvious one to do with the secondary meaning of the word, and a less obvious one because to call someone a 'pussy' (in Chicago) is to imply that they are a bit feminine, that they fill a stereotypically feminine role, and if the worst thing that one man can think of to say to another is that he is like a woman then I'd say that's about as sexist as you can get!