[...]I think that one of the strongest effects of culture on the human psyche is to shape the narratives that we use to dissect the world. These narratives give me a lens for interpreting what happens to me. I, as a western woman, am likely to interpret my choices from an individualistic perspective. I decide things. I make them happen. In Invitations to Love: Literacy, Love Letters, and Social Change in Nepal, Laura Ahearn discusses the ways in which Nepali women will talk around the concept of agency[...]

Most people, when feeling, don’t stop to think “but wait, what about the intersection of race, class, and gender!” We feel what we feel. If (say) I call a woman a bitch in an argument, and she asks me “how would it make you feel if I called you a mean name right now?”, my empathic reaction does not need to understand the differences of history and context and power to come up with the answer “It would make me feel bad. I just made you feel bad. Shit, I’m sorry.”

You’re describing a personal interaction, not a mass media message. People who are encoding mass media messages *do* have to work with finer instruments than “mean name” versus “not mean name.”

The problem isn’t that my feelings are hurt when a woman on TV is shallowly depicted as enjoying a rape. The problem is that this shallow depiction plays into a common construction of women as rapable, and of rape as okay, or even loving. That conception is part of our cultural narrative, the narrative which makes it more possible for a teenage boy to rape a teenage girl and see it as a compliment, or as loving, or whatever other bullshit excuse it is.

And these are the kinds of places where uninformed role-reversals go wrong. *I* wouldn’t mind it if lots of random girls grabbed my butt, so why is she complaining about the acceptance of sexual harrassment against women in my script? And etc.

You’re trying to condense a bunch of different types of behaviors, Robert. Name calling =/= physical act, neither of which is equal to media narratives or depictions of name calling or physical acts. The original comment was about media depictions. These cannot be appropriately governed with the rudimentary rules you present for navigating name-calling in personal relationships.

I also worry that just “reversing the sexes” in any situation can be just as easily used to justify a lack of empathy (”If I was in that situation, I wouldn’t think it was a big deal, so why is she whining so much?”).

Right. I think the reversal can be useful as a tool to spur empathy, but like the golden rule, it’s often more useful to ask not ‘how would I want to be treated were I in their circumstances’, but rather ‘how do they want to be treated?”

—Myca

Do you think Lucy meant the same to women, Myca? Made them expect less of themselves?

Sorry, CJ, missed your question until now.

I tend to agree with Mandolin in her comment #9 in that I Love Lucy both reinforced and subverted the traditional narrative . . . I guess the Simpsons might be an example on the other side. That is, both shows present an essentially sexist narrative, but do so in such a way that they simultaneously undermine it.

I think part of the difficulty in coming up with a female ‘equivalent’ for this sort of thing has to do with the lack of female-based sit-coms on television . . . which, once again, is also sexism. If we need to go back to I Love Lucy for an example, I think that tells us something.

Of course, the next most obvious recent example of a popular female-headed sit-com would be Roseanne, which I think deliberately subverted all of this . . . both Roseanne and Dan were the ‘funny one’. Both Roseanne and Dan were ‘the straight man’. Both and neither were incompetent.

—Myca

I also worry that just “reversing the sexes” in any situation can be just as easily used to justify a lack of empathy (”If I was in that situation, I wouldn’t think it was a big deal, so why is she whining so much?”).

Regarding the harms of the main character of something like “Home Improvement,” I actually don’t think the primary harm is men’s hurt feelings; I frankly doubt that most men’s feelings are hurt by that sort of thing, anymore than most women’s feelings are hurt by seeing Julia Louis Dryfus play an incompetent fool in “New Adventures of Old Christine.” (Hey, I just used Julie’s reversal!) But when a stereotype is played out not just in one show, but in many shows, I worry about the role models being sent to the next generation. (This may be especially important in light family sitcoms, which are perhaps more likely to be watched by kids with their parents).

What do you think would be the opposite of this?

And I think she’s correct. If you want to know how someone feels, you have to put yourself in their shoes. Sure, their shoes might not fit you exactly, but you’ll get an idea. The suggested goal is emotional empathy, not analytical precision.

Asking them directly would probably provide better information, but we usually don’t have that option when dealing with things like TV. The producers or writers can’t go out and poll 150 million Americans of the opposite sex.

Most people, when feeling, don’t stop to think “but wait, what about the intersection of race, class, and gender!” We feel what we feel. If (say) I call a woman a bitch in an argument, and she asks me “how would it make you feel if I called you a mean name right now?”, my empathic reaction does not need to understand the differences of history and context and power to come up with the answer “It would make me feel bad. I just made you feel bad. Shit, I’m sorry.”

But that wasn’t the argument. The argument didn’t include an adjustment for history, context, or power. It’s disingenuous of you to suggest it did.

The argument was: “If we see a male being punched on a sitcom by a woman, we should think “What if a female was punched by a male on a sitcom”"

And there’s an obvious difference in the power that a *depiction* of violence against women has in this social context, and the power that a *depiction* of violence against men has in this social context. One can take a stance saying that they’re both wrong, but they aren’t *equal.* Men and women are not cogs which can be swapped in and swapped out, without the situation changing.

You want to argue that people know intuitively how to change the situation to adjust for power, then make that argument. But it isn’t the one on the table.

Yeah, so? We’re all people, and we all hurt. Fine, social mockery against men on TV doesn’t hurt in the same way or as much as social mockery against women. It still hurts, and the reversal of “how would you feel if it was you” is a perfectly appropriate test to apply. People aren’t morons (well, some people, anyway) and can make a cognitive adaptation to recognize whatever differences are relevant. (”Gee, if that happened to me, it would be even worse than it was for you…but it would suck for either of us, and I sympathize with your pain.”)

But we don’t all feel equal pain at equal insults.

Moreover, there’s a difference between a linguistic argument (”bitch” is a loaded term) and a physical act, so I reject your attempt to condense them in the prior comment.

But we all feel the same pain, and we forget that at the peril of our very souls.

If we see a male being punched on a sitcom by a woman, we should think “What if a female was punched by a male on a sitcom”

I think when we buy keyrings and T’shirts that say, “I am a bitch and proud of it”, we should think how it would feel if we saw someone wearing a T-shirt or having a key ring saying the opposite.

That is the best way to see how the other side feels.

I’d be willing to wager that most sitcom watchers are male. Sounds like the world needs some female-oriented sitcoms.

This is hilariously revealing of the dynamic at work on the male buffoon sitcoms: “If we can successfully portray ourselves as idiots in need of someone to take care of us, maybe women will take care of us and not ask anything from us.”

Bad for men AND women.

I think male bufoons are harmless since almost all the other white guys on TV seem to be doing fairly well. And I also don’t know how important stereotypes really are in general.