A Comedy of Influence.

Rush Limbaugh has been in the news again as of late. I try to ignore it and hope it’ll go away, but it doesn’t. Rush said some pretty grotesque things on air a minute ago (surprise!!) that pissed a lot of people off (surprise, again!!), and he's been losing sponsors, largely via demand from people who don't enjoy hatespeech. From the right, some folks are pulling at #StopRush-style protest on Jon Stewart, and suggesting that Bill Maher was being inappropriate when he called what’s her face from Alaska a cunt. I’d just like to put this out there as food for thought: Jon Stewart and Bill Maher are comedians. Jon Stewart is an actor. While I enjoy their programs very much, they are political comedy programs. The key word being comedy.

Let us Google the definition of “comedy,” shall we??


com•e•dy/ˈkämədē/
Noun: Professional entertainment consisting of jokes and satirical sketches, intended to make an audience laugh.
A movie, play, or broadcast program intended to make an audience laugh.


I picked the first available listing, but most of us can probably agree that the above is a reasonable overview of what comedy means. Now that we have that established, that Jon Stewart and Bill Maher are the hosts of comedy shows, meant to entertain an audience and make people laugh.

Let us now Google Jon Stewart, Bill Maher, and Rush Limbaugh to see what their job descriptions are. I’m using Wikipedia. Deal with it.

*a-hem*

Jon Stewart: “American political satirist, writer, television host, actor, media critic and stand-up comedian.”

Bill Maher: “American stand-up comedian, television host, political commentator, author, and actor. Before his current role as the host of HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher, Maher hosted a similar late-night talk show called Politically Incorrect originally on Comedy Central and later on ABC.”

Rush Limbaugh: “American radio talk show host, political commentator, an opinion leader of American conservatives particularly influential in matters affecting the Republican Party.”

Okay, so as defined by popular culture, Stewart and Maher are funny whereas Limbaugh is influential and an opinion leader. Am I really the only one who sees a difference between a stand-up comedian, even one that I think is hilarious, and someone who is supposed to be in a position of power, influencing people’s opinions?? I mean, come on. I quote George Carlin, Lewis Black and Margaret Cho a lot, but I rarely hear them being lauded as leaders of influence. Do you??

I don’t always agree with Bill Maher, but to the best of my knowledge he called that Plain woman a cunt in a stand-up comedy show. Rush Limbaugh went on his show, as an influential opinion leader and went off on Sandra Fluke. And there’s call from the right that liberals hate free speech because we didn’t like that and said so, loudly. We could get into the whole “hate speech is not free speech” debate, but then we’d be here all day. I suggest that before anyone else stands up and demands the boycott of Stewart and Maher, learn the difference between “influence” and satire.

But that’s just one woman’s opinion.

Boobfeeding as Controversy.

I’m going to come out on a subject that’s been around for a long time but seems to be making (yet another) resurgence in the news right now: breastfeeding. If you do it in public, you’re disgusting, and if you don’t do it at all, you’re irresponsible. Or at least that’s what I’m gathering. When I chose not to breastfeed my daughter, a lot of people criticized me, and they weren’t very nice about it. I stand here today to say that I made the right decision. I lost my pregnancy weight in 2 weeks (I shit you not) and went on to lose another 20 lbs in the following six months. It sounds like a pregnant woman’s dream, but it was another year before I found out why: I had PPD, and when some women get that depressed, they don’t eat. I wasn’t getting enough nutrition for myself, let alone another person. Imagine that. A young mother making a choice for her damn self that was good and things worked out okay. And if you do choose to breastfeed your child, which society seems to have joined some militant chapter of the La Leche League, you’d better do it in the privacy of your own home.

What.

The.

HELL??

A gal can’t win no matter what choice she makes.

So, ladies, I say FUCK ‘EM. I’m tired of hearing everyone else’s opinion on the subject. They’ve come for our vaginas AND our boobs. It’s time to either punch some throats or just say that: FUCK ‘EM.