“Seth MacFarlane made a whole bunch of sexist, reductive jokes at the Oscars last night. It's frustrating enough to know that 77 percent of Academy voters are male. Or to watch 30 men and 9 women collect awards last night. But MacFarlane's boob song, the needless sexualization of a little girl, and the relentless commentary about how women look reinforced, over and over, that women somehow don't belong. They matter only insofar as they are beautiful or naked, or preferably both. This wasn't an awards ceremony so much as a black-tie celebration of the straight white male gaze. MacFarlane's opening musical number, "We Saw Your Boobs," might as well have been a siren blaring, "This isn't for you." Come on, everyone likes boobs, right? No. The answer is no. They're not something I hate, and heck, I have a pair to call my own, and yet my takeaway from The Accused was not "Finally, I've seen Jodie Foster's breasts." My lasting memory of Boys Don't Cry is not "Hey, free breasts!" At least there was that super timely and relevant reference to Kate Winslet's many nude scenes. Jeez, the song was a joke! Can't you take a joke? Yes, I can take a joke. I can take a bunch! A thousand, 10,000, maybe even more! But after 30 or so years, this stuff doesn't feel like joking. It's dehumanizing and humiliating, and as if every single one of those jokes is an ostensibly gentler way of saying, "I don't think you belong here." All those little instances add up, grain of sand by grain of sand until I'm stranded in a desert of every "tits or GTFO" joke I've ever tried to ignore. Then came the joke about actresses getting the flu to lose weight. "It paid off," MacFarlane said. "Looking good." Well, thank God, because what matters to all women is that we look good for Seth MacFarlane. How many women did he introduce over the course of the night by mentioning how they looked: "Please welcome the lovely ___ ," "the beautiful ______"? How many men? Uh, those are compliments! Now he can't even give women compliments? Compliment away, friends. Let's compliment the shit out of each other. But let's be really cognizant of what we compliment each other on, and what that says about what we expect from each other, and what we consider valuable and worth mentioning. It doesn't matter what Salma Hayek says, because she's so pretty! You just don't like Seth MacFarlane's sense of humor. What did you expect? Actually, I do like Seth MacFarlane's sense of humor. (Sometimes. No one likes everything all the time!) I've been a loyal Family Guy viewer for almost fifteen years. I've been to — and adored — Family Guy: Live. If MacFarlane had sung "Shipoopi" all night, I'd be writing a really different story right now. Instead, there were jokes about how Rex Reed would probably call Adele fat — because that's what's important about her — and how someday Quvenzhané Wallis will be old enough to date George Clooney — because that's what's important about her — and how sometimes, gasp, a woman might have body hair — because that's what's important about them. Women are nags, and Jews run Hollywood! Thank you, Seth MacFarlane, for this cutting-edge humor. Like Mark Wahlberg said, the party's at Jack Nicholson's house. You remember, that place where Roman Polanski drugged and raped a 13-year-old girl. Ha-ha, ha-ha, ha. I dream of someday watching women win all the non-performance categories, of women making as many films as men do, of women and men being nominated for a comparable number of awards. There are a lot of reasons why that day is far, far in the future. But I'll tell you what's not helping: the biggest night in film being dedicated to alienating, excluding, and debasing women. Actual gender equality is a ways away, but I'd settle for one four-hour ceremony where women aren't being actively degraded. ”
——-Why Seth MacFarlane’s misogyny matters
http://www.vulture.com/2013/02/why-seth-macfarlanes-misogyny-matters.html
“So I get why some women were angry with MacFarlane, even though he wasn’t the author of most of the jokes. (Bruce Vilanch, a gay man, has been the head writer for the Oscars since 1989 and has won several Emmys for his writing.) MacFarlane was the messenger and the message from Hollywood isn’t always a good one for women. Yet as Vilanch said in an interview with Salon, the show is scripted, every presenter has to sign off on whatever it is they say on-stage in advance of the ceremony so it can go up on the teleprompter. Women as well as men. The only impromptu moments are the speeches of the winners. But in real life, outside of his Oscar hosting activities, MacFarlane has been a staunch supporter of women’s and LGBT rights and donated more than a quarter of a million dollars to the Democratic Party in support of liberal causes. In 2011, he was awarded the Humanist of the Year Award by Harvard University for “his extensive body of work, his active, passionate commitment to Humanist values, and his fearless support of equal marriage rights and other social justice issues.” MacFarlane isn’t a Mel Gibson–Holocaust denier, racist, wife-beater. He’s one of the good guys. Were some of the jokes tasteless? Yes. Did MacFarlane repeat them anyway, even though he occasionally said throughout the telecast, “I thought we decided not to do that one.” Sure. But most of these jokes have been done on late night TV and nearly every day Huffington Post has another “actress reveals side-boob” video. This morning, after the Oscars, one of the lead pieces on Huffington Post was about Anne Hathaway’s nipples showing in her gown (which were actually just sewn-in darts, for the record) and Jennifer Lawrence showing “side boob.” Maybe MacFarlane was just a messenger. And the message actually is coming from us. No wonder we’re upset.”
—http://www.advocate.com/commentary/2013/02/28/op-ed-seth-macfarlane-isnt-problem
“The problem with Seth MacFarlane’s humor, as always, is that he’s almost always punching down instead of punching up. He’s picking on people who have always been picked upon, and he thinks he’s hilarious for doing so. What’s more, he’s making a lot of money from other people who enjoy that sort of thing. But that doesn’t make him funny. It makes him one of those fratboy douchebags who seem to be everywhere in life, even into middle age, making uncomfortably insulting wisecracks that always seem to end with the protest that “I’m just joking.” The result? The two white guys are the straight men in this bit. Everybody else—foreign, old, female—is ripe for the ribbing.”
—Joel Mathis, “Seth MacFarlane’s Racist, Sexist New Show, Dads”
“My struggle as a feminist and a critic isn't to contain my outrage—it's to remind myself to feel anything at all. To put it simply, I AM TIRED OF TRYING TO EXPLAIN THIS SHIT TO PEOPLE WHO DON'T WANT TO HEAR IT. I am tired of trying to have an intellectual discussion about dog-whistle sexism in a culture where prominent politicians are still trying to grasp what rape is, and in a world where little girls are shot in the head because they want to go to school. Asking people to think critically about some hacky jokes from a dancing cartoonist? You might as well wear a sandwich board that says, "Yell at Me With Bad Grammar." I am tired of being called a shrieking harridan for pointing out inequalities so tangible and blatant that they are regularly codified into law. What are you supposed to do when someone asks you to "prove" that feminism isn't a massive conspiracy theory in a country where we've only had 39 female senators in the nation's entire history, and 20 of them are serving right now? What kind of a stupid fucking question is that? What are you supposed to say when the 8,000th faux-incredulous jackass throws you the same argument about the wage gap or the draft or bumbling dads in Tide commercials—as though holding each of their hands individually through the empirical facts of the world around us is a worthwhile use of my time. As though feminist academics haven't filled books (decades of books) with answers to that shit already. As though they believe that if they can keep you occupied refuting their flimsy trump cards over and over forever, they can stave off any changes to the culture that keeps them on top. I'm not a feminist by choice, I'm a feminist because this is the world. And if my fatigue sounds defeatist, it isn't. It's the opposite. It's an internal rallying cry that reminds me how bad things are.”
—Lindy West, abbreviated from her article: “Sexism Fatigue: When Seth MacFarlane Is a Complete Ass and You Don’t Even Notice”
“I also didn’t like the remark made about [Quvenzhane Wallis and George Clooney], or the stuff out of Ted's mouth and all the comments about what women do to get thin for their dresses. Way too much stuff about women and bodies, as though that's what defines us. ”
—Jane Fonda on Seth MacFarlane. (via)Seth MacFarlane's Sexist Jokes Transcribed (This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things)
nymag.comIt’s no surprise that Seth MacFarlane would get up on stage at the Academy Awards and be a raging sexist - that’s kind of how he’s built his entire career. And, knowing that the Academy is something like 77% white men, it’s no surprise that they actually chose him to host. But in case you didn’t watch (like me!), here’s a transcript of his worst sexist jokes, and why no one should ever patronize him by watching his insufferable, formulaic crap.
Event covering in the future:
If the rumors are true and The Oscars invite Seth MacFarlane to host again, I will boycott full stop. No posting dresses, not even mentioning the event. Broadcasting his kind of blatant, harmful sexism at such a major event, especially when there are more women working in Hollywood than ever, is utterly unacceptable and I won’t have it.
