I’m not actually trying to be sexist, I’m just pondering. I appreciate a sense of humor in a person. It’s one of my favorite human traits. And whenever I encounter a woman who is funny, that is an especially nice surprise. 'Cause most funny people that I know, or know of, seem to be men.
Now, don’t get me wrong: Many women are funny. And they’re funny in pretty much exactly the same way that men are. There’s no “male humor” or “female humor”, as such, funny is funny. There just seems to be fewer of them.
Also, I don’t mean that they’re as rare as hen’s teeth. The ratio seems to be about four funny men to one funny woman. This seems to hold true for comedians I like, in movies, TV and various media, as well as in real life.
Is it just my imagination? Are there actual reasons for it? Or are most of you ladies just not bothering to tell me your jokes?
Hang on, I’ll actually have a go at answering my own question. I went outside and had some air, and a thought occurred to me:
Much humor is based on engaging with taboo or uncomfortable subjects. Women are often less likely to do this, as they have traditionally been socialized to be more “polite”, or “nice”, than men. Or to put it another way: Humor, in some ways, has a lot in common with rudeness. And men are more likely than women to be rude.
As a result, women are simply less likely than men to hang out in the areas of discourse where funny often lives.
ISTM that it’s fairly common for women to say, when discussing what they’re looking for in a mate or what they like about their present one, that having a sense of humor is a big deal for them. Comparatively rare for men when discussing women. This suggests two things:
[ul]
[li]that men are funnier because women want humor in men[/li][li]even if the above is not true, the fact that women seem to want this suggest that humor might be seen as something of a masculine trait. (this is much more tenuous.)[/li][/ul]
in another thread I wouldn’t know how to look for right now, someone mentioned some studies which have found out that, in mixed company, women tend to talk less than men
and on the media, there are a lot more men; very often when a movie or tv show has both, men do get more lines than the women. Individual characters I mean, not “all the guys in the movie” vs “all the gals in the same movie”; I mean, how much does Sharon Carter talk in Civil War? The angry mother might get more total lines but she only gets one scene. Wanda waves a lot more than she talks. It’s not a comedy per se, but it’s certainly not lacking in jokes.
So part of it may be that given those factors plus your own “single-sex situation” being “all guys”, you’re hearing more things said by men.
I don’t think women typically mean that they’re looking for a comedian when they say that, though. That’s more a matter of looking for someone cheerful, who can chuckle at what comes along in day-to-day life.
The phrasing tends to be, from women, “I want a man who makes me laugh”, whereas a guy wants “a woman with a sense of humor” (often meaning one who laughs at his jokes, not one who makes him laugh). It might have something to do with the whole one-sided-initiative thing, which frankly is a bitch.
I think it has more to do with men being the default gender, so what is funny to men is objectively funny, while what is funny to women is “women’s humor.” You see the same thing in all kinds of marginalized populations. A lot of Jewish comedians have two sets of material, one for general audiences, and one for Jewish audiences. Black comics have two sets of material, and so forth. No white, male comic has two sets of material.
I have gone to lots of women’s music festivals, and other women’s events where there were female stand-up comics, so I have seen lots and lots of women comics, and I prefer them. There are men I find hilarious, like John Mulaney, but by far my favorite comics are women. I think Wanda Sykes is the best comic in the US right now. Probably some of the women I really like, like Kate Clinton, many people haven’t heard of, because she mostly plays to mostly women audiences, but she does the best political humor I’ve seen. I wish The Daily Show had picked her up as a correspondent.
Anyway, I think that anyone who seeks out funny women will find them, and find they are out there in big numbers, they just don’t get the large venues, because people who book shows know that women will buy tickets to see men, but getting men to come see women is a harder sell.
I think it’s also that women place more emphasis on personality than looks. ‘Good sense of humour’ being just one part of a good personality – it doesn’t mean playing the comedian, more, as you say, the ability to take things on the chin, see the good in the bad, not take themselves too seriously and not lose their rag over petty things.
IMHO, I generally much prefer the style of women comedians – more self-deprecating, less joke-scoring, more subtle. I’ve heard this idea many times that women aren’t as funny as men, and I think it entirely depends on what kind of things you find funny.
It also takes quite some confidence to stand up and try to be funny. In my own profession (design), women are far more doubtful of their own abilities than men are (despite frequent evidence to the contrary). I can easily see that translated to comedy, where women are put off such an exposing career.
Proof: If you are married, go out drinking with the guys. Come home late so you miss dinner and bring your friends with you. The wife will be standing there with her hands on her hips giving everyone a nasty look! But all the guys will be laughing, joking, and having a good old time! See!
I have had the pleasure to work in standup comedy and can tell you straight up the number of hilarious female comics out there is beyond my capacity to measure. Women can be side-splittingly funny. I see no convincing evidence to the contrary.
Are there more famous male comedians? Yes there are. There are also more unfunny and failed male comedians. That is a product of selection bias, not sense of humor.
Gay men and straight women are funnier.
Straight men and lesbians, not so much.
So apparently, people who are into men are funnier than people who are into women.
IOW, you gotta have a sense of humor to be attracted to someone with a penis.
My wife says that she sees women make a lot more humorous comments when they’re only around other women. There may be some social stigma attached to a woman being wry or taboo-breaking in mixed company.
Assuming it’s true, it strikes me as much along the lines of why a lot of the top something are men. As such, it’s probably a combination of a few factors. First, some amount of cultural bias, when men have been given greater freedom for a longer period of time. For instance, I can think of several female comics from fairly recently, but going back a couple decades, I’m stressed to think of more than a couple. However, I can still think of plenty of funny men going back quite a ways.
Second, humor is a form of intelligence, or at least an application of forms of intelligence like social intelligence, emotional intelligence, etc. As I’ve come to understand, particularly in these sorts of things, it’s not that men are necessarily MORE of these sorts of things, but rather men have great variation. As such, even if on average both are equally funny, as we get to funnier and funnier or duller and duller people, men will start to dominate the numbers as a result. Really, this sort of fits with my experience pretty well too. When I think of the people I know, the funniest and dullest people I know are men.
I also wonder if there’s not an evolutionary aspect to it as touched on above. Maybe men, either learned socially or perhaps with some genetic aspect, are more successful in attracting a woman by using humor and women accept this humor and laugh for they don’t. And, frankly, as a man, also like someone mentioned upthread, I find the idea of a woman with a sense of humor more important than one that would make me laugh. Maybe it’s just me, but I think I’d prefer a woman who would appreciate my jokes and observations and enjoy most of them than one who would for me. I wonder if that’s something that’s just socialized as part of our culture.
There is something going on there. You’ll often hear: “He makes me laugh.” The Jessica / Roger Rabbit sort of relationship. You don’t really get that the other way around.
Has any man ever said: “I like her because she makes me laugh”? Well, I’ve been known to say it. I can find a funny woman intoxicatingly attractive. But I may well be some kind of weirdo.
Although, oddly enough, my most serious relationship was with someone who, God bless her, had no sense of humor. Now, I don’t mean that as a put-down. She had other wonderful qualities, and I could sing her praises all day long. But no sense of funny. Never laughed at my jokes, didn’t crack any herself. Actually, now I’m wondering what she saw in me, as I though “sense of humor” was the one thing I had going on. But, I digress.
This is exactly what I was thinking. OP, I bet if you make it a point to check out groups of women in casual restaurants/bars, you will see lots of laughter going on. We are hysterical, you’ll just have to take our word for it! But I think women are much more likely to sit back and let others have the limelight. I think this issue is well known when it comes to achieving parity in business, but I hadn’t really thought about it in regard to humor. I also think that some of the things that women find really funny find their best audience with other women.
