Are men naturally funnier than women?

The other day I was having a conversation with a friend in which he argued that most women don’t have a sense of humour, and few women are really funny. Which took me back somewhat, given that I’ve always thought that I am quite good at being funny, in conversation. If anything, I was a little hurt, somewhat offended on behalf of the sisterhood.

He was adamant. Women just aren’t as funny as men. Maybe he is right: after all, no less a feminist than Germaine Greer has made a similar point. She argues that women are good at making fun of themselves — witness French and Saunders — but that men grow up in a culture of joking and banter:

“The greater visibility of male comedians reflects a greater investment of intellectual energy by men of all walks of life in keeping each other amused. It is now a truism that men never talk to each other about things that matter. Most of what takes place when men are together is phatic communication, intended to build fellowship rather than intimacy.”

There is also a competitive element that drives men and their comedy:

“Competition drives men to more and more outrageous and bizarre mental acrobatics, to stay ahead of the game and have the last laugh. The greater the pressure, the faster the firing of neurons in the male brain. You get your best results from women when you take the pressure off. Men do the inspired lunacy; women do droll.”

This sounds hideously essentialist — my Masters lecturers at Wits would not have approved — but in my experience it is true. I am good at banter, but more in the sense of the droll observation than the ridiculous pun.

Thinking back to the kind of comedy I enjoy most, I don’t necessarily distinguish between men and women; my favourite comedians are an even mix of both. It seems to me that women do sketch comedy very well. Look at the brilliant Smack the Pony, which satirises competitiveness between women, as in the G-string skit, or this singing match. On the other hand, men push the inherent absurdity of situations to their limits. Compare Catherine Tate, whose characters are always believable, even the ghastly granny, to those in Little Britain, which has become more revolting and extreme with every passing season.

My friend suggested that women lack the aggression to be truly funny, because comedy is vicious. But then what about Sarah Silverman, who makes jokes about abortion? I saw her perform in a small club in New York City in July 2001, and I remember feeling faintly appalled by her brand of targeted offensiveness. In an article in slate.com, Sam Anderson reflected:

“She handles the complex algorithms of taboo — who’s allowed to joke about what, to whom, using what terminology — with instant precision: ‘Everybody blames the Jews for killing Christ, and then the Jews try to pass it off on the Romans. I’m one of the few people that believe it was the blacks.'”

Anderson describes Silverman, along with Sacha Baron Cohen and others, as a “meta-bigot”:

“The meta-bigots work at social problems indirectly; instead of discussing race, rape, abortion, incest or mass starvation, they parody our discussions of them. They manipulate stereotypes about stereotypes. It’s a dangerous game: If you’re humourless, distracted, or even just inordinately history-conscious, meta-bigotry can look suspiciously like actual bigotry.”

In South Africa, there are female comedians such as Krijay Govender and Judy Jake. But comedy bills are dominated by men, and it’s hard for women to compete with all that manic energy and supreme self-confidence. For years I harboured an ambition to stand-up, but I think my style is too observational, too wry and quiet, not aggressive enough for an audience bigger than a dinner party or a conversation in a coffee shop.

I think I’ll stick to making deadpan remarks sotto voce, and hope that I continue to get away with being ironic. Irony is of course a dangerous thing. It has got me into trouble many times, particularly with women, who often take what I say seriously — though I have great female friends with whom I share a similar sense of humour, it has to be said that, overall, men tend to “get” me more than women do. Anderson, in his article on Silverman, argues, “But in a world as complicatedly social as ours, it’s not expendable — irony is social chess, the playful manipulation of lazy expectations. It’s at least as important as love or sadness.”

The playful manipulation of lazy expectations: maybe it’s laziness to think that the tendency to be funny is somehow linked to one’s gender. Let us go forth, and be funny.