First Draft: All Tied Up First Draft

Final Draft: All Tied Up Final Draft

Throughout history, women have pushed for their voices to be heard in the political field to make a difference for others and what they believe is right. Unfortunately, however, such women are also often criticised harshly by the media and world for trivial matters relating to their jobs, their history and even more noticeably, their clothing. People, particularly men, but also women, will frequently criticise women for their clothing as a tool for silencing them and undermining their work. Because of this, I decided to base my sketch ‘All Tied Up’ upon these issues and themes women face in their everyday lives, particularly in jobs like politics and media.

When I first wrote my sketch, I took inspiration from various issues women have faced regarding their clothing being used as a method to silence them. For example, in 2017, Today show reporter Lisa Wilkinson was criticised by the media for ‘wearing the same floral shirt twice in two months’ while also recalling moments the reporter also had worn outfits. While the article itself was harshly criticised, it still stands to serve as her co-star Karl Stefanovic stated, “Women are judged much more harshly and keenly for what they do, what they say, and what they wear [compared to that of a man].” (Coy 2019 para. 11) Thus for my sketch, I applied a ‘flipped reality’ scenario based upon some of Tim Ferguson’s principles of comedy where the values of the society are inverted, “portraying the trivial as important… to expose the fallacies in accepted truths.’ (Ferguson 2011 p. 5) In this way, I demonstrated a flipped reality by having two men that are political rivals help one another when it is discovered one of them is wearing the same tie they have worn previously. This is its the way is a direct parody of the criticisms Lisa Wilkinson faced in the wake of wearing the same blouse twice and thus “applies faulty logic” (Ferguson 2011 p. 5) to these known absolutes, allowing the audience to recognise and ideally question the biases women face in regards to clothing. The “exaggeration of these given elements” (Ferguson 2011 p. 5) allows for me to push the comedy of the scene, such as with the direct parody of the issue when Politician 2 mentions how “Senator Frank wore the same tweed jacket twice in the same month” and that “the press ate him alive.” Their played up reactions to the situations additionally reflects the stereotypical responses of women in regards to clothing issues when seen in media as reflected by Politician 2’s comment “It’s a guy thing, you wouldn’t understand.”

My group, unfortunately, ran into some issues at the beginning as while there was four of us, we were unable to properly come together and discuss issues until later as one of our team members being absent the entirety of the process, thus leaving us with three people. We didn’t want this to affect our work, so we decided to come up with our sketches individually with us coming together and brainstorming ideas until we each found ones that we liked. In this case, I was reminded of criticism Lisa Wilkinson faced and wanted to take the approach of two male politicians obsessing over what they are wearing as far as it could go. I would have generalised further to types of suits or shoes, but I decided as ties are often a stand out feature to a suit it would be best to go with something easily identifiable. Ideally to drive home the theme that clothing is not what women or men should be judged upon but their ideals and what they are striving for. As directly reference in the sketch when Politician 2 exclaims “It doesn’t matter who we’re wearing or if we wore it before. It’s our policies that matter.” When our scripts were workshopped during class, it was encouraging to see that others did enjoy the script and I was encouraged to continue to push the idea further with the kind of jargon involved around men’s clothing. Such as types of knots for ties or having even a spare tie. I was additionally provided with other examples of similar, if not related issues that could be incorporated into my sketch. For instance, Lisa Wilkinson’s co-star Karl Stefanovic actually had previously made headlines in 2014 for revealing that he had “been wearing the same blue suit [or a year]… to make a point about the ways his female colleagues are judged” (Adewunmi 2019 para. 2) and unsurprisingly “No one has noticed, no one gives a s**t.” (Adewunmi 2019 para. 2) Other points that I was advised to revise were issues regarding setting and description of setting as initially I had made it unclear the two politicians were rivals originally. The setting was also changed due to feasibility. My group is planning to perform my sketch, so instead of having a backstage set, it seemed like it would be easier to perform the sketch in a green room setting as it’s smaller and more easily accessible as well as being a location such a conversation is more likely to occur.

The type of feminism my sketch uses arguably would be postmodern feminism. The sketch itself is trying to call out the harsh criticisms women receive in regards to their clothing as a way to silence them. It is a double standard women are forced to confront when compared to a man as “It doesn’t matter what women do; if they’re trying to be independent… or lead, they’re shamed. Just as a female boss is a ‘bitch’ only because she’s trying to lead and delegate when a man doing the same thing is considered ‘good.'” (Ukockis 2019 p.164) My sketch is trying to call out this behaviour and showing how even in a flipped reality where men suffer the issues, instead, it is not fair upon anyone. Instead of being like Liberal Feminism in simply wanting to be treated the same while changing nothing or Radical Feminism in believing ‘men as a group are the main enemy’ (Beasley 1999 p. 55) Postmodern Feminism instead pushes to ‘reject the notion of foundational truth in favour of recognition that these false truths are not external or impartial but constructed, through exclusion and repression’. (Beasley 1999 p. 85) Instead of trying to tear both genders or just one down, I wanted to identify that flaws of this issue in out patriarchy in the hopes we can work to change it for the betterment of both genders much like how both politicians are technically rivals but still able to lend a hand to one another.

As NY congress representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted, “If I walked into Congress wearing a sack, they would laugh & take a picture of my backside. If I walk in with my best sale-rack clothes, they laugh & take a picture of my backside.” (Ocasio-Cortez 2018) Many women across the political and media field are criticised into silence by detractors only for what they wear, and I hope my sketch can reach out to audiences and show them how harmful these views can be and encourage audience members to not stand for the treatment of women under such grounds.

References
– Ukockis, G. (2019). Misogyny: The new activism. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, pp 164.
– Beasley, C. (1999). What is feminism anyway: Understanding contemporary feminist logic. Singapore: South Wind Productions Ltd, pp.55,85.
Ferguson, T. (2011). The cheeky monkey. Strawberry Hills, N.S.W.: Currency Press. pp
– Adewunmi, B. (2019). Male TV presenter wears same suit for a year – does anyone notice?. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/womens-blog/2014/nov/17/male-tv-presenter-same-suit-year-female-colleagues-judged [Accessed 9 May 2019].
– Coy, B. (2019). Lisa’s perfect response to outfit shaming. [online] NewsComAu. Available at: https://www.news.com.au/entertainment/tv/morning-shows/lisa-wilkinson-delivers-the-perfect-response-to-fashion-critics-on-live-tv/news-story/fa6757e4d1240cb6f261c43ce7974a32 [Accessed 8 May 2019].
– Ocasio-Cortez 2018, If I walked into Congress wearing a sack, they would laugh & take a picture of my backside. If I walk in with my best sale-rack clothes, they laugh & take a picture of my backside. Twitter, 15 November, Viewed 8 May 2019. Available at: https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1063208373192146945

Video: Obsessive Boyfriends Are SO Romantic!

Throughout the years, men and women have frequently become trapped in dangerous situations of domestic violence and abuse at the hands of their significant other, forcing then into adjusting to different lives to please their lovers and unable to escape this situation. It is, unfortunately, a situation many people come into contact with whether as a witness or a victim and is an issue that society as a whole needs to become more aware of. As such, the Sketch I have chosen to analyse is “Obsessive Boyfriends Are SO Romantic!” by CollegeHumor, a comedy sketch addressing the issues women face in these dangerous toxic relationships using various elements of comedy to accentuate the driving message and push its themes.

The sketch shows three women, Katie, Jessica and Rehka, sitting together discussing their romantic lives with their boyfriends/ex-boyfriends, who are incredibly possessive of them. Committing actions such as demanding to know where they are at all times, stalking them and forcing them to do whatever they say while the girls consider this behaviour to be ‘romantic,’ and thus highlighting just how dangerous these relationships are. The sketch makes use of various principles through the characters use of negation, ‘offering bare truths’ (Ferguson, 2011) of how dangerous these women’s lives are while denying anything to be wrong or abnormal, such as the character Katie explaining how her ex-boyfriend has been stalking her wherever she goes while her friend Jessica exclaims “oh my god, so romantic!” It is taking these scenarios that many women frequently experience and ‘applies faulty logic’ to these ‘known absolutes (Ferguson, 2011) as explained in Tim Ferguson’s principles of comedy. The sketch uses exaggeration to combine various elements and manipulative tactics men use on women by men, demanding to know where they are and who they are with at all times, stalking, controlling who they speak to and what to do/ wear, forcing them to have sex with them whenever they want etc. While not all abusive relationships contain all these elements, it allows for a larger target audience where women that have been caught in similar experiences to see similar reflected in their own lives or in the lives of others.

I find this sketch to be an effective way of demonstrating the message that relationship based upon living in fear of your significant other and have no autonomy within the relationship is not healthy nor in any way romantic and you should seek help. It is a theme of Domestic Abuse within relationships and the toxic manipulative ways it is used to control these women in their relationships. This is even further displayed as in the description of the video, they provide a link and number to call if a victim or witness needs help. This portrayal of ‘the irrational as rational’ works as intended to ‘expose the fallacies in these accepted truths.’(Ferguson, 2011) It is a way for victims and witnesses to see how not all domestic abuse is physical and can also be mental and emotional. If a victim or witness can identify one of these behaviours in their own relationship and see how the sketch is pointing out how toxic such behaviour is. It could be used to give people strength to leave these situations or seek help. Throughout history, men have frequently been viewed as the dominant sex which is frequently show how men in the past would view that men were meant to ‘silent the female species.’ (Beard, 2017). This can be seen through the behaviour of the boyfriends in the sketch demonstrating ‘Ownership Entitlement’, where men would view their opinion as more important than that of a woman’s in a relationship and view a ‘lack of necessity to consult with women partners or reach consensus’ (Towns and Scott, 2013) upon her own decisions, effectively silencing her. This is shown through Zehka describing how she isn’t allowed to speak or even meet her boyfriend’s friends as ‘he thinks I’m stupid and doesn’t want me embarrassing him.’

Additionally, another manipulation tactic used in the sketch is ‘Identity Ownership’ where ‘boyfriends/ husbands undermine their partner’s independence and agency, questioning her judgement or her self-expression and that questioned her fidelity or sexualised her actions.’ (Towns and Scott, 2013). It can be seen in the sketch through the way the sketch again portrays Zehka’s boyfriend where she described her boyfriend as “always telling me what to wear and what to say in order for him to still like me,” but also through Jessica’s boyfriend when she describes how he “needs all the passwords to all of my accounts.” Studies show how this is a frequent manipulation tactic turning their partner into ‘an item to display at their boyfriend’s discretion.’ (Towns and Scott, 2013) Where women are left to be completely dependent upon the man and are left convinced they are nothing when not in the relationship as also demonstrated in the sketch where Jessica says “but you don’t have a boyfriend, what could be sadder?” It’s this use of verbal irony implying a woman is nothing without a man and that this type of relationship is what “real love” is. The character summarises this use of irony as she described her version of love being “work, taking time, keeping you on edge and awake at night,” all things that love should considerably not do in a relationship all while treating it as usual and an ideal relationship.

This sketch demonstrates through its humour in the negation and irony how relationships based upon such toxic behaviours are not healthy is a way for other to be able to identify these problems and help either themselves or others that can’t help themselves in these situations.

Bibliography
Ferguson, T. (2011). The cheeky monkey. Strawberry Hills, N.S.W.: Currency Press.
Beard, M. (2017). Women & power. London: Profile Books, p.4.
Towns, A. and Scott, H. (2013). ‘I couldn’t even dress the way I wanted..’ Young women talk of ‘ownership’ by boyfriends: An opportunity for the prevention of domestic violence?. Feminism & Psychology, [online] 23(4), pp.536-555. Available at: https://journals-sagepub-com.ezproxy.lib.rmit.edu.au/doi/pdf/10.1177/0959353513481955 [Accessed 21 Mar. 2019].