Christopher Hitchens tries to explain why. Are men more likely than women really to think that life itself is a cruel joke? Or is the pain and risk of having babies no laughing matter?
Is there anything more boring than a woman talking about her newborn? Or about her dreams? I’m not sure about these studies. Mr. Mansfield’s study of manliness shows that women secretly think that manly exaggeration is the biggest joke in the cosmos, but they (in their self-interest and out of love) don’t laugh about it while we men are around. And Mr. Hitchens’ own (intentional) wittiness I’ve always found to be pretty uneven.
Here Hitchens laughably wastes many, many words in a futile attempt to show that Ann Coulter has no sense of humor. She’s obviously laughing all the way to the bank.
I thought this whole matter had been settled along with the "women are terrible drivers" debate and the "women are too emotional to run a business" discussion. What’s with Hitchens? Has he been in a coma since the late sixties?
Well, at the risk of offending men (and gets loads of support from women), could it be that the child survives to adulthood better in men? More charitably, perhaps men are better at keeping the flame of their childhood enthusiasms burning?
I thoroughly enjoyed Hitchens’ article and found many pearls of wisdom in it. On the whole, however, I’d have to say that while men are very often funnier than women, it is women who have a better sense of humor on the whole. We do, after all, put up with men. And comedians are notoriously depressives in real life. You don’t have to BE funny to have a great sense of humor. Though say whatever you will about Ann Coulter--she IS funny!
in some way men do not want women to be funny.
I thought the above to be quite true, along with quite a bit else in the article. We women are expected to be audience, and - oh my - I am not complaining. When men leave me weeping it is because I am laughing so hard.
To make someone laugh is a form of conquest. That is more important to men than to women, and if it is a childish sort of conquest, well, who cares? I say it beats most of the other sorts, hands down. Please, make me laugh!
There are definite sex differences in humor, and I can get a roomful of women laughing over Hitchen’s deadliest subject - childbirth - in a way I can never get men to see it. I always found pregnancy and childbirth to be a cruel joke and honestly, what can more crude than what happens during labor? I know. Some women speak of it as beautiful thing, but really! "Oh! The sweet mystery of life!" Such women would glamorize the sex act, too.
What’s more boring than a woman talking about her newborn? Perhaps a man talking about his performance in a football game, or what it took it land a fish, or how he won a hand at the poker game - what is more deadly than that? Some rare man on some rare occasion can make those things funny and maybe for men they have interest, but as a female, those are on a par with "his teeny-tiny toes" that are so sweet.
Some subtle distinctions, thanks. Women might have a better sense of humor but not be as funny... That’s because men are funnier in two senses: They tell better jokes etc. and they’re more ridiculous.
The line that got me laughing was the image of Ann Coulter laughing. Good sense of humor? Please. I imagine she wears dentures from all the grinding of the teeth she does. She will age badly.