PART 1– The Monologue
When my good friend Noreen asked me if I would audition for the Vagina Monologues with her, my answer was immediately a definite, “Yes.” I love performing and I strongly identify as a feminist, so a production like the Vagina Monologues seemed right up my alley. At the audition, the producer asked me which monologue I’d like to perform. I remembered The Little Coochie Snorcher That Could from seeing Vagina Monologues at UMass and thinking it was one of the really funny pieces. Being a comedian, I thought it would be best to use my strengths and perform a piece with lots of jokes.
My memory is shit. Coochie Snorcher is a seven minute monologue where the monologist gets raped twice. TWICE. In seven minutes. I wasn’t completely wrong, there are a few funny likes here and there. I was able to add a motion or two to certain lines and moments to increase the humor in the story. But for the most part, the piece is about a girl whose vagina has been mistreated over and over. Whether it’s her by her mother, screaming at the monologist as a five-year old telling her to, “Stop scratching your coochie snorcher!” Or by Edgar, a ten-year old on the playground who punches the monologist square in her vagina. Or by Alfred, her father’s best friend who comes up behind her in her father’s basement and sticks his, “big hard penis into {her} coochie snorcher.” This girl just can’t catch a break.
One of the women from the show said to me, “I really like the way you perform Coochie Snorcher. I’ve seen it performed before and it can be so dark. So so dark and sad. I like watching you do it because you make it bearable.” It’s not an easy monologue to watch because a ten year old gets raped. But it’s something we can’t turn off and pretend doesn’t happen. Which brings me to how humor can get messages out.
PART 2– Rape Isn’t Funny
Being a comedian in the Vagina Monologues wasn’t easy. ”Rape is never funny.” (Pulls nervously at her shirt collar) Welllllllll… I meaaaaaan… You’re right about that. Rape is never funny. Jokes about rape could be funny. As a comedian it is drilled into me day after day that nothing is off-limits. The holocaust, 9/11, and even something as horrific and traumatic as rape can be incorporated into someone’s act. Here’s why I think it’s okay.
Offensive jokes and deciding whether or not to tell them is something I struggle with a lot. And I’m still struggling. And it’s something I would love to talk to you (yes, you!) about. Because that’s why we do them. So people talk about it. We need to talk about rape. If I come into you school or workplace and say, “We’re going to talk about rape,” people might tune out, get uncomfortable, even become defensive. But if you’re at a comedy show and someone on stage references rape (or a part of rape culture) and makes a good point about slut-shaming, blaming the victim, or otherwise, you might actually learn something. My newest joke is:
Last night I was at a whiskey tasting event and the host made the toast,“To the women who do, and to the women who don’t. But not to the women who say they will and don’t.” Everyone laughed. I said, “Sir, are you familiar with the term slut-shaming? A woman has the right to change her mind.” And once again feminism saves everyone from having too much fun!
Right there I’ve taught a new vocabulary word to the audience. Slut-shaming is a real thing, it goes hand-in-hand with blaming the victim. Is this joke about rape? No, not really. But here’s this one…
I don’t have a boyfriend and some days it seems like everyone is trying to set me up. My friends, my family, my coworkers… When I blow into my rape whistle it goes, “Are you sure?”
In this joke, rape is used to heighten the intensity of how single I am. I guess what it’s saying is, “in the event that I’m about to be raped maybe I should surrender because it’s better than being alone.” Which to be honest kind of makes me sick. I’m definitely torn on this issue. That joke minimizes the severity of rape, comparing it to just an unwanted come on.
One other reason I think it’s okay to make rape jokes is because boo-ing a joke at a comedy club doesn’t reduce the risk of assault. It doesn’t encourage any politicians to make streets safer. It doesn’t ask judges to prosecute rapists any harsher. It only disrupts the show. And I know we live in a rape culture. Where rapey lyrics in songs aren’t questioned. Where advertisements use violent images of women to sell anything from alcohol and cigarettes to perfume and jeans. Jokes about rape can contribute to the rape culture if the jokes are unthoughtful and used to shock value. But I just feel if you’re going to boo somebody, boo the lawyer who helped a rapist take his victim to court to sue for custody of her baby. That’s FUCKING INSANE and extremely serious. Louis CK accusing a woman of liking rape is not extremely serious. It’s funny. Laugh at it. And if the guy you’re watching it with laughs, but doesn’t laugh at any other jokes, maybe run away.
I remember I was with my ex boyfriend (boyfriend at the time) and I was meeting some friends of his. We were talking about babysitters and how they make a lot of money. My man said, “I didn’t realize how expensive it is for people with kids to go out. Because on top of the dinner, on top of the movie, on top of the parking, you ALSO have to pay for a babysitter.” I wanted so badly to say, “Oh man. Is this your way of telling me I should get that abortion?” But I refrained just due to the fact that this was a first impression and I didn’t really know these people. I thought it was funny though, so I thought, “I’ll just tell him in the car.” So in the car ride home I told him the joke, and he replied, “Abortion is never funny.” I thought to myself, “Holy shit, I have to break up with this guy.” It was such a huge turn off that this guy thought that I thought abortion was funny. I don’t think abortion is funny at all. I think jokes about abortion can be funny.
PART 3- The Women
The last thing I want to mention about doing the Vagina Monologues is the women who participated in it with me. These women are phenomenal. Talk about girl power, these ladies were beautiful, funny, friendly, caring, and CRAZY smart. I mean, it’s MIT. The majors some of these girls had I couldn’t even pronounce. One day one of the girls went up to our chalk board in the green room. She picked up some chalk and began writing what I could only describe as “MIT on the chalk board in Good Will Hunting gibberish.”
I asked her, “What’s that?”
“Oh, it’s this problem. I have it stuck in my head and I just really want to solve it.”
“I see,” I said. ”Hey, could I write a problem on the board?” I picked up a piece of chalk.
Only 50 year old men want to date me.
I have acne.
I woke up with heart burn.
First, it made everybody laugh. Then, it inspired everyone to write their own problems on the board. Some of them were funny and pathetic like mine. And some of them were more serious. I suggested when we were done that we burn the chalk board to the ground. But, like I said, it was a chalk board. And that’s arson.
We had three shows. Before our Friday night show we played a “Vagina Game.” We went around in a circle and said either our favorite word for vagina, or demonstrated our favorite moan. My favorite moan is, “Fuck me like you’re paying for it!” I like it because it’s one of those moans you can only use during a recession. Because it’s not saying, “Fuck me like it’s payday and I’m your first choice!” It’s saying, “Fuck me like you’re down to your last dollar and it was me or a sandwich. Eat up.”
Before our Saturday night show we went around in a circle and moaned like a celebrity. The group had to guess whose moan it was. When it was my turn I moaned, “Uh! Uh! I’mma letchu finish inside me, Kanye!” I was, of course, Kimberly Kardashian. My friend Noreen’s was great. She was Oprah and screamed as she pointed, “You get to cum! And you get to cum! And you get to cum!” The entire cast was hilarious and I spent most of our warm ups cracking a smile from ear to ear.
Before our Sunday afternoon show, our producer introduced something new to us. She said, “Tell us why you are rising.” Which meant, tell us why you’re standing up for women all over the world, and why you’re doing the Vagina Monologues. The first third of the room gave reasons like, “Because I hate slut-shaming.” ”Because I believe women deserve equality.” When it was my turn I said, “Because I’m a woman in comedy and I get treated wildly different than the men. Because I can’t tell you how many times I hear ‘women aren’t funny.’ Because I get sincerely asked who I blew to get on that show.”
The girl who spoke directly after me said, “I’m rising because I was sexually assaulted and I couldn’t tell anybody.” Then she choked up and started to cry. Several of the other girls ran over and gave this one a big hug. My eyes immediately filled with tears and since I was standing right there I joined in the group hug. It broke my heart to see this young, smart, beautiful woman torn to pieces because some asshole couldn’t understand, “No.” She was actually one of the girls I had connected with and I couldn’t believe she had been through that abuse.
When we regathered ourselves, the next girl spoke. ”I was also sexually assaulted.” For the next two thirds of the circle I would say the majority (or maybe it just felt like the majority because honestly one was too many) had a similar story. Either it had happened to them, or their best friends. Some were recent incidents and others had been struggling with the torment for years. I couldn’t fight back the tears. Nobody deserves to be victimized or made to feel unsafe. On a college campus, at a job, or even at home. The strength these women had to stand up for themselves was remarkable to me. By doing the Vagina Monologues, these women took a stand and said, “What happened to me was wrong. What happened to my best friend was wrong. I’m not going to sit by and let it happen to anyone else’s daughter, sister, mother, or friend. This stops now.”
Being in the Vagina Monologues was an amazing experience. As an outsider (believe it or not I do not go to MIT) I was accepted by all cast members. It made me think about the rights of women a lot. But we can’t just be thinking and talking about it during February, when the Vagina Monologues are typically performed. We need to keep talking about it, keep working on it all year long. Because women are amazing. Women are funny, and talented, and compassionate. We can’t let any woman be silenced by fear. We have to protect each other. We have to encourage each other. We can’t be at competition with each other. A good friend once said, “When women say, ‘I only have guy friends. I only hang out with guys. I just don’t get along with girls, I’m more like one of the guys.’ I think, ‘That’s because you’re a bitch and women don’t like you.’”
Some of the things I said here may have offended you, or maybe you disagree with them, or maybe you totally agree with them and whatever you think that’s good and it’s okay. I said it before, if you want to talk about anything I’ve said here I promise to be open minded. You can reach me at daniellesoto617@gmail.com
Happy International Women’s Day! Hey, how comes there’s no International Men’s Day? Oh wait, I’m sorry, it’s tomorrow. And the next day. And the next day. And the next day…
