Women dress like whores at the gym, haven’t you heard? That’s according to US “comic” Shane Gillis, who made the “gag” while hosting Saturday Night Live over the weekend. “I didn’t know women just dressed like whores now,” the 38-year-old said, during his routine. “Look, I’m sorry there’s no other way to describe it.”
Which is sexist, misogynistic and idiotic all in one. Look, I’m sorry, there’s no other way to describe it.
What’s funnier (not hard) is that he also uttered the F-word on the show, and later apologised for that, which speaks volumes about what Gillis – and the people in charge at SNL – imagine viewers might take offence at. Swearing? Eek! Calling women whores for working out wearing Lycra? Go right ahead, sir.
“You’ve seen the shorts? … The wrinkles go around the cheeks and all combine at the butthole. And don’t look! You’re not allowed to look,” Gillis said. Ah, those selfish women won’t even let him stare at them, creepily. Unbelievable, eh? God forbid they should want to exercise in clothes that feel comfortable and allow them to move freely.
To me, it’s wild that those sorts of comments can still be made on a prominent TV show: that Gillis’s monologue wasn’t flagged before he delivered it, and that his comment actually got a laugh from a studio audience. He was previously fired from SNL for making racist and homophobic jokes, which could look horribly like someone wanted him to stir up controversy – at our expense – by inviting him back. That’s where we are. That’s how normalised slut-shaming has become.
Of course, I’m a woman, so obviously I can’t take a joke. Never mind that calling women whores is the sort of stuff that reinforces the opinions of men who feel entitled to our bodies and emboldened to harass or assault us. I’m constantly impressed by the ability of some men to define a woman’s worth by what she’s wearing, and their absolute confidence that we dress for them.
Make no mistake, allowing a man with a platform like SNL to get away with saying this stuff absolutely encourages other men to objectify women. It creates an environment in which our bodies are sexualised in all walks of life, whether we’re at work, at the gym or simply walking down the street. The whole thing is only a couple of steps away from “but was she wearing a short skirt?”
As the actor Dan Levy put it on an Instagram reel criticising Gillis and SNL, “Women wearing short shorts at the gym does not make them whores. It makes the men calling them whores misogynists.”
Hard agree, but where’s the accountability? Why is it always women – or in the instance of Levy a lone male voice – calling this out? It’s especially sinister to see women used as a punchline against the backdrop of the current news cycle, and in light of the alleged Cornell gang rape, and the young men who stayed silent after seeing “jokey” messages on a group Snapchat offering “free pussy” – because, presumably, it wasn’t their problem? Because rape culture has been normalised to the extent that women are now utterly dehumanised?
They say men are scared women will laugh at them and women are scared men will kill them, but some men are literally laughing at our expense.