May 14, 2017

"The second most horrific sounding nickname for the human female's genitals..."

According to the Urban Dictionary. But why not use it — with an "-ed" — as the name for a supposedly mainstream Mother's-Day-Weekend mother-and-daughter movie?

Don't worry. It's terrible. You don't have to see it. I'm reading Buzzfeed, where the headline sounds conflicted: "'Snatched' Is Proof That The White-Women-Behaving-Badly Comedy Needs To Take A Break/Why is it so hard to translate Amy Schumer’s wayward comedic persona into a movie?" Do you want her to try harder or just give it a rest?
More than anything else, Snatched feels like an exhausted dead end for a type of comedy that Schumer and Lena Dunham, in particular, became famous for in the last decade — a comedy that consists of pitilessly self-lacerating white-women-behaving-badly scenarios that leans into its characters’ uglier tendencies while also inquiring into the standards by which those characters get judged.
Speaking of exhausting. That sentence. Or no, it's not exhausting me. It's energizing me to revive this blog's "Sentence of the Day" feature — which briefly flared back in February. I only used it twice but, interestingly enough, both times it had to do with feminism:

On February 3, 2017, I declared this — from "Aging Is Feminizing Me and I Hate It," by Eileen Myles in New York Magazine — the "Sentence of the Day": "You know like any face I made when I was young was adorable and now if I’m worried there’s this pathetic gleam of how do I look and yet we love an old dog or an old leather couch so why not an old female arm or an ass all its own, speaking powerfully shabbily in time."

On February 8, 2017, I got caught on this sentence from a New Yorker review of a book called "Why I Am Not a Feminist": "Reading that second line, I immediately thought of an irksome scene in Megyn Kelly’s memoir, in which Kelly tells Sheryl Sandberg that she’s not a feminist, and Sandberg—whose entire feminist initiative is based on making the movement palatable to people like Kelly, and whose awkward accommodation of the Trump Administration should surprise no one—'passed no judgment' on Kelly’s distaste for the term."

59 comments:

traditionalguy said...

Obviously, chain of thought writers need to fearlessly accept the much despised semi-colon.

rhhardin said...

All the female cunt words have highly tuned performances. The word just has to be in the right hands.

The brits have screwed cunt up a little by using in addition for a worthless and unreliable man.

rhhardin said...

Middle Dutch snacken is suggested as the origin.

Mary Beth said...

It’s a type of comedy that has had a marvelous capacity to enrage, either because its depictions of obliviousness, immaturity, and narcissism get misread as endorsements, or because its performances of calculated awfulness have a way of triggering misogynistic reactions in people who prefer women onscreen to be likable and free of bodily functions.

This is added just so you know that the reviewer didn't like the movie for good reasons, not because of ignorant, misogynistic reasons.

rhhardin said...

Snatch is more prospective of access. Once you've got it there you go to another word.

And snatch isn't used like cunt as part for the whole.

This isn't covered in foreign learners' English dictionaries. It's a wonder that they learn to get along at all. This may be the Muslim assimilation problem right there.

tim in vermont said...

"Snatch" is "horrific sounding"? I guess maybe only to somebody who doesn't like sex all that much, or men all the much.

tim in vermont said...

I always thought "bearded clam," or "tuna" sounded pretty bad though. "Muff" is kind of nice, like "quim." "Trim" isn't too bad either. I guess the big problem with snatch is the large admixture of male sexuality that goes into its connotations.

rhhardin said...

Horrified newsbabes had to go to "women's genitalia" when talking about pussy.

That cut out all of the performance of pussy, which Trump meant specifically to include. If he meant women's genitalia he would have said women's genitalia.

rhhardin said...

It ought to be herring anyway, not tuna. They've got the wrong fish.

rhhardin said...

What did the French blind man say when passing the fish market?

Hello, girls.

rhhardin said...

Pussy depended on body hair but lingers on owing to ease of double meaning.

I mean who talks about beavers.

rhhardin said...

The feminist position is that no word for women's genitalia has any legitimate performace.

Or, whittled down: that's not funny.

rhhardin said...

I've got Amy Schumer's Train Wreck but have not watched it yet. A lot of speculative orders go into the maybe later pile.

Michael K said...

I have always liked Goldie Hawn and hate to see her in a movie with this fat loser. My favorite movie of hers was the one, it is said, killed off her career. It's called "Overboard" and starred Kurt Russell who she has been with ever since. I've read that it didn't begin to be a kid movie and that is what hurt her career. Anyway, I like her but will not see this movie, even on DVD.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Rainbow Snatch in Hollywood

tcrosse said...

And Happy Mothers Day to you, too.

rhhardin said...

Overboard was okay, one of the less frenetic Goldie Hawn movies, which is good if you're not a laff-riot fan.

Owen said...

I was going to try to say something and intelligent but rhhardin took over that whole space. Done and done.

Owen said...

Has anybody done any scholarly work on Feminist Style and why it is so nasty and (ahem) impenetrable?

Dagwood said...

More horrific than 'twat'?

robother said...

"...while also inquiring into the standards by which those characters get judged."

At least he didn't write "interrogating," I give him points for that.

Kevin said...

The second most horrific sounding nickname for the human female's genitals...

...is Amy Schumer.

rhhardin said...

In the Blood (Gina Carano) can be read as feminist style, albeit parodied, or at least guys will find it entertaining. Women might not see the humor, just good old fashioned feminism.

Carano in the story accomplishes what feminist writers see themselves as accomplishing, in short killing all the guys in sight in hand to hand combat.

Big Mike said...

It's been so long since I heard that word used as a synonym for a vagina that I guess I'd assumed it went out of fashion about the time polyester leisure suits. I am starting to suspect that it's dawning on many women that even if there were no men around and females reproduced by parthenogenesis, that there still would be women foregoing motherhood in favor of their careers, there would still be women who were lacking in talent and/or commitment to hard work and casting about for some convenient excuse why their lack of success was not really their fault, and Hillary Clinton would still be a corrupt and inept politician. It's just that without men they'd have to open their own jars of jelly and mow their own lawns. So Schumer's act is wearing a touch thin.

Happy Mother's Day to you, Althouse. Our two sons showed up for the weekend, each bringing a bouquet of her same favorite flower picked up at the same local florist on their way in. Roughly the same size, too, but fortunately different enough that the wife knows which came from whom. Neither knew the other was getting flowers. We're going to Sunday brunch in a bit. My treat.

I don't see why 21st Century feminists are so down on motherhood; raising two good boys to become good men in this cockamamie world is a serious challenge.

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

Guy Ritchie did a great movie with Brad Pitt and Jason Statham titled 'Snatch'.

It was about a jewel heist, though.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0208092/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

Bay Area Guy said...

Goldie Hawn was great. Not Hollywood starlet beautiful, but funny and cute, with great eyes and a nice smile.

Amy Schumer? Not so much.

chickelit said...

rhhardin said...
Middle Dutch snacken is suggested as the origin.

The Durch invented snacking and many snack foods.

Ann Althouse said...

"Even in a Walt Disney movie, you can say, We're going to snatch that pussy and put him in a box and bring him on the airplane."

Dust Bunny Queen said...

The brits have screwed cunt up a little by using in addition for a worthless and unreliable man.

Kevin the Cunt :-)

I've already wished my Daughter and Stepmother a Happy Mother's day and they have done the same. So in our separate parts of the State we all are going to enjoy a peaceful relaxing day.

We are doing more yard work. Going to disassemble the big pile of wood, lumber scraps, wire etc that has accumulated over the last couple of years in the back of the orchard.. Salvage the good stuff we want to use, put into piles the debris to go to the dump next weekend, sort out the items that someone might like to put out into a "free take it pile" (hogwire, chicken wire, well wire, PVC stuff).... and have a big bonfire later where we will have a few cocktails while tending the fire. My husband is making dinner tonight: ribeye steaks (rare), grilled french bread, caesar salad with real anchovies on top of mine! and we may have TWO scoops of ice cream....because we can.

Perfect Mother's Day.

chickelit said...

Althouse asked Do you want her [Amy Shumer] to try harder or just give it a rest?

Stop paying her attention. You're just encouraging her.

Henry said...

Anyone remember Pecker?

rhhardin said...

Anyone remember Pecker?

Christina Ricci, says my list. I've watched it but don't remember anyhing. I could go look at the blurb on the back and refresh my memory, or not.

rhhardin said...

It's important to keep a list of DVDs and where you put each after watching.

Earnest Prole said...

I’m sure Amy Schumer’s most recent movie is as absolutely awful as her most recent Netflix comedy special, which I watched for the sheer horror of it. But her sketch comedy from her Comedy Central show “Inside Amy Schumer” is absolutely inspired.

tim in vermont said...

I always figured that "twat" came from thatched "roof" in French, or toit, pronounced twat.

Michelle Dulak Thomson said...

Look, in a world containing "cunt," "twat," and "pussy," how can "snatch" be the second-most-horrific version? It's not as though male genitalia don't have rude names of their own. Indeed, they have more of them. The Nanny over at Bloomberg View is assiduously rooting them out. Dick Cheney, for example, now has to be referred to as Richard. I wrote a comment inadvertently referring to Nixon as "Tricky Dick," and had to repost the entire thing with his name altered to "Tricky Duck."

Michelle Dulak Thomson said...

Come to think of it, "Tricky Duck" would make an awesome band name.

holdfast said...

Meat flaps.

Sideways cheeseburger.

Salami curtains.


Earnest Prole said...

For something truly filthy you always have to go back to those single-syllable anglo-saxonisms.

ALP said...

"...leans into its characters’ uglier tendencies..."

THIS. As a frequent consumer of all things comedic, I tire easily of comedy that comes from too much anger and nastiness. Its too easy, like making fun of Republican politicians. And it makes me feel like the artist doesn't respect their audience enough - like they just want to use us as a bitchy sounding board. It doesn't have staying power. And she's not the first comedy act to stumble going to the big screen: The Trailer Park Boys (great series, sucky movies), Borat (great series sucky movies).

It seems to be like writing: some writers can do great short stories but produce tedious novels.

YoungHegelian said...

I have no memory of where I saw this, online or TV late night, but it was a show on the perils of labiaplasty. There was an interview between the doctor & patient before the examination, & the doctor ends it with "okay, let's take a look at the roast beef".

!!!

Let me tell ya, if I'm ever at a urologist & he comes in an says "Okay, let's pull out the wiener & take a look-see. Kosher, eh?", I'll be gone even before I can get my pants back on.

Oso Negro said...

"An exhausted dead end"? More like a run-down cul de sac.

Oso Negro said...

Blogger rhhardin said...
Pussy depended on body hair but lingers on owing to ease of double meaning.

I mean who talks about beavers.

5/14/17, 8:15 AM


If you dated younger women you would know that the beavers are pretty much extinct.

Oso Negro said...

"Gash" is a much more appalling description, e.g. "the paparazzi snapped photos of Britney Spears' leaking gash as she exited the limo."

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Eric Cartman & Amy Schumer

HoodlumDoodlum said...

I prefer "snicker" in a Cockney-rhyming riff on Carrol's "Jabberwocky" (thought not actually rhyming, of course).

Feel free to use that one yourself.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Earnest Prole said...I’m sure Amy Schumer’s most recent movie is as absolutely awful as her most recent Netflix comedy special, which I watched for the sheer horror of it. But her sketch comedy from her Comedy Central show “Inside Amy Schumer” is absolutely inspired.

Writers. Right?

Michael K said...

"the beavers are pretty much extinct."

And crab lice are an endangered species.

holdfast said...

Canada was built on beaver!

''Split-Arse", or simply "split".

Caroline said...

Oh, how I'm pining, pining! For the winsome, long lost Patriarchy.

David Begley said...

The IMDB reviews are brutal.

Jupiter said...

Sheryl Sandberg and Megyn Kelly. Huh.

Feminism was constructed on the theory that the Men were hogging all the fun. And I guess if you are Sheryl Sandberg or Megyn Kelly, that might appear to have been true. For some reason, no one seems to want to drop her kids off at daycare so she can drive a garbage truck. That's some fun we can go right on hogging.

Ann Althouse said...

"Anyone remember Pecker?"

One of my favorite movies.

Search the blog archive to see what I've said about it.

Earnest Prole said...

I have always liked Goldie Hawn

For a split-second I thought you were coining an h-word.

Unknown said...

Amy Schumer's wheelhouse is the slump-buster genre

Richard said...

I guess nobody here is an Agatha Christy fan. Miss Marple is referred to as an old pussy in a number of her books. An old pussy is an old lady with time on her hands who probably gossips and expresses judgmental opinions about others. Also, according to etymonline.com, the word pussy is a diminutive of the word puss which means cat and which was also used as both an insult and, subsequently, a term of endearment for a women (from the 1580s).

Warren Fahy said...

Bad sentences. My brain hurts.

Krumhorn said...

I always thought that 'fuzzer' was apt.

- Krumhorn

MST said...

@rhhardin "The feminist position is that no word for women's genitalia has any legitimate performace."

So we are back to the Victorian gambit of pretending it doesn't exist.