is this 'misogynistic' or is it just fun...
 

...thoughts etc...?...(..it’s been taken down now btw...I think the article says that...)...


Council under fire for 'misogynistic' tweet urging people to 'treat coronavirus like your mother-in-law'...

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Stockport council has come under fire for a ‘misogynistic’ tweet which urged people to treat coronavirus ‘like your mother-in-law’.

The post - which also appeared on Facebook - was intended as a humorous way of getting the message about social distancing across.

It read ‘the trick to social distancing is acting like your mother-in-law’s around every corner!’

But some felt it was badly misjudged - particularly in light of evidence that domestic violence against women has soared during lockdown.

The council has since removed the offending posts and said sorry for 'any upset caused'.

Coun Tom Morrison, who asked for them to be taken down, said it had done ‘nothing to help combat dangerous stereotypes that have spiked over recent months’.

Explaining his failure to see the funny side, he cited a south Manchester domestic violence charity reporting a 160pc increase in calls at the beginning of lockdown, and the UN describing the issue as a global ‘shadow pandemic’.

“This is simply unacceptable, I thought we left these kind of tropes back in the 1970s where they belong," he said.

“Across Stockport council, women are desperately under-represented. Is it any wonder when the council’s own social media team is putting out crass comments like this?

“We need to be doing everything we can to encourage more women to get involved in politics, not lumping stereotypes on them.”

It’s not the first time the town hall has run into trouble with its approach to coronavirus messaging.

Back in April it had to apologise after using the example of the 1986 Challenger disaster - in which seven astronauts died when the space shuttle exploded just seconds after lift off - to drum home a message about listening to expert advice.

Coun Morrison, who is the Lib Dems' shadow cabinet member for Inclusive Neighbourhoods, said he expected better in the future.

He said: “Stockport council needs to get it’s act in gear, retract this post, apologise, and clearly stop hiring Jim Davidson to write their social media content."

A spokesperson for Stockport council said: "The council has taken down the social media posts. We apologise for any upset caused."

It is misogynistic. Also dumb. Also, I don't even understand what it means!

...I guess it would mean to distance yourself as you would with your mother in law because of mother in law/type humour...take all precautions etc...

...likening mother in law to COVID-19..?....

I didn't understand the message either.

There's an anti-speeding campaign in Scotland called 'Drive like Gran's in the car'.

...sorry I was half asleep this morning, so probably posted a confusing OP...

"Do you know how fast you were going back there???"

"I had no choice, officer! My gran is an adrenaline junkie!"

Its highlighted the need to social distance so it's all good.

I meant not understanding the message behind the campaign, not your post.

....hmmmm, yeah...but I don’t think it’s a one size fits all/type thing...obviously it’s a generalisation and targeted to female grandparents and not Male/or both...but it’s promoting a ‘balanced speed’, I would say...(...I don’t know if it’s inferring that he’s actually speeding or whether ‘gran’ just isn’t comfortable with his speed...it doesn’t really equate to attaching COVID-19 to a mother in law...imo...

...I think gran maybe just lusts after her pal Derrick...and she’s been stalking him and knows what time exactly he will cross that road...

...shakin’ that ass, shakin’ that ass...:laugh:...

I don't see the issue. It's clearly said in jest, and hardly the most offensive thing anyone has ever tweeted.

i would judge the message by whether it was successful or not. If it had the required effect ... great, if it didn't then it was inappropriate

...they did take it straight down and apologised as well...it’s just really looking at what others thought../...was it felt to be ‘Misogynist’/thoughtless or whatever, you know...

...do you mean if it had been particularly noticed that many in that local area weren’t wearing masks ../...not socially distancing etc...and then they were after the ad in a marked way....?...

I was thinking about this yesterday as there is a campaign to stop speeding, and it has Dad driving the kids around... when women speed too, you would never think we were in 2020

I can't work out how it's making light of domestic abuse. :think:

I remember when i was married and a made a Freudian slip. I was having
dinner with my then Mother-in-Law, and I wanted to say, "Could you please
pass the wine?" "But instead I said, "You awful witch, you have completely
ruined my life."

D:

It's out dated sexist ****e so I'm glad they took it down. I know it's supposed to be lighthearted etc and it's not the most offensive thing in the world but it does carry forward stupid stereotypes about women

I'm not sure I agree with the logic in that :joker:. The ends justify the means, essentially?

"Hey everyone, there's a demon worshipper here who says that killing puppies will reduce Covid!"

"Hmmm well if it has that effect then great and fine but if it doesn't decrease cases then it's a bit of a waste of perfectly good puppies isn't it."

Aren't mother-in-law jokes mainly just based on the idea that they have this rose tinted view of their own child in contrast to their partner and that makes them overbearing and impossible to please etc. It can apply just as much to wives as husbands I'd have thought (as in women can also find their mother-in-law very frustrating)

and as most comedians were men it was the MIL that was targetted

Yeah I would have thought it stereotyped overbearing mothers as opposed to "women".

Over reaction to a bit of tongue in cheek humour I think.

:joker:

Not misogynistic at all

yes but why not the Father in law :shrug: he could equally think no one is good enough for his Princess

It plays into the trope that all mother-in-laws are middle-aged battleaxes who you would obviously want to avoid. Of course it's misogynistic. It could probably be argued that it's very "low level" misogyny but :shrug: the subtle messages are the ones that let the larger ones flourish.

Indeed; if the aim of the joke is what's been said, why not "your in-laws are around the corner".

Mothers are always women though so it is about women

Don't open THAT can of worms Niamh! :laugh:

...it could have been ‘father in law’ just easily, but it wasn’t...because there hasn’t really been father in law ‘humour’ in the same way...as in, inferring father in laws are bit monstrous and stereotyping them in such a negative way...it’s not providing any ‘equal, why ‘in law humour at all’...and it’s definitely not progressing in any way by using a ‘humour’ that has become out dated for a reason...

they should have used "Chugger" instead as that would put the fear of God in most

Nah, sorry, ‘everyone hates/is scared of their mother-in-law’ is not demeaning an entire gender

...I mean, one of the very things that ‘father in law humour’ hasn’t been a thing is what should have told them that this was an awful regression...

...it’s stereotyping a ‘role’ as it were, in a negative way because it’s equating it to an horrendous virus...

Where did you get the impression that targetting the entire gender is a prerequisite of something being misogyny? One of the targetted characteristics of the joke is that it is the female in-law, specifically, thus it's gender-targetted, thus it's misogynistic. Just because it only applies to "mother in laws" and not women in general doesn't make it not misogyny. That's like the claim that Tommy Robinson isn't racist because he has black mates and only says bad things about Muslims. Or saying that someone "isn't homophobic" because they only dislike effeminate gay men and are fine with the blokey ones.

Most women become mother in laws ...:idc:

to say everyone hates them is just ridiculous

But not all women are mothers. :smug:

And not all mothers are monstrous in-laws.