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Not Tropeworthy: Slapstick Knows No Gender

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    Original post 
Note: This thread was proposed by nw09.

This trope is defined as "when a female character lacks the usual immunity to slapstick that comes with her sex and is thus regularly on the receiving end of physical comedy in a manner normally reserved for male characters."

This does not seem to be a trope. It's only defined as an aversion to something else, and tropes defined just as an aversion to other trope are usually not tropeworthy (especially when what it's an aversion to is defined as the absence of something.

Furthermore, there's no solid evidence that women are usually immune to slapstick. There are a lot of examples for this trope, and women have been on the receiving end as long as slapstick has existed. The trope description even says that female slapstick victims are becoming more common with time, so it may as well be the same as men being victims.

A wick check of 50 examples has only two examples that provided any sort of context for why this might be noteworthy ("the female character is One of the Boys" and "male characters get it more often"). The rest were written as just a standard Slapstick entry. Zero examples gave any indication that this trope is meant to be a subversion of women being immune to slapstick – it seems that this is just "slapstick but the victim is female".

Proposing a cut.

Wick check:

Slapstick Knows no Gender attempts to be "women are not Immune to Slapstick", which would only be noteworthy if they usually are. The sheer amount of examples for this trope indicates that this is probably not the case. The description even admits that this trope is becoming more and more common with time, so it may as well be no different from men being the victims of slapstick.

50/50

    Just "women receive slapstick" 48/ 50 

    Has additional context 2/ 50 
  • Black Jesus: Due to being One of the Guys, she gets about as many comical beatdowns as the rest of them.
  • Slapstick Knows no Gender: It's more common for the male characters to get hurt, but even the female characters get this from time to time. This includes an episode where Jocelyne is repeatedly hit on the head with a frying pan, while Dominique gets hit on the hand by that same frying pan.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Dec 4th 2022 at 10:41:03 AM

GastonRabbit Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#1: Nov 4th 2022 at 8:36:22 PM

To-do list:

    Original post 
Note: This thread was proposed by nw09.

This trope is defined as "when a female character lacks the usual immunity to slapstick that comes with her sex and is thus regularly on the receiving end of physical comedy in a manner normally reserved for male characters."

This does not seem to be a trope. It's only defined as an aversion to something else, and tropes defined just as an aversion to other trope are usually not tropeworthy (especially when what it's an aversion to is defined as the absence of something.

Furthermore, there's no solid evidence that women are usually immune to slapstick. There are a lot of examples for this trope, and women have been on the receiving end as long as slapstick has existed. The trope description even says that female slapstick victims are becoming more common with time, so it may as well be the same as men being victims.

A wick check of 50 examples has only two examples that provided any sort of context for why this might be noteworthy ("the female character is One of the Boys" and "male characters get it more often"). The rest were written as just a standard Slapstick entry. Zero examples gave any indication that this trope is meant to be a subversion of women being immune to slapstick – it seems that this is just "slapstick but the victim is female".

Proposing a cut.

Wick check:

Slapstick Knows no Gender attempts to be "women are not Immune to Slapstick", which would only be noteworthy if they usually are. The sheer amount of examples for this trope indicates that this is probably not the case. The description even admits that this trope is becoming more and more common with time, so it may as well be no different from men being the victims of slapstick.

50/50

    Just "women receive slapstick" 48/ 50 

    Has additional context 2/ 50 
  • Black Jesus: Due to being One of the Guys, she gets about as many comical beatdowns as the rest of them.
  • Slapstick Knows no Gender: It's more common for the male characters to get hurt, but even the female characters get this from time to time. This includes an episode where Jocelyne is repeatedly hit on the head with a frying pan, while Dominique gets hit on the hand by that same frying pan.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Dec 4th 2022 at 10:41:03 AM

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
GastonRabbit Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#2: Nov 4th 2022 at 8:36:33 PM

Paging ~nw09 to the thread.

Anyway, there are way too many inbounds to do a full-fledged cut, so I think we should either redirect to Slapstick or disambiguate between Slapstick and Immune to Slapstick if we get rid of this.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Nov 4th 2022 at 10:37:35 AM

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Noaqiyeum Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they) from the gentle and welcoming dark (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they)
#3: Nov 4th 2022 at 8:47:39 PM

Furthermore, there's no solid evidence that women are usually immune to slapstick. There are a lot of examples for this trope, and women have been on the receiving end as long as slapstick has existed.

I don't believe the page is about exceptions to women being immune to slapstick - rather, I understand it to be that slapstick as a genre is typically an exception to Beauty Is Never Tarnished.

It's difficult to say that that's a trope, though, without the noted problem of just listing actresses who did physical comedy. If I'm right, it might need to focus only on slapstick gags occurring in other genres where Beauty Is Never Tarnished is the norm, or else be incorporated into a description or Analysis/ page.

The Revolution Will Not Be Tropeable
Adept (Holding A Herring) Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
#4: Nov 4th 2022 at 9:04:07 PM

[up]Even if we restrict it that way, the page is still defined as an aversion to Beauty Is Never Tarnished, and isn't really meaningful on its own.

[up][up]I lean towards redirecting.

nw09 Since: Apr, 2018
#5: Nov 4th 2022 at 9:15:35 PM

Support disambiguating, since the idea behind the trope was related to Immune to Slapstick.

Noaqiyeum Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they) from the gentle and welcoming dark (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they)
#6: Nov 4th 2022 at 9:44:45 PM

[up][up] ...not sure I understand, sorry. Are you agreeing with my second paragraph, or am I overlooking a distinction?

The Revolution Will Not Be Tropeable
Adept (Holding A Herring) Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
#7: Nov 4th 2022 at 9:53:01 PM

[up]What I'm saying is that even if we go by your definition, it's still not tropeworthy.

The problem raised in the OP is that the trope is basically an aversion to another "trope" (i.e. the perception that females are Immune to Slapstick)—and that's not tropeworthy because it leads to "Slapstick happens to women"-type examples that are The Same, but More Specific to Slapstick.

You propose that it's about "an exception to Beauty Is Never Tarnished" instead of the OP's definition, but it's still basically defined as an aversion to something else, and restricting the examples doesn't resolve the tropeworthiness issue. Redefining the page to "focus only on slapstick gags occurring in other genres where Beauty Is Never Tarnished is the norm" will still end up leaving examples that boils down to "slapstick happens".

Edited by Adept on Nov 4th 2022 at 11:53:34 PM

Noaqiyeum Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they) from the gentle and welcoming dark (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they)
#8: Nov 4th 2022 at 9:56:33 PM

Yes, which is why I also suggested moving it to an Analysis/ page for Slapstick or Beauty Is Never Tarnished.

Edited by Noaqiyeum on Nov 4th 2022 at 4:57:17 PM

The Revolution Will Not Be Tropeable
Amonimus the Retromancer from <<|Wiki Talk|>> (Sergeant) Relationship Status: In another castle
the Retromancer
#9: Nov 5th 2022 at 12:41:47 AM

I'll parrot the argument made at Would Hit a Girl, meaning for the past decade or two the aversions of "women can't get hurt" are no longer notable, so redirect/disambig is fine.

Edited by Amonimus on Nov 5th 2022 at 10:43:28 PM

TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
WarJay77 Big Catch, Sparkle Edition from The Void (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
#10: Nov 5th 2022 at 12:48:10 AM

Ehhh... I mean I get the logic but just because a trope is currently outdated doesn't mean it's not actually a trope. That's why we have things like Forgotten Trope and Discredited Trope.

The issue with this one is that it's just talking about the one genre where women getting hurt has always been seen as comical. Women have been getting hurt in slapstick since the days of I Love Lucy. It's weird to specifically call it out, though, since the point is that it is the norm in slapstick already and thus there's no point in having a separate trope for "slapstick, but a woman". All it really does is force people to split examples needlessly when discussing slapstick comedy in a work.

So, I agree with a merge, but on the basis of this trope and slapstick being the exact same trope with a needless gender split, not on the basis of the stereotype being outdated.

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
RobertTYL Since: Oct, 2019 Relationship Status: Holding out for a hero
#11: Nov 5th 2022 at 1:21:00 AM

Half of these are just "A Butt-Monkey that Happens to be Female"...

Provided that wasn't already a trope on its own

Edited by RobertTYL on Nov 5th 2022 at 4:22:08 PM

GastonRabbit Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#12: Nov 5th 2022 at 1:39:47 AM

[up]Butt-Monkey could go on the disambiguation page if we disambiguate this between the pages previously mentioned.

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
amathieu13 Since: Aug, 2013
#13: Nov 5th 2022 at 3:16:36 AM

[up][up][up]agree with that logic and the merge

MorganWick (Elder Troper)
themayorofsimpleton Now a lurker. Thanks for everything. | he/him from Elsewhere (Experienced, Not Yet Jaded) Relationship Status: Abstaining
GastonRabbit Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#16: Nov 5th 2022 at 9:48:19 AM

Maybe I wasn't completely awake when I originally read WarJay's post, because I took another look at it just now and I agree with her argument that "Slapstick, but toward women" is The Same, but More Specific. Historical information regarding the depiction and/or perception of slapstick toward women instead of men can go on an Analysis subpage of the Slapstick trope page (which doesn't already exist) if necessary.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Nov 5th 2022 at 11:49:00 AM

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Amonimus the Retromancer from <<|Wiki Talk|>> (Sergeant) Relationship Status: In another castle
the Retromancer
#17: Nov 5th 2022 at 10:25:09 AM

To clarify myself, I wasn't arguing that it became a Forgotten Trope, I think that "Slapstick but with women" isn't own trope in the first place, it was just easier to notice in early days.

Edited by Amonimus on Nov 5th 2022 at 8:26:11 PM

TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
GastonRabbit MOD Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#18: Nov 6th 2022 at 10:55:53 PM

I hooked a crowner regarding whether to merge with Slapstick. Note that the part about making an Analysis subpage for Slapstick isn't a requirement; I was simply mentioning that doing so is acceptable if the two tropes are merged.

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Tremmor19 reconsidering from bunker in the everglades Since: Dec, 2018 Relationship Status: Too sexy for my shirt
reconsidering
#19: Nov 7th 2022 at 3:17:13 PM

i don't really have an objection to this specific case but i do actually want to push back on the general idea— it seems like there's a lot of push to de-gender tropes where gender no longer is a factor, but was previously— this seems like a bad idea?

like in theory we are supposed to document tropes in general, not just in 2022, and it seems like this recency bias makes it untenable to trope anything which doesn't apply in the modern day, including things which were clearly tropes at the time

I'm not sure i have a perfect solution, but I'd really like there to be some kind of explicit way to trope things like "this story rejects a near-universal convention for its era" which doesn't allow for examples from eras/ locations where it's not universal

Edited by Tremmor19 on Nov 7th 2022 at 6:20:36 AM

WarJay77 Big Catch, Sparkle Edition from The Void (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
#20: Nov 7th 2022 at 3:20:10 PM

Again, the issue isn't that the gender stuff is "no longer relevant", it's that for slapstick in particular gender never has been relevant and so, since the dawn of the genre, this trope has always just been a pointlessly gendered version of Slapstick with no other difference or meaning.

Of course we don't want to get rid of tropes where the concept is outdated but was once a real thing... but we haven't really been doing that, we've only been targeting tropes that have decayed into meaninglessness or ones where the difference was always artificial.

Edited by WarJay77 on Nov 7th 2022 at 6:21:43 AM

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Tremmor19 reconsidering from bunker in the everglades Since: Dec, 2018 Relationship Status: Too sexy for my shirt
reconsidering
#21: Nov 7th 2022 at 3:23:46 PM

^ yea, like i said I'm not pushing back on this one specifically (although i could see an argument for "within a single work, male characters are subject to violence and action in serious scenes, while female characters are only subject to funny violence with no lasting consequences"). but that would be a pretty significant narrowing imo so it might just be a new trope altogether

but mostly I'm discussing the overall trend

Amonimus the Retromancer from <<|Wiki Talk|>> (Sergeant) Relationship Status: In another castle
the Retromancer
#22: Nov 7th 2022 at 3:24:14 PM

The wick check showing that it's a ZCE magnet is just another argument that it'd be difficult to keep.

I know there's a trend, but it's not the main reason.

Edited by Amonimus on Nov 7th 2022 at 2:24:47 PM

TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
WarJay77 Big Catch, Sparkle Edition from The Void (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
#23: Nov 7th 2022 at 3:25:13 PM

Like I said, I can't actually think of a time when we targeted a gendered trope that was an actual trope, especially on the basis of the gender split alone, you know?

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Noaqiyeum Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they) from the gentle and welcoming dark (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they)
#24: Nov 7th 2022 at 3:34:59 PM

I share Tremmor's concerns regarding recency bias (not in terms of de-gendering tropes specifically, but also towards treating deprecated or niche tropes as not thriving - this came up in the Tandem Parasite thread), but in this case I agree with Jay. The only way I can imagine handling this as its own trope is to show the contrast "Beauty Is Never Tarnished in dramatic scenes, but averted in comic scenes in the same work", and since that would mean purging all the examples that are actually from slapstick comedy it would likely need to go to TLP anyway.

The Revolution Will Not Be Tropeable
Adept (Holding A Herring) Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
#25: Nov 8th 2022 at 12:36:00 AM

We could always put any salvageable concepts in the Yard. But as it is, there's nothing usable from Slapstick Knows no Gender, especially since none of the examples seem to follow the definition outlined [up].

Trope Repair Shop: Slapstick Knows No Gender
6th Nov '22 10:51:32 PM

Crown Description:

Concerns have been raised that Slapstick Knows No Gender is The Same But More Specific to Slapstick due to its gender-specific focus compared to Slapstick itself. What should be done with it?

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