My Own Blonde Moments....

Blonde jokes get on my nerves, I simply cannot abide them. What can possibly be funny about a lame and witless joke that diminishes, demeans, ridicules, belittles and insults a woman, who by nature of genetic disposition ( or who just wants to be pretty), is fair haired?

I just don't get it. The blonde is always, pretty, beautiful even, thin, long haired and wide eyed in these jokes. She's never homely, heavy set or cross-eyed. The joke always has this blonde bumbling along hapless and clueless. I find it curious that these jokes are directed toward a sort of ideal, a standard of beauty for many and they serve no other purpose than to tear this ideal down while laughing at her. I find that particularly interesting as it smacks of something very high-schoolish. It's as if someone who has been blessed with fair hair and beauty can't possibly possess intellect and sizable gray matter on top of it. The inference being she's a pretty blonde and that's all she gets from the genetic gods. She can't be blonde, beautiful and have brains. A notion I continually refute as I have given birth to one such wondrous creature.

I am a feminist at heart. I will always stop a person when they try and tell a blonde joke to me. When I hear a woman say, "I'm having a blonde moment"...I set her straight post haste . I'm having none of it. I will not propagate the stereotype. Women (and men) behave stupidly on a daily basis and it has nothing to do with hair color, natural or otherwise. Case in point...pick a Kardasian...it really doesn't matter which one, any of them will do. Better yet how about a professional athlete who brought his gun into a locker room or better yet a football player who shot himself in the leg walking up to the VIP room in a club? Let's not forget a certain southern Governor who told aides he was hiking the Appalachian Trail when in reality he was flying, commercial, to spend time with his paramour. Hapless? Bumbling? I'd say. It has nothing to do with hair color and everything to do with plain old stupidity itself. It comes in all shapes, sizes and colors..

This week I was present for a blonde joke telling. Not just one mind you. After the first was told friends casually mentioned that it wasn't a great idea to tell one around me. Not to be deterred, this precious jokester (who I am very fond of) proceeded to tell two more. Adding insult to...well insult.

Now some might say to me...be a good sport. Laugh with everyone, lighten up...it's just a joke. I'm not buying that. I am a good sport and it's not just a joke. Anytime a person, anytime a man, tells a joke that diminishes a woman, depicts her as inferior, demeans her as less than, it isn't just a joke. Telling the joke to me personally, telling more after you know I dislike them, hurts me. It tells me the joke teller has no respect for me, the joke teller thinks so little of me that he enjoys the insult enough to keep it going. I am not going to be smiling at someone as they insult me, as they tell me that I am stupid and then laugh about it with those nearby. I'm simply not standing for it....nor should any one else.

Truthfully, the only dumb blondes that exist are the ones who stand by and listen to these jokes without saying a word. The ones that tell them are just as clueless.

Indeed