[“The Sound of Young America” theme song]

Jesse Thorn hey welcome to “The Sound of Young America” radio friends. I’m Jesse Thorn, America’s Radio Sweetheart. On this week’s “The Sound of Young America” broadcast, three folks who are practicing some serious anti-hegemonic cultural production. That’s American Studies talk for sticking it to the man. A little bit later on in the program we’ll talk with Lisa Jervis and Andi Zeisler. They are the founding editors of Bitch Magazine. The subtitle of which is “A Feminist Response to Popular Culture”. They’re celebrating their 10^th anniversary with the publication of a book called “Bitchfest” which compiles some of the best essays from the first 10 years of the magazine. And in just a minute we’ll talk with Maz Jobrani. Maz is headlining the Axis of Evil Comedy Tour which brings together a group of three Middle Eastern standup comedians. He’s also one of the co-stars of the upcoming television sitcom “The Knight of Prosperity” which has already received some rave reviews from the critics out there. That’s all to come on this week’s “The Sound of Young America” from meximumfun.org. We’ll be back in just a second.

[music]

My guest Maz Jobrani is a standup comedian and an actor. He’s been seen in films like “The Interpreter” and “Friday After Next”, on television in “Curb Your Enthusiasm” and on “24”, and he’s one of stars of the upcoming ABC sitcom “The Knight of Prosperity”. He’s currently on the road with the all Middle Eastern American Axis of Evil Comedy Tour. I spoke with him from a rented home in New York where he was working on the show.

Let’s start by talking about this tour that your on. This Axis of Evil Comedy Tour is this is an sort of an odd duck. I think some of the other it’s obviously in some ways in the mold of you know the Kings of Comedy or the Blue Collar Comedy Tour. But those are comedians doing doing sort of specifically targeted acts at a very specifically targeted demographic. Whereas what you’re doing with this Axis of Evil Comedy Tour is similarly themed but I can’t imagine that I can’t imagine that you’re you’re really touring the country on the back of the Arab American comedy audience.

Maz Jobrani: No you’re right. Actually, I always use the term Middle Eastern American because then that includes lik e you know Iranians and Arabs and even going further you could include Indians and other other eastern countries there. But but yeah, actually one of our goals with doing this is to cross over to a more general American population crowd. And we actually a lot of our shows, like we did a show in DC it was 1800 people were there and I’d say about 60% was Middle Eastern, 40% was just like white American. And that’s the thing is that we get a lot of support from the Middle Eastern community because there just has not been I mean you can’t name a Middle Eastern American comedian. They they you know who nobody. There’s no name. There’s never been anyone that anyone knows of and especially given the times and the way Middle Easterners are depicted and and you know the first word, I’ve tried this on stage before, I’ve said you know “What so you think of when you hear the word ‘Middle East’?” And people say “War” or “Terrorism” right off the bat. And so go “Oh great. That’s our image.” So that’s the thing is we’re trying to do standup and you know and cross over and have people come to our shows and go “Oh that guy was funny and he was Middle Eastern and he didn’t throw a rock at me or try and blow anything up. Whoa that’s kind of cool.”

Jesse Thorn Are you guys representative of some kind of scene in the in the comedy world? Are there is there a Middle Eastern American comedy world that you’re bringing to people or are you sort of creating it?

Maz Jobrani: You know it’s an interesting question. I don’t I guess we’re kind of at the forefront here because what happened was the way we all got together was about six years ago before September 11^th Mitzi Shore who is the owner of the Comedy Store and Pauly Shore’s mother, she had me as a regular at the Comedy Store. I was her only Middle Eastern comic there, and then she came up with the idea of putting together a show with Middle Eastern Comedians and that’s when she found Ahmed Ahmed and I had seen Aron Kader so I recommended him to be a regular at the club. And he did he performed in front of her, became a regular. Then we brought on Sam Tripoli. There was a handful of us and at that point it was what I just told you. It was like every every like ethnicity that that is even related to the Middle East or can be mistaken mistaken for like a in this whole war on terror thing. Like she had like an Indian on the show. You know Sam Tripoli was like half-Armenian. It was just like anything that kind of fit it. So we kind of brought came together and she called it the Arabian Knights. And we started shows doing shows as the Arabian Knights. And one of the things was what I just said earlier was that Iranians aren’t Arabs so a lot of times we’d do these shows and Iranians would come up afterwards and say ”Oh it was great. What a great time. Thank you so much for a fun time, but you know Iranians are not Arabs.” I was like, “Yeah I know, but you know in the minds of the world we kind of all we all fall into the same category.” And so we just used the Arabian Knights name for a while and did well. And then after a while Aron, Ahmed and I, Aron is Palestinian American, Ahmed is Egyptian American, we decided to go with the name the Axis of Evil Comedy Show. It had been a name we’d thrown around before and we liked the statement that it made. In my mind, it makes the statement that it’s basically taking that term that George Bush gave to that part of the world and kind of turning it on its head by putting the word “comedy” behind it. Because in my mind it’s a total joke because if you break it down you know why is it that Iran and North Korean and Iraq ended up in this “Axis of Evil” when you have other countries like Egypt and Saudi Arabia where some of the terrorists came from? Not to day that they should have been in it. I’m just saying there’s a lot more behind why these countries ended up where they ended up in this name. And secondly, when George Bush says “It’s the governments I have a problem with.” In reality, even if he says that, unfortunately the people suffer from these countries. And so we did we we’ve kind of I think we’re at the forefront at creating this kind of new thing. You know there’s another tour out there called The Allah Made Me Funny Tour, but they’re not all Middle Eastern. One’s a Pakistani comic. The other one’s an African American comedian. They’re more based on the the Muslim thing that brings them together. But yeah it’s new man. I’m pretty sure it’s pretty new in terms of you know just being Middle Eastern based.

Jesse Thorn Do you I’ve talked to the comedians who are who are not white and play ethnically themed shows, and a lot of times they tell me they have kind of mixed feelings about it. You know on the one hand obviously being very proud of their ethnicity and proud to be able to play to an audience that will you know largely understand the cultural references they’re making and things like that. But on the other hand also kind of not necessarily always comfortable with the idea of being pigeonholed by their ethnicity. What’s your feeling about that?

Maz Jobrani: You know I think that it’s funny because early on you know Sam Tripoli and I were talking and he said “You know you want to be a comedian that happens to be Iranian, not an Iranian comedian.” And I agree with him. And I think that as a person I’m you know I’m 34 years old. I’m married. I have a lot of other things that I can talk and I do talk about in my standup. And I think as a writer and as a creator we need to expand on other aspects of ourselves. Now the problem that I keep running into, it’s such a heated political time that even if I weren’t Iranian, there’s a lot of political stuff I want to talk about. So when I read the newspapers and I hear that you know the President of Iraq came to America and made a speech in front of Congress and was saying that Iraq is fine. Everything’s going well. I’m thinking to myself, “Is it really? Is this just a pol you know this is a politician speaking?” And it’s like, “Are these guys out of their minds like are they reading the same newspaper I am?” Or like when I hear that Donald Rumsfeld that somebody asked him “Is it a civil war over there?” And he started hemming and hawing, going “Well you know define civil war.” Like “What do you mean?” And I’m like “Come one man.” So I think it’s a comedian’s job to expose hypocrisy as much as we can and but it feels like these days a lot of that falls into this Middle Eastern category when I see when I see what’s going on in the world. So I end up talking about that stuff a lot. And and yeah I also would like to talk about other issues [?] but a lot of especially in front of one of these like if we’re doing an Axis of Evil Comedy Show where I know that there is a charged kind of Middle Eastern crowd that wants to hear some political stuff wants to hear positive stuff about the Middle East then I just go for it. And I have a blast and it’s great to have these people on board. I mean our show in DC, you know DC is the you know political heart of America and it’s great to just do a show in front of 1800 people and you know one of the other comics, Dean Obeidallah, who performs with us made a reference to Ann Coulter and they all got it with no problem. I mentioned the name John Bolton and I didn’t have to go through the explanation of you know the American Ambassador to the United Nations. It was just John Bolton and they got it. You know it’s great to have that that in front of these kinds of audiences. I also end up doing shows where you know whether it’s the Comedy Store in LA or the Comedy Cellar here in New York where it’s a mixed crowd and sometimes you do. You get a little heavy on your ethnicity and you see that you’ve lost this crowd and then part of you goes “Well I need more jokes that’ll cross over.” And then part of you goes “Well maybe they just they need to be more informed about who I am, and I’ve got to kind of stick to my guns and push it.” So you know it’s it goes both ways. I you know I don’t want to like I learned early on I would Iwould get Iwould get booked at some clubs that were bars and I’d go out and I’d be wanting to work on material and then I’d end up having to do boob jokes and stuff because they didn’t want to hear anything about politics. I learned early on that I did not want to be that guy. I don’t want to necessarily please every crowd. I want to have my voice and and then hopefully be able to have different crowds understand me.

Jesse Thorn When you’re on the road as a comedian, you’re working with your working with lots and lots and lots of other comedians in you know in the Comedy Store in a Comedy Store show. You know you’re working with a lot more than two other comedians often. Do you see a lot of Middle Eastern stereotypes that are still sort of that are still sort of de rigueur in contemporary American comedy?

Maz Jobrani: Absolutely. And it’s funny I was just talking to again to Dean Obeidallah and he was telling he saw some comic who was doing jokes you know an American comic doing jokes about the Middle East. And he said you know the guy was like using an Indian accent but he was talking he was trying to be an Arab and then he was just like mixing it all up and just putting all together everyone together. And that’ sthe thing is that it’s very specific the differences. And I mean even like you know after September 11^th when when Indian Sikhs were being shot who have nothing to do with that you know world of terrorism and the sort in terms of what had happened on September 11^th. And people think that OK if you wear a turban then you’re a bad and that’s it. And the I think that a lot of people you know I live in LA now. So there’s a lot of Iranians there. So there’s a lot of people in LA who have been exposed to the Iranian culture, but a lot of people haven’t. And if you go to the country even more people don’t know what what the Middle Eastern cultures are all about. And so I I do run into that. And I see comics doing some joke and it just you know. They say “Oh the guy you know turban dude” or whatever. It’s just simplifying it a little too much. And I want to go up onstage and clarify it to people and go “No this isn’t the case.” You know you know and again it’s the situation where we have an issue in the world with you know the Middle Eastern extremists that might be that are going around and and and actually you know doing terrorist acts that are a minority number wise if you look at it. If you look at it, they’re a minority amongst all Middle Easterners and also Muslims in the world. But that is the stereotype that people always talk about. And and so that’s kind of you know I also make jokes about it, but at the same time I try to be as specific and I try and be as clear as possible. I’ve even had people come up to me afterwards and like correct me on certain things. You know whether it was I was talking about the Academy Awards and there was no Arabs there, and someone goes “Salma Hayek,” and I go “What?”, and they go “Yeah, she’s half-Lebanese,” or whatever half-Lebanese or Palestinian or something. I was like “Wow you learn something every every every show, I guess.”

Jesse Thorn You’re listening to “The Sound of Young America” from maximumfun.org. My guest is Maz Jobrani. We’ll be back with more with Maz, that’s a mouthful, in just one minute.

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Jesse Thorn You know “The Sound of Young America” is supported by listener donations and it doesn’t take a large donation to make a large difference. On our website, we ask for donations of $2, $5 or $10 a month. I think you can probably swing that if you really “The Sound of Young America”. I’d love to have you do it. It makes a huge difference for the program. I haven’t taken home a dollar from “The Sound of Young America”. I do it because I love it. All our money goes to buy things like mixing boards and microphones and stuff like that. So visit maximumfun.org and donate today.

[music]

You’re listening to “The Sound of Young America”. I’m Jesse Thorn, America’s radio sweetheart. My guest Maz Jobrani is an actor and standup comedian. He is currently on tour with the Axis of Evil Comedy Tour. He’s also going to be on the ABC sitcom “The Knights of Prosperity.

What about these ethnic variations? I man I watched your acting reel on your website and you know you’re a guy who grew up in in Marin County right, in the Bay Area?

Maz Jobrani: Yeah.

Jesse Thorn And of of the roles that you have, there are a few that are clearly you know could very well be Iranian American guy or you know just American guy that happens to also be Iranian American. But you also have you know a lot of roles where you’re playing you know your role on “Curb Your Enthusiasm” for example, you’re playing a Sikh.

Maz Jobrani: Yeah.

Jesse Thorn And there’s a lot of roles that you’re just playing the kind of vaguely Middle Eastern guy. How do you feel about that when you’re when you’re like going out on auditions and auditioning for a lot of roles that are I presume just kind of. I mean, even on the “Knights of Prosperity” which I’ve already spoken very highly of, your character is a cab driver.

Maz Jobrani: Yeah.

Jesse Thorn How do you feel about that?

Maz Jobrani: Yeah it’s funny because you know it’s funny because people will look at it on at on the face and the surface and they go “Oh man another ethnic you know another stereotype. You’re playing a cab driver.” And I go “Well no.” I go, “Look you know there’s a lot of other things involved.” First of all, as a as an actor you want to be involved with good writing and this show “Knights of Prosperity” has good writing. The opportunity to work on “Curb Your Enthusiasm” was great to do you know a show with these guys that are that are at the top of their game. You know or playing a Saudi ambassador on “The West Wing”. There’s all these opportunities to do great to work with great people and great writing. That’s number one. Number two is for example you know even in this show “The Knights of Prosperity” they they talk about how this character I play Gourishankar Subramaniam was a lawyer back in India, and now he’s here driving a cab, driving old ladies to matinees as they say in the show. Well you know I take the cab all the time in New York and there’s a lot of those types of people who were you know I met a guy who was a Ph.D. in Egypt and now he’s driving a cab here. And that’s a reality. And that’s also something that I can relate to in terms of like ok I’ve met people like that or I know people like that. I have relatives of mine who came from Iran and took jobs in positions they never would have taken. And so I go ok that I can understand. What I’ve tried to do is I’ve tried to stay away from the stereotype of playing any terrorist parts and I you know I had done that on a Chuck Norris movie once and it was like it was the worst experience. It was stupid. And I now have a bit out of it so that’s good at least. As a comedian you get a bit out of it.

Jesse Thorn [laughs]

Maz Jobrani: And then I also did it on the TV show “24”, where I played the ambivalent terrorist in season two. And like halfway through the episode I was like, “I don’t want to do this.” And then they shot me and I was like “OK that sucks.” But what I’ve said is, I don’t want to play anymore parts like that where because if you want to see Middle Eastern terrorists just turn on the TV. You see them on the news all the time. But I’m not going to stop playing other parts because end of the day I mean you look at my look that you know I can play a lot of different Middle Eastern parts. I’ve also played you know Latino. There’s this movie “Moon Pie” that hasn’t come out yet, but I play a Mexican guy in that. You know I’d love to be able to play more you know like Tony Shaloub got a chance to play an Italian in “The Big Night”. I would love to get a chance to do that. Sometimes, it just depends on where you are in your career and what kind of opportunities come up. But for me I have fun playing these parts you know and I don’t think I don’t think it necessarily feeds a negative stereotype when there’s a reality. That’s more real to me, the Indian cab driver, than playing a terrorist. Again, like I said, I always I haven’t even met emphasize in my in my standup that I’ve never even met a terrorist, talked to one, nor do I want to meet one. But I have met Indian cab drivers. So it’s easier for me to go ok that’s more of a reality to me. And I know that people are going to be critical all the time but you know it just it like I said it’s it’s a gig you’re having fun doing. You’re the writers write great stuff. And I mean every character in this show is an underdog, is the Indian cab driver and the Columbian waitress and the you know American janitor and the you know the black bouncer whatever security guard. So yeah I just think that you know you can’t just lead your whole career going, I will only play parts that are you know men of integrity you know lawyers and doctors only you know.

Jesse Thorn Have you ever have you ever had an occasion where you where you either went into a job or went into an audition and and it left bad taste in your mouth to the extent that you decided not to participate in it or to leave or to turn down a role?

Maz Jobrani: Yeah. I haven’t had the audition actually happen where I ended up leaving with a bad taste in my mouth, but I have had you know audition come to me where they said “Hey you know they’re doing another show you know or movie or whatever and it’s a terrorist part.” And I’ve just started turning those down. It’s funny. My agent called me up just a little a little while back and he goes, “Hey I’m getting ready”. Because I’ve told them, I’ve instructed them that I no longer want to do those parts. So he called me up and he said “Hey, I’m getting ready to turn down a role. I just wanted to double check with you.” And I said “OK what is it?” And he goes “’Flight 93’. Any more questions?” I go “Nope. That’s fine.” And then I said “Are there any good parts in there?” And he said “Yeah but they’re all for white guys.” I said “OK that’s fine. I’m done.” So yeah. I mean I’ve unfortunately those parts are still out there and and you know. I mean that’s just the reality of it. I can’t blame people for writing you know a movie about about September 11^th of this sort but you know I just choose not to participate in this.

Jesse Thorn Something you alluded to about “Knights of Prosperity” that it that impressed me is that is it is a program that very much identifies with the underdog and and doesn’t really paint broad strokes about working calls people which is pretty uncommon I think in in television. It must have been exciting to have that come across your desk and get that role which is I mean you mentioned the fact that you character was a was a professional in his past life. There was a wonderful line in the pilot of the series where you draft an intern into this effort to become a criminal gang and you describe it you describe it to the main character as being like white slavery.

Maz Jobrani: Yeah.

Jesse Thorn I though that was pretty fantastic. It seems it seems to be very very sincere. It seems to very sincerely identify with working class people in a way that American television especially the past 20 years or so hasn’t that much.

Maz Jobrani: You know as an actor, especially with comedy parts, you know when auditions come up during pilot season, you read a lot of sitcoms and they tend to be pretty just you know not they I’ve never never laughed out loud as I was reading one of those scripts. And when I read this script I was laughing out loud. And I just think that the writers have created these great characters that you know we just talked about this recently while we were shooting that it’s funny that the characters are trying to rob Mick Jagger. And you know being a thief is not a good thing necessarily, but these characters are written in such a way that I feel that the audience will root for us because we are the underdogs. And and it’s just fun, like I said. What they’ve done is they’ve really done it in an equal handed way as well where they have this diverse cast which you don’t see on TV that often. You know that’s one of the things I was saying you know like “Friends” for example was not quite often for being a show in New York City where everybody was just white at the coffee shop. And here we are with a show that has a Middle Eastern guy playing an Indian but still a Middle Eastern guy, a Latina, an African American, and then you’ve got Donal Logue playing you know just the white American guy, and then you get Lenny Venito as kind of an Italian based guy, and then Josh Grisetti as the intern. But it’s got this it’s got this diverse cast and everyone has their weaknesses and strengths you know? And every week we get our scripts and we read them and I’m just cracking up at the kind of stuff they’re coming up with you know. And that’s the other thing too if they haven’t made it, for example, again talking about the stereotypes, they haven’t made my character. I intentionally did not I don’t play the character with too thick of an accent in terms of like you know I didn’t make him like Apu where I was like [thick fake Indian accent] “Hello how are you? What are you doing?” It wasn’t like that. I intentionally lessened the accent so that you know he talks like this [mild Indian accent] “he’s still got an accent of this sort” but it’s not over the top because I didn’t want it to be too cartoony And at the same time like I said they make these they’re not weak characters either like when the Italian guy Lenny Venito’s character “Squatch” you know says something to me that I don’t agree with I you know I give it back give it back to him. And it’s great to have a character that not sitting there and just taking an abuse taking abuse from someone else but actually standing up for himself.

Jesse Thorn Do you think there’s any things in this series that Indian American people are going to be coming up to you after shows and complaining about or pointing out?

Maz Jobrani: You know what, I’m I’ve started to learn that no matter what you say and do people will come up to you people have their agendas and they will come up to you and someone there’s always someone out there who’s going to find you and give their two cents on it. And I’m sure I will either get letters or I mean it will start of with “Hey, why do you have an Iranian playing an Indian?” And my mentality on this is that you know we’re all actors and you know if an actor can come in and do a part and fit the part for an Iranian better than I can, and this has happened before, you know that guys should take it whatever the whatever his ethnicity is. And I’ve seen that happen before. And so the same thing goes in this situation. Maybe you know I’m sure there’s Indian actors that might have done some parts of it better but somehow this character and I clicked. So it’s like, great. So I was able to get it and so I‘m doing it. But everyone’s got their agenda, like I said, and so I’m sure someone will approach me and talk to me abut it.

Jesse Thorn All right. I admit.

Maz Jobrani: I should have like a Indian first member in my new posse if I can get one. Actually I’m married to an Indian, so I’ll just have her hang out with me.

Jesse Thorn Well Maz thank you so much for taking the time to be on “The Sound of Young America”. It was a pleasure to have you.

Maz Jobrani: Thanks a lot. It was great to be on here.

Jesse Thorn Maz Jobrani can be found online at mazjobrani.com. You can find out more information about the Axis of Evil Comedy Tour at axisofevilcomedy.com. And “The Knights of Prosperity”, Maz’s new television program, premiers Tuesday October 17^th at 9 on ABC. You’re listening to “The Sound of Young America”. We’ll be back in just a second with the founding editors of Bitch Magazine.

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Jesse Thorn You’re listening to “The Sound of Young America”. I’m Jesse Thorn, America’s Radio Sweetheart. My guest Lisa Jervis and Andi Zeisler are the founding editors of the Bay Area’s own Bitch Magazine which is a feminist look at popular culture. They’re celebrating their 10^th anniversary with the publication of “Bitchfest” a compendium of writings from the magazine, both theirs and others. Lisa, Andi, welcome to “The Sound of Young America”. How are you?

: Good thanks for having us.

Andi Zeisler: For having us.

Jesse Thorn So what was the impetus 10 years ago behind starting this magazine? I gather both of you were in your young 20s. What was was it wanting to create the place to work that you didn’t see on the media landscape?

Lisa Jervis: It was really creating what we wanted to read that we didn’t really see on the media landscape.

Andi Zeisler: Yeah.

Lisa Jervis: We were frustrated with with women’s magazines and with the fact that they were you know depressing to read and the gender messages they were sending out and you know TV, advertising, movies, everything. We just were very very frustrated with the messages that were being put out there about women and gender and feminism.

Andi Zeisler: It sort of seemed to us that women’s media was and media for young women in particular was moving backward instead of forward. And at the time you know we were we were 22. We didn’t have journalism degrees. We didn’t really have a voice but we did have kind of a passion for the subject matter. And so we were like if we’re going to do it, if we want to read this stuff, we’re going to have to create it. And assuming that thee are other people out there who are interested in this stuff maybe we’ll have an audience.

Jesse Thorn You said “a passion for the subject matter”. To what extent do you mean a passion for feminism and women’s issues, and to what extent do you mean a passion for popular culture?

Andi Zeisler: Well popular culture, I mean that was sort of the that was sort of the genesis of it. I mean Lisa and I spent a lot of time you know we were bored 9-to-5ers and we spent a lot of time in our free time reading magazines, and going to movies and watching TV and talking about it to each other. And you know a lot of that talk was actually complaining how insulting and kind of hackneyed the portrayals of women and girls were.

Lisa Jervis: You sort of really see both you know a passion for the subject matter and pop culture and feminism. I mean I don’t think that we would have chosen to do a magazine that was just about pop culture without the feminist component. And at the same time you know pop culture is you know known as kind of guilty pleasure sometimes within feminist circles. And certainly 10 years ago when we started publishing, there was not that much serious pop culture critique going on from a feminist perspective or any other. So it really seemed like you know like a big kind of gaping hole because there’s so much to say from a feminist and politicized perspective about pop culture and it just wasn’t getting a lot of attention.

Jesse Thorn Do you feel like there was there was something in the feminist culture or feminist academic culture that led to there being that hole in in feminist critique?

Lisa Jervis: I think that pop culture in all and it’s not just confined to feminist academia. It’s really you know there’s always been this kind of false distinction between high culture and low culture, or mass culture and smart culture you know that leads to kind of disdain on the part of intellectuals toward you know mass media. And I think that that’s really what’s behind that.

Jesse Thorn Tell me about how you decided to define this the tone that you have in the magazine which is I think very much both both sort of literate and critical in this sort of academic sense and not afraid to be kind of fun and funny as well. I mean that seems like something that you don’t find a lot of you don’t find in a lot of places.

Andi Zeisler: Well to us it was really important to have the subject matter be really accessible. You know because it’s not like there was a lack of feminist and pop culture critique out there, but those tended to be either very academic in the case of pop culture critique and not enough not accessible enough in the terms in terms of feminist media. You know Ms. Magazine as awesome as it’s always been at the time wasn’t really making any effort to court young college age readers and rarely addressed pop culture. And so you know Lisa and I were both college educated. We both knew how to sort of throw the jargon around, but that really wasn’t our idea in doing this ‘zine. It was to really lend kind of a fun irreverence about our love/hate relationship with pop culture and you know a real sense of informed feminist critique that was would be accessible to people who didn’t necessarily weren’t necessarily completely coming from the same place we were. You know we wanted to really make people you know think about media criticism but also entertain them.

Lisa Jervis: And also you know it really would be fun to write as well as fun to read. So I think that that was behind that’s behind a lot of our sense of humor is that’s just kind of you know how we talk about things and you know we didn’t want to we didn’t want to have to filter ourselves so much.

Jesse Thorn Was there something about your kind of generational placement that gave you sort of a unique perspective? Having grown up in having grown up in a context where you know feminism was something that, I don’t know, I’m it I’m five or six years younger than you but feminist feminist theory was something that’s reasonably ensconced at least in higher education. Was there something that was there something that you you were able to do that someone who was you know a pioneer lets say wasn’t able to do?

Lisa Jervis: Oh I think I mean my mom is a feminist so you being raised by a feminist and kind of with feminism to some extent in the water, and by that I mean there are certain feminist principles that really have been absorbed into mainstream culture about just what you kind of basic women’s rights. And so I think there a sense of entitlement that that we have because of that, and I mean entitlement in a very positive sense. I mean, often that’s a negative word but. So we felt like well we’ve got these opinions and we’ve got the right to air them and you know we want people to listen. And I think that that’s something that we didn’t have to fight for so much because we were raised with that entitlement that was really given to us by earlier feminists.

Jesse Thorn I think a lot of people today like if they think of feminism or the women’s movement I mean if anything then maybe their thinking of like reproductive rights you know? And they have sort of a limited conception of it. What were the issues that you saw in popular culture that you know 10 yeatrs ago that made you want to get out there and say something?

Andi Zeisler: Well I think the issues of female representation in pop culture have in some sense at that time were the same as they’d every been really. It was just a question of really limited characterizations of women in television, in movies, in music to some extent or at least how those things were covered by other media. You know, one of the things that we talked about a lot at least in the early years was the fact that if there was ever a woman on the cover of Rolling Stone she had to be in lingerie and kind of have her mouth hanging open and be in this kind of sexualized pose. And there seemed to be no reason for it, but it was the same kind of representation that women in Rolling Stone got in the 70s. You know it really hadn’t changed. And on TV and in movies to some extent that was the same thing. You know you rarely saw strong female leads. Really female characters in action movies though this has changed a bit at that time were really just playing the kind of doting nervous wife waiting for her husband to save the world and get home. And so we really wanted to point out that these representations were limiting and that you know we had something to say about it.

Jesse Thorn It seems like the sort of mainstream media’s line on feminism is almost completely bound up in in either you know as I mentioned reproductive rights or these trend stories that either say like “Feminism is dead. All women you know just want to stay home and have babies now,” which is obviously both reductive of contemporary mores and of feminism that it would be against that, or or that there’s this new post-feminist movement that means such-and-such a thing. It seems like that’s something that comes up a number of times in the book, the way that the mainstream media shapes these kind of odd stories of what feminism is about.

Andi Zeisler: Yeah, absolutely. I mean the thing about the mainstream media is that very few people within it are really making the effort to look at feminist activism and feminist thought and actual feminists who are really doing stuff there on a grassroots level. They tend to glom onto as you said trend stories about marriage and work and kind of scapegoat feminism. And you know and then you know politicians often add to this you know like when Rick Santorum was being interviewed by George Stephanopoulos and made reference to radical feminists having you know made women you know run out to work and neglect their families but that he actually couldn’t name one of these so-called radical feminists. I mean, that’s the thing. They’re really bound up in the idea of feminism as this evil but very unclear about defining its terms and what actually happening. So yeah it’s very unfortunate. And I think the main problem is that feminism is really seen in the mainstream media as a zero-sum game and so what’s good for women is inevitably painted as being bad for men. And that’s just how they like to play it, and it’s it’s very very frustrating.

Jesse Thorn Do you guys do you encounter [laughs] it’s funny like that’s the third time I’ve said “you guys” when in one of the essays in the book is about the the gender neutral the gender neutralization of the phrase “you guys” and the kind of way that that’s sort of fraught with peril.

Lisa Jervis: We also I mean you know unless you’re going to say “y’all” it’s hard I mean.

Andi Zeisler: Or “youse”. That’s a good one. If you’re from the East Coast especially you can get away with that.

Jesse Thorn So do youse’uns encounter

Lisa Jervis: [laughs]

Jesse Thorn encounter people who are uncomfortable with the idea of being painted as a feminist or are uncomfortable with that feminist baggage that you just described that sort of Rick Santorum idea of of feminism? And if so, how do you address that as you know as people who are self-professed feminists?

Lisa Jervis: Well I don’t personally I don’t feel like I run into people who are afraid of the label, and I think that might just say something about the people that I end up meeting you know out here in kind of the Bay Area progressive bubble. But also through the you know the work that we’re doing you know we tend to meet people who are not afraid to call themselves feminists. I think that by and large our readership is not afraid you know to call themselves feminists. But the word still does have an incredibly strong negative connotation. I think actually Andi can probably speak to this one better. I know you have more thoughts on that.

Andi Zeisler: Yeah. I mean, well you know it’s really unfortunate. The reactions I think on an anecdotal level the reactions I get are sort of nobody as ever come out and been like “Well, you know, I’m not a feminist.” But you do encounter people who are sort of intrigued by the idea of the magazine and by the idea of a magazine that is about pop culture and about women. But you do you can sort of physically see a little bit of a look of discomfort flitter across people’s faces sometimes and you know people who work with us have stories about it to. We have a board member who’s a lawyer and she has been out attorney and has done a lot of pro bono work for us. And she has in the past drafted coworkers into helping her on projects and invariably one of them will say something like “Oh is this a you know is this a man-hating magazine?” And it’s almost it sounds to my like a sort of automatic response like they don’t know what else to say because they hear “feminist” and they think “Oh, it must really be anti-male.” And we’ve had men come up to us at events where we table with the magazine and they sort of say you know kind of half-jokingly “Oh, I’m a man. Can I read this magazine?” And you know my reaction is always sort of to be like “I don’t know. Can you?” And it’s just one of those things like you it’s hard to know how to respond because you don’t want to be like overly furious and dogmatic and by like “Well, feminism is really for everybody.” But that the same time, it’s a little bit frustrating because I often feel gosh haven’t we just gotten beyond this? But it’s true. Feminism has a very very I don’t very very tenacious image problem and as much stuff as we do to kind of defang it there are always going to be people who immediately leap to their kind of primal work association.

Lisa Jervis: But that’s always been part of the mission of the magazine as well is to counteract those negative messages about not just about women but about feminism and to you know to be out thee with the humor and with all of the other sorts of things that people don’t think that people don’t think can be part of feminism. But to you know basically we’re trying to help feminisms image problem and I didn’t say that very well but.

Jesse Thorn [laughs] Another thing that you’re trying to help with an image problem is the word “bitch”. That’s a pretty powerful that’s a pretty powerful choice. I mean I guess it’s something that helps helps helped your ‘zine stand out on the shelves at you know Modern Times Books on Valencia Street in 1996. Tell me about why you made why you made that choice to name the magazine that.

Andi Zeisler: Well with “bitch” it really there was never any other title on the table.

Jesse Thorn And why would there be right?

[Lisa Jervis laughs]

Andi Zeisler: You know it’s funny because there there are you know at the time and there certainly still are feminist magazines out there and they’re really identifiable as feminist magazines. You know you hear a title like “Lilith” or “Sojourner” or you know obviously “Ms.” and you know sort immediately know what you’re getting. But with “Bitch” there could be a little bit of intrigue there if someone saw it on a bookshelf and didn’t automatically know what it was just the power of the word might be enough to attract them. And you know not that we were trying to do a bait-and-switch but we we thought you know the more readers the better. And the more readers who aren’t already sort of on our bandwagon that would be great.

Lisa Jervis: But at the same time we always were really careful and remain really careful about pairing the main title with the subtitle which is “A Feminist Response to Pop Culture” because we don’t want there to be any misunderstanding you know about where we’re coming from with the word “bitch”. But also I mean you know that’s a word that’s hurled at women who are outspoken and won’t back down from their opinions and you know we really wanted the magazine to be like that. And we also wanted to take the sting out the word that way. It’s kind of like if you’re going to try to insult me by saying that I’m opinionated well that’s just not going to work because I know I’m opinionated and I’m pretty happy about it.

Andi Zeisler: And that’s not a bad thing. And women should not be made to feel that being opinionated is a bad thing. And that’s you know unfortunately the word “bitch” is still really readily used in that way and so unfortunately we haven’t single handedly managed to conquer it.

Jesse Thorn [laughs] That would be quite the nifty trick for the

Andi Zeisler: It really would be, yeah.

Jesse Thorn For the magazine with the readership of 50,000 to

Andi Zeisler: It’s true.

Lisa Jervis: Well you know we we talk about our goal being world domination and you know we’re kind of kidding but you know we’re getting there.

Jesse Thorn You’re listening to “The Sound of Young America”. My guests are Lisa Jervis and Andi Zeisler the founding editors of Bitch Magazine. We’ll be back with more with Lisa and Andi in just one minute.

[Music]

Jesse Thorn A brand new shipment of “The Sound of Young America” t-shirts is here. That’s right. Our shirts have been so popular that I had to reorder them. There are now also available in men’s small along with medium, large, extra-large, double-extra-large and women’s sizes. They’re all printed on super high quality American Apparel t-shirts and they’re only $16 shipped. So visit maximumfun.org and buy one today. Odds are it’ll be the best decision you make in your entire life.

[music]

It’s “The Sound of Young America” from maximumfun.org. With me are Lisa Jervis and Andi Zeisler of Bitch magazine. So so what’s going on now in 2006? What are the themes that are that are coming up in the magazine, perhaps themes that are more prevalent now than they were when you started 10 years ago?

Andi Zeisler:: Well, I mean, we’ve changed in the sense that we you know the writing in the early issues was all opinion and we really didn’t have we really didn’t look for the sort of balance of fact, opinion and anaylsis that we have now back then. It was really much more in the spirit or the ‘zine where we just wrote what we wanted to write. So certainly the scope of the magazine have has broadened and we print a lot of things that we wouldn’t have printed earlier you know stuff the definitely reflects a broader readership, a readership that’s getting older more concerned with things like motherhood and different kinds of activism beyond what most people consider strictly feminist. You know, things like abuse in prison rights, sustainable farming things like that. So definitely the range of topics has evolved and broadened.

Lisa Jervis: But I think some you know there are kind of perennial I mean unfortunately not enough has changed about the way women and feminists are being represented in popular culture that you know there’s some topic that unfortunately as much as we would love to leave behind things about body image, things about sexual justification, things about I don’t know.

Andi Zeisler: Reproductive rights.

Lisa Jervis: Yeah, I mean we can’t leave those behind because they’re still battles to be fought. And you know as long as as long as there are things that need to be commented on in those areas, we’re going to be doing it.

Jesse Thorn I want to ask you guys about this cultural trend that I perceive that I thought was very interestingly described in one of the essays in the book which was not written by either of you as I recall. But there’s an essay about the “ironic t-shirts” sold by you know mass market retailers like Abercrombie & Fitch and American Eagle were the examples that have you know racist slogans like you know “Chinese Dry Cleaner Two Wong’s Don’t Make a White” or something like that.

Lisa Jervis: “Two Wong’s Will Make It White” I believe is

Jesse Thorn “Two Wong’s Will” well that makes a lot more sense.

Lisa Jervis: Yeah.

[all laugh]

Jesse Thorn Hate to have a nonsensical racism.

Lisa Jervis: Yeah well you know they do that too sometimes.

Jesse Thorn It feels it it feels like it’s tied in to me with a sort of culture where actual cultural criticism has in has in significant part been replaced by sort of snark. So like a

Andi Zeisler: Totally. Sure.

Jesse Thorn And that’s something which you know I I was really delighted in reading the book to not find, but it’s something that’s very easy to see if you turn on the television you know. Particularly with regard to you know celebrity culture or things like that. And it seems like there’s a lot of folks out there who are doing something that’s really gross and then kind of half-assedly saying that they’re doing it ironically or something like that. What what what’s your perspective on that sort of that sort of part of the sort of under-40 culture?

Andi Zeisler: I think in a lot of ways it a little bit of a logical result of a culture that really has come to devalue sincerity as something that’s cheesy and hard to take seriously.

Lisa Jervis: And embarrassing. Like if you’re really sincere about something you might get embarrassed, but if you are being sarcastic all the time then you can always just play something off as like “Oh you didn’t get my joke?”

Andi Zeisler: Yeah.

Lisa Jervis: You know, I didn’t mean that.

Andi Zeisler: It’s kind of a mass hipsterization of culture. And I it’s hard to really pinpoint how it started but I’m you know I think that you could say the internet has something to do with it. People’s sense of fear has something to do with it. The phenomenon of adults sort of staying kind of arrested in a young adult phase and not wanting to grow up and sort of get square is a big part of it. And it’s it’s hard to know how all those things politically fit together but definitely the result has been the commercialization of a kind of sarcasm and yeah basically a sort of unwillingness to give in to sincerity I guess.

Lisa Jervis: I think there’s also an element that people are very afraid to be accused of being sexist or racist even though our culture is still very sexist and racist and there are a lot of covert ways in which that’s approved of and supported by the culture. Overt racism and sexism are now you know unfashionable, but people haven’t really done their work to become not racist and sexist and so it’s a way of protecting those kind of ironic t-shirts it’s a way of trying to be on the inside of a joke whether you really are or are not. Wearing of those t-shirts, it kind of lets people partake in some of this race talk without having to take a stand one way or another? Does that make sense?

Jesse Thorn It it does. It seems it seems in a lot of ways to be kind of a way of allowing people to be contemptuous or negative about something that they’re supposed to think is bad without actually doing I think it was interesting you used the word “doing the work” without actually doing the work to make things better or even to make their own position or or place in world better.

Lisa Jervis: Exactly. But it’s very easy to defend yourself against charges of racism when it’s about a t-shirt and you can just say like “Dude, can’t you tell it’s ironic. It’s an ironic t-shirt. This doesn’t mean that I really think that Asians should be doing laundry.” And the fact that the stereotypes that the t-shirts play around with are so extreme, they’re so archaic, that it is kind of like well of course this person doesn’t really think that so they must be really this you know this multiracial insider who doesn’t have you know any racist thoughts ever when in fact they just bought a t-shirt manufactured by a corporation.

Jesse Thorn It it seems like it it’s also very easy to to use that as a way to kind of blur the lines between, especially in terms of humor, between things that are genuinely satirical and things that fall under the banner of “Hey I’m an equal opportunity offender.”

Andi Zeisler: Exactly. And I think that’s kind of that’s kind fo the important part of these t-shirts is that people aren’t really thinking about what they’re what sort of message they’re sending by wearing the t-shirt. They haven’t really thought through the nuance the nuances between satire and just sort of dumb humor, dumb racist humor. We really have sort of gotten lazy about our satire in this society and so unfortunately you know you get you know comedians, magazines like “Vice”, that rely on very sloppy shorthand assuming that everyone’s going to get the joke and not realizing in fact that most people as Lisa said haven’t done the work and haven’t really made the distinction in their own mind between what’s satire and what’s just lazy stereotyping.

Jesse Thorn Andi I want to ask you about a piece that you have in the book about women in comedy.

Andi Zeisler: mm-hm.

Jesse Thorn Tell a little bit about what the impetus for that particular piece was and and how it kind of how it made you think about the about the way that women relate in the world of comedy.

Andi Zeisler: Well, I mean, initially I wanted to write the piece because I’m you know I’ve always loved comedy and I come from a family who you know on family road trips would slap like a George Carlin tape in the tape player or Cheech & Chong tape and we’d all laugh along about like the pot jokes and the curse words and stuff like that. But women always seemed like this novelty subcategory. And I think what really got me thinking about it was I kept running into people who didn’t think people like Janeane Garofalo or Margaret Cho were funny. And these people were invariably men. And then you know then digging a little deeper into it and reading interviews with these women it turned out that was you know that was kind of their lot. You know comedy is a boys club and there was this idea that if a woman made a joke in a group full of men and the men didn’t laugh the idea was well the joke just wasn’t funny. Whereas, in a room full of women it might have gotten very different reaction but because men are the dominant audience, they were the judges. And you know, when you look at women’s comedy it really is very self reflective. You know I saw Janeane Garofalo a couple of times and she’s hilarious but some of the funniest things she did were bits about her own you know kind of drug related breakdowns or her body image or things like that. And if you look back in the history of women’s comedy, that’s kind of always been the case is that women really turn their sharpest barbs on themselves. Men do that too, but you sort of see the power dynamics when you look at the differences between men’s and women’s comedy.

Lisa Jervis: Well and women tend to do it almost universally. Whereas some male comedians do it and plenty of them don’t. And it’s rare to see a female comedian who doesn’t.

Jesse Thorn Why why do you think that persists in you know 21^st century America? It’s silly to say 21^st century American, but in a world where half of the consumers are women, what is that makes the cultural values of men stick more in in in the world of comedy?

Andi Zeisler: I I mean that’s a really good question, and I think the easy answer is just well there’s just always been more of them and so they gotten to sort of set the rules. And women have either had to play along or risk sort of being ostracized and not getting their material out there, or you know being ghettoized as just a female comic you know. What has certainly happened to a lot of women. I I don’t really know. I mean I’m sure there’s a huge amount of industry reasons for it with things like bookers and on comedy tours, agents, bookers at clubs, festivals like the Aspen Comedy Festival. You know and then you certainly have old guard comedians making their views on female comics known. I mean, John Belushi refused to work with female comedians on Saturday Night Live. And so it’s definitely still it may not be as blatant anymore but it’s still there. You know when you have

Lisa Jervis: But just a few years ago Jerry Lewis made that comment

As: Excactly.

Lisa Jervis: about what was it that basically women should be home making babies and they weren’t funny.

Andi Zeisler: Well he said yeah he asked who he was asked who he thought were the funniest female comedians working today. And he said “You know what? I don’t think of women as being funny. I think of them as producing machines that bring babies into the world.” And you know I mean whatever you think of Jerry Lewis he has always been a industry force and the fact that he said something that probably reflects what a lot of other comedians have felt like you know as much as we sort of recoiled as a nation there were probably a lot of people thinking “Well, you know, I don’t really think women are that funny either.” But they had Jerry Lewis to validate it.

Jesse Thorn Well Lisa, Andi we’re plumb out of time but thank you so much for sharing your time with us.

Lisa Jervis: Thanks for having us.

Andi Zeisler: Thank you for having us.

Jesse Thorn Lisa Jervis and Andi Zeisler are the coeditors of “Bitchfest” 10 years of cultural criticism from the pages of Bitch Magazine as well as the founding editors of that magazine.

[music]

Well that’s about all the time we have for this week’s “The Sound of Young America” broadcast. I’ve been your host Jesse Thorn, America’s Radio Sweetheart. The show is produced by Speaking Into Microphones. Our theme music was written and performed by Dan Grayson and myself. Incidental music on today’s show by DJW. You can find bonus interview material from both our sets of guests on the blog at maximumfun.org. We’ll see you next week on “The Sound of Young America” from maximumfun.org.