Why not?
During my adolescence, I was...let's just say...more awkward than a republican at a rap concert. I was taller than all the boys, overweight, massively insecure and desperate for people to like me. Not so surprisingly, I didn't have tons of friends in my middle school years. It wasn't until, hanging out with two girls that I knew only casually, that I found what worked for me...one of them, laughing at a joke I'd told (which I'd stolen from my dad), said 'You're funny! We need you around more!' Bingo. If I couldn't be pretty, if I couldn't be athletic, if I couldn't be popular or cool...I could be funny.
As I grew up I tried honing my craft, forming my own niche of comedy; a mixture of eye-rolling puns and incessant and often cruel self-deprecation and the the laughs started to come in. I looked up to stand-up comedians and comedy actors as my role models, envying the attention they got and how people thought they were just so cool and how everyone wished that they could hang out with those people...and I wanted to be 'that person.'
Many times I've heard the phrase 'You should do stand up' or 'You need your own show' and I thought maybe I would give it a try some day...but yet, there was always a voice in the crowd that persisted with 'women aren't funny.'
It eventually dawned on me that 95% of the comedians I'd grown up idolizing were men...that funny women were 'alright', but there were very few that really made me laugh out loud. Even many of the classic funny women worked with a straight man in their comedy to even out the dynamic (Gracie Allen, Lucille Ball, Joan Rivers on Carson etc.) Truly funny (solo) female standup comedians proved such a rare breed that maybe what I had always aspired to isn't possible, maybe women lack the ability to truly be funny.
No, because women ARE funny, women are hilarious...there are just...some added...issues.
To find a person funny and share a laugh with someone requires a certain level of understanding with that person; you need to be able to identify what level they are on and establish a report. For example, is the comedian an average guy like you, is it a person putting on a shtick as though they are poor and stupid, making you their 'better' in the scenario, or are they perhaps the 'I think I'm better than you' type? This report establishes the basis for the comedy, ground level; it sets up the type of humour, what you can/cannot laugh at, what you're going to relate to, what the subject matter is going to be etc. Here's where the problem starts for women. No matter which of these humour types or personae taken on by a woman, the main trait that will always take precedence is still 'woman', which hinders the ability to establish that base connection necessary for comedy because you aren't focused on the type of connection, you're focused on the fact that it's a female first and foremost.
We live in a society with a lot of preconceived notions as to what it is to be a 'woman' and are constantly presented with images and media that reinforce these ideas. Have you ever notices that Old Spice has fun, clever commercials for men with their horseback riding, puppy holding super man, but that no fun commercials exist that are geared for women? The media presents to us that being a woman means being 'feminine, pretty, intelligent, busy, strong, blah blah blah' When is the last time you saw a woman in a commercial in sweatpants, eating nachos and doing something stupid? Women in the media are just not allowed to be average, lazy, dumb or frankly, real. I believe that this occurs for two main reasons; firstly, that these companies need women to keep hating themselves and aspiring to be 'better' so that they will buy their products to try to live up to the goal of 'super woman' they've created; if we accept that we just can sit in our underwear and each junk food, we won't buy as much of their crap. The second is that it's become socially unacceptable to make fun of women, even if it's lightheartedly. This is largely women's own fault (don't jump down my throat women's libbers). Women had to fight hard for everything we have gained in society given that we couldn't even vote at the turn of the 1900's. The hard fight included fighting against a lot of jokes that were mean in spirit against women, degradation and humiliation as well. Unfortunately, in the aftermath of this fight, it has come to the point where it's not ok to make fun of women, of their issues, of their struggles or of what makes them both unique and similar to men without the 'sexism' issue being raised by someone. So, until the sexism police learn to calm their tits a bit and accept that if it's ok to laugh at men's foibles, then it's ok to laugh at women's...then that wall of awkwardness will continue to persist. If you think it's untrue, look at any man in the room when a woman cracks a joke about anything 'risqué' or just about being a woman...he will only laugh after scanning the audience and making sure it's ok to do so.
Female stand up comedians also did themselves no favours when the genre started to take off in the 80's by making almost all female standup comedy about being a female. Great, nothing quite like alienating half the possible audience right off the bat. The most successful male comedians don't spend their whole acts talking about what it's like having a penis and the hardships of men...but yet so many female comedians focused their comedy on being a woman, life as a woman, how women are different etc. Yes, this was a time when such topics were important in society and it was great for women to get their issues out there...but don't come crying to the media when guys aren't busting a gut laughing at comedy that in no way speaks to them. When I think of my favourite male comedians, their routines that stand out in my mind have to do with family, life, work, kids, every day annoyances...things that any person on the street can relate to. When focusing their routines on life 'as a woman' instead of just life, female comedians failed to establish that basic connection with the men in the audience.
There is also one factor that I cannot fail to mention that most women will agree with and most men disagree with, which is that many men are intimidated by a funny woman. Being funny requires a certain level of intelligence, no matter the type of humour; it takes timing, observation, situational awareness, a sharp wit and a knowledge of subject matter and language. Any person who can be 'on' consistently enough to be considered 'funny', especially to such an extent as to do so professionally, is definitely intelligent in some way (unless you are Kevin James in which you are just loud and enjoy falling down a lot). While society develops and women continue to achieve higher equality, men are becoming less intimidated by strong, smart women; but, there are still those who are lagging behind on the evolutionary scale and don't like the idea that they're not as smart, quick witted, charming or funny as a woman. I suggest that these people to join the twenty-first century and grow a pair.
My last point as to why it may be said that women are not funny is simply that men and women do have some obvious differences in what they find funny. There is a reason that most women cannot sit through an afternoon of reruns of the Three Stooges...we just do not find them funny! Gross out comedy like Jackass and fart jokes (or anything with Kevin James) just doesn't appeal to women. I can't even fully justify why this is, it's just not funny to us, maybe some of it is a woman's nurturing instinct...when we see someone fall down, we want to help, not laugh and when someone craps their pants, it's usually us who has to clean it up.
I think women are funny. I think women are getting funnier and funnier. I wish I was as funny (as sexy) as Tina Fey. I do, however, think there are still barriers we need to break down to really be funny as a gender, and I think we will get there. Women standup comedians weren't even really featured on television until the mid 1980's, decades after the first men, so we have a some catching up to do. So, to people like Adam Carolla who think women can't be funny, I invite them all to sit down, relax and to enjoy the show.
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