Dating A Comedian: Do It!

Yesterday, I read a blog entry that sort of hit close to home with me. Mary Swanson, a writer from relationship blog The Frisky wrote a piece entitled “Dating A Comedian – Don’t Do It!” which was picked up by CNN.com.  In it, Swanson described two different experiences where she dated comedians, both of which were negative. The first guy promised not to make fun of her during his show, then broke his promise as soon as he began to bomb onstage. The second guy could not stop doing routines long enough for normal human interaction, and solicited attention from everyone in the room, usually at her expense.

Upon reading about Ms. Swanson’s experiences, I must quote that gentleman and jheri-curled scholar, Jules from “Pulp Fiction”: “Well, allow me to retort…”

Quite frankly, Swanson dated one liar, and one asshole who had trouble separating his work from his personal life. You can meet guys like that in ANY profession, so let’s not label comedians as the only culprits. Jerks are all over the corporate American workforce, from the mailroom to the boardroom. You can find them everywhere from the pulpit of Churches, to the drive through at Churches’ Chicken. The same way, you can find good guys in all of these places, the comedy club included.

In both cases from the blog, the men did not respect Swanson enough to treat her the way that she desired. There are a two time-honored and highly constructive ways to deal with that problem, which are better than telling women of the world not to date guys like me whom enjoy making people laugh:

1. Stop dating assholes altogether. I already know that this is too much to ask of most women, but I’m saying it regardless.
2. Take a look in the mirror and try to figure out why these guys felt like it was OK to disrespect you. Ladies need to realize that 90% of men are only going to do what you ALLOW THEM to do. The other 10% are usually date rapists or some other sort of violent felon. Carry yourself in a dignified manner, and be assertive when you feel he’s gotten out of line. 9 times out of 10, you’ll be heard and respected. Carry pepper spray or a tazer in your purse if you feel like you’re dealing with someone who might be in that last 10%

As critical as I have been over this particular blog entry, I will admit that there is one constant that comes about whenever I date someone and she finds out I’m a comic. Inevitably, she will ask this question: “You’re not going to talk about me onstage or make fun of me on your blog, are you?”

Depending on how things are going with us, I answer it one of two ways:

If we have no chemistry, whatsoever: “That’s pretty presumptous of you to think that anyone would give enough of a damn about you and your life to want to read about it, or hear about it onstage.”

Anyone else: “The only way I would make fun of you is if you were to do something way out of line, ABOVE and BEYOND the call of horrible…like, throw hot grits on me for no reason whatsoever. Even then, I’d let you know that I’m going to clown you before I actually do it. As long as you’re a decent human being, I won’t make fun of you.”

So you see, the answer is, “Yes, I’ll clown you if you completely and utterly deserve it, but I don’t believe in delivering the comedic version of a sucker punch to my friends just to get a cheap laugh.” I really hope that this cleared things up for the readers of that particular blog entry. Women are still going to go out with me regardless, but hopefully my response today will help the rest of the comedians of the world along the way in their quest to find a soulmate and partner.