Le rire pour parler autrement de ce qui fait mal ! | Karen Chataîgner | TEDxBelfort
Sexism, rape, homophobia, incest—they preferred violence against children. All these subjects are addressed—because they're disturbing. Well, I decided to make people laugh about them, for whomever it suits. It's called serious humor. In fact, I use laughter to talk about serious, sensitive, taboo subjects, to bring people in and then debate. And since my life has been full of twists and turns, it's been my source of inspiration. But by buses, at first I did theatrical improvisation. A team, themes, we have fun. Henry, I liked to put the windshield wipers on, well, they're stuck there. Then I wanted to be alone on stage and I thought, but I'm a lesbian, I'm going to go on stage and, by a pool, a couple's relationship with my sweetheart, what are we going to laugh at or not? In some regions of France, when you say on stage that you're a lesbian, in the audience an army of meerkats stares at you with their red eyes. 7 is supposed to stimulate the imagination and make you think, but Their imagination stimulates him more, she stops at a lot of questions, she said she was a lesbian, do you think she does drugs? I don't know, she removed her worst signs before going on stage, but it's only when they're older that they gain weight, they cut their hair, the clichés prevail, well, the clichés, the ignorance, because afterwards I went to the bar, like that, going to Antwerp, and a man who comes up to me says, "Are you really a lesbian?" "Yes, so I wo n't buy you a drink, you're right, because it's contagious," so I'll touch your shoulder, I said, "Are you gay, believe it or not?" He played dead and looked at his hand as if he were a lesbian, "I'm a lesbian, I 'm a lesbian." At the silo, he'll never applaud like before, it's me, I went in with a flower in my gun, well, the life of a fan, and once in the south of France, I played in front of a room full of retirees, not a laugh for an hour, Talat at the oars, you look at the engine, there No more gas, you end up swimming, and I have a sketch called "The Orgasm," as the name suggests. I stage an orgasm that's supposed to trigger laughter. That was more like the meerkat effect, it was the "don't smile" effect. You know, you came out exhausted. A squirt of fabric softener, you lie. And the next morning at breakfast, between 3:40 and flex, I'm told that during the break, some gentlemen went to the bathroom to touch themselves. We had to scrub the walls. There's your bowl of cornflakes. You ask him, "Study?" But what a moment of Wisches living! Who wrote the script? Since then, I've lost my hang-ups, but I've continued, persevering. The girl, another time at the banks, I'm performing. There's a guy coming down from the bleachers who raises his fist and is happy. Yeah, I'll show you, and look at me. Hi lesbian, I'll show you. Excuse me, sir, it's not the time to show myself. I'm performing, but look over there where he's wearing it. It's due I was showing off my kisses, so I told this to a friend named Mines and Goodbye, who was organizing a conference on violence against women. She said, "Well, we'll give you fifteen minutes, come and perform this," and that's how I realized it's possible to talk about the violence we experience, that we have the right to make people laugh about it, and that it can even spark debate. These were the first steps in serious humor. I then met the National Federation of Women's Solidarity, which runs the 3919 hotline. I even became their ambassador. It's a love story. I met historians, female historians, lawyers, legal experts, psychologists, associations, and I mixed all this information with my humor, and the stand-up comedy routines to defend human rights were born. I start from my beginnings and these people I met. I explain that they weren't malicious, they were ignorant, and ignorance makes you stupid. Stupidity can lead to violence, ignorance, stupidity, violence, the ricochet of fools, and I also explain that in the street when you hold your sweetheart's hand you attract them, they come out from everywhere, to the two lesbians, and that's what makes the guy, beautiful girl, we can film, you become bait to ricochet, I call them the houga or guys, nothing to do with the Marsupilami, the or cases, it's a small percentage of the sums that haven't finished their Darwinian evolution, they're still at the beginning, they're in the knees like that, they can go skiing, it bounces in their way, holes to gain flexibility and the mouth always open to breathe, if we forget [Applause] and when two lesbians hold hands in front of a houga and remains true to himself, oh oh oh, and suddenly he comes because he wants to talk, he wants to know, is a girl a lesbian? No, she's my sister, we're going to mass, oh, I was thinking the same thing, you can't be a lesbian, you're beautiful, and all 10 minutes who has another one the barrel you're looking for something at 3 he's known for two hundredths of a second and you wonder if you're looking for something at 3 it lights up is on no I'm looking for a restaurant oh but I mean you're organic strong power strip and when you send them his own ignorance and you have to win a bet or idiots cognitive dissonance I can't think out of breath at the same time go buy yourself an evolution ignorance stupidity violence the ricochet of idiots and you can't even ignore them and then I think you shouldn't ignore ignorance because ignorance makes you stupid and it can lead to violence the only strength we have on another level is sharing let's talk about what we want with whomever we want as soon as we feel it's the straitjacket of the ignorant let's talk let's not share what the ignorant people appropriate these subjects like a stain appropriates a white sweater talk we share we are only the ricochets cool I then started to play For town halls, she told me that with themes like violence against women, not many people actually show up. It's true that some people were interested, some were curious to know how to make people laugh about it, and some were just there to have a good time. And in the end, everyone debates. I experience some amazing moments. For the city of Bordeaux, I performed after Doctors of the World, who were presenting a documentary about hospitals in Africa that have set them up to welcome raped women. It was poignant and horrific. The documentary ends with a woman who has been raped and is a woman who will be raped again. The lights come up in the room, and then a voiceover immediately jumps in, because she's taking a deep breath. I liked that because you can see the horror, laugh at the worst, and then debate. It's possible. I performed in Nice. There was a woman there who was a battered woman. She expressed her anger and suffering, even yelling at me, but there were people from Planned Parenthood there. She was able to find help. I performed in front of the LGBT community. In Toulouse, it's incredible that when you laugh at what you have to endure, then you talk. Words are the beginning of action, and now I'm playing in companies. Companies, what I love is the concentration of humanity, even better than coffee to keep you awake. It's leveling up, the elevator that elevates ignorance. That says it all. I'm wide awake. I've been working in companies for 15 years. I lead meetings and seminars with laughter, and it's complicated, technical. The sharper my humor gets, the more I perform stand-up talks. I attend incredibly deep debates between colleagues, and the diversity department takes notes. When we laugh, we're a bit like being with friends, and it feels good to say everything. So, my perspective grows from company to company, from city to city, like a big national brainstorming session. I meet extraordinary people, I have incredible moments, and it's even bigger than ever, kicking my ass in the face during the worst times I've experienced. One language in crime, another, and humor is a universal language, so to the question, can we laugh at everything? I say yes, when it's the right time, and now is the time. How about we laugh before, promise to have some rice? [Applause]