“There’s not a right or wrong way to be a man in comedy, but there’s a lot of wrong ways to be a woman”

“I do feel held to a higher standard because I’m a woman,” Kelly said. “Because there are fewer of us, I represent comedy when I perform. I also stick out in a show – if I have a bad show it’s more memorable than if one of the 30 white guys wearing the same toothpaste-stained shirt has a bad show. But it’s also an advantage if a woman can rise to the occasion and knock it out of the park – she’ll succeed at a more accelerated rate because she’s a commodity.”

I felt that last one was really insightful. I am a white man, and I always figured this kind of double higher standard was usually only a detriment, but I think it’s pretty rad that some women are able to use this kind of sexist novelty to their advantage.

Also, to anyone who is interested in more perspectives Lindy West writes about her time as a fat woman in Comedy, a comedy critic, and how she had to deal with sexism in her own comedy path. She writes about this in her memoir “Shrill.”