The Penis Monologues
by Christopher Ferdinandi
ChrisFerdinandi@hotmail.com
Reverend Brian Shanley, President of Providence College, has banned all productions of The Vagina Monologues from taking place at PC this year. The Monologues, he asserts, “reduces women to their vaginas,” a claim that’s not all that uncommon.
For those of you who have been living in a social vacuum for the last few years – and for the freshmen – The Vagina Monologues is a book written by Eve Ensler. It is the product of 200 interviews she conducted with women of various ages and ethnicities that she later transformed into a set of monologues, each featuring a different character and experience. Each monologue has something to do with, obviously, the vagina, be it personal experiences – rape, menstration, penetration in all its forms – or hypothetical questions.
Febuary 14, Valentine’s Day, has been dubbed V-Day by Vagina Monologue worshippers, and on stages across the country The Monologues are performed annually on this day of so-called female liberation.
As a form of protest against Shanley’s decision, and as part of my ongoing struggle for male rights, I’ve written The Penis Monologues, because guys deserve some friggin’ liberation, too!
Note: The following are male adaptations of actual chapters in The Monologues.
If your penis wore clothes, what would it wear?
Army fatigues and shit kickers
A raincoat
Nothing at all
A loincloth
A fedora
What does your penis smell like?
Fresh cut grass
The ocean
A mountain
My girlfriend
Your wife
Old denim
The little dingle-berry that could
This chapter of The Penis Monologues is so filthy that I can’t even show it to you, which is shame, because it really liberates us men from the shackles society has placed on us simply because of our anatomy.
Let me give you a basic overview, though: A 16 year old is uncomfortable with his body and sexuality. He gives his member an awkward nickname. One day, a 24 year old man who lives in the neighborhood, with the permission of the boy’s father, takes the boy back to his apartment.
The man gets the boy drunk off vodka, and they engage in a day of passionate pedophilic sexual exploration, the details of which are far too shocking and disgusting to be revealed on these pages. This man-boy love isn’t portrayed as perverted, however. Instead, our boy narrator confides, “I realized later he was my surprising, unexpected, politically incorrect salvation.”
For all the lurid, graphic and vile details, read the chapter of The Vagina Monologues that inspired this particular section of my work, “The little coochie-snorcher that could.”
The liberation of man
So how about it, guys? Feel liberated? Yea, me neither. I could go on and on with more examples: stories about men circle-jerking as they learn how to enjoy their penises together; a lament about all the injustices committed against penises – “turn and cough,” ungroomed women, kung-fu grip; me shouting the word dick louder and louder to free the word from its negative social connotations.
But honestly, none of that does anything to express the true value of manhood and masculinity. If anything, it reduces men to their genitals, and it’s quite obvious that The Monologues does the same thing to women. Ironically, that’s something they accuse men of doing to them on a fairly regular basis.
The Monologues isn’t all male bashing, homosexuality, pedophilia and pointless hypothetical questions, though. There are some meaningful stories about female insecurity, the miracles of birth, and the horrors of female sexual abuse in third-world countries. But they are far and few between, and grossly outweighed by the pointless repetition of the word “vagina.” If women want to be liberated and respected, they can begin by respecting themselves and finding value in themselves beyond the mere complications of their sexual organs.
I’ve read the official statement by Rev. Shanley on his decision to ban the production, and I must say, it’s far more insightful, liberating, respectful and intelligent than anything found in The Vagina Monologues. That said, I don’t think he made the right decision in banning the play.
As an institution of higher learning, PC has a responsibility to prepare its students for the real world by giving them the tools to wade through the garbage and make their own education decisions. Rev. Shanley’s students would be better served by being allowed to see The Monologues and then participate in an informed, open discussion about it. Filth and stupidity are everywhere in the world. It’s important that people know how to separate it from the stuff of value.
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