Domestic violence has been thrust into the media spotlight over the past week, after an elevator video of former NFL star Ray Rice beating his wife surfaced online.
While his team and the league have taken action after the clip went public, they’re still under intense scrutiny for obvious reasons.
Many have spoken out about the controversial vid, including Ray’s wife, but the serious scandal hasn’t been addressed in satire — until now.
Before anyone feels the need to criticize YouTube comedienne Megan MacKay for adding humor to a not-so-funny situation, it’s important to listen to everything she’s bringing up in her Ray Rice Inspired Makeup Tutorial video (below!)
It’s so not what you’re expecting…
Wow! Very powerful!
While we agree with a lot of what she’s saying, we also want to note that domestic violence can happen to men too — an awful situation for both genders.
In response to the release of her video, MTV asked the vlogger some questions about the reception and making of the tutorial:
You tackled a difficult subject with humor as well as anger, which is a tricky balance to strike. Can you talk about the process of creating this video?
“Generally, when I’m making a video, I start with picking a news story that I’m really passionate about. I’m a big-time feminist and the NFL just botched the hell out of the Rice scandal, so the choice for me was pretty clear. I really wanted to pull apart and examine the way we were talking about the Rice incident and compare it to how we speak about and treat abuse victims in general.
To me, good satire takes a bad thing and says, “This is bad.” Great satire takes a bad thing, pulls it apart, and points out all of the specific reasons why the thing is bad├óΓé¼ΓÇ¥including some of the more nebulous, nuanced reasons that are difficult to put into words. My goal with every video is to create great satire. Well, OK, not every video├óΓé¼ΓÇ¥sometimes in videos I just eat chocolate and cry. But I try to make most of them resonate.”
Who do you hope will see this video? What do you hope viewers might walk away from it with?
“In general, I’m happy when a viewer walks away thinking, “Huh, that was funny and interesting. I’m glad I watched that,” even if they don’t share it and never think about it again. As a comedian, you get used to your content being semi-disposable. My jokes about the 2012 Grammys just don’t kill like they used to, y’know?
Coming from that mindset, it’s mind-blowing to see people liking and sharing the video, and talking about it in the comments and on Twitter. I’m so glad it resonated with people, and I’m happy I could contribute a little bit to what I believe is a very important conversation.”
So after watching and reading, we have to ask U…
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