Of course, roasts are intended as a parade of the foulest, most offensive, base jokes. And while the ones about Joan could understandably be interpreted as misogynist - and wholly unoriginal - apparently everybody's appearances/genitals were fair game. (Tom Arnold got grief for being fat, Brad Garrett for looking like Frankenstein, and Carl Reiner for having old, saggy balls.) Besides, Joan was laughing the whole time. (Or at least, the minimal movement in her face seemed to imply so.)

My favorite part, though, was when Joan went after Gilbert Gottfried for having the longest set. I love that she made fun of him for not having his eyes open.

The Huffington Post reported on the first few productions of the play in Beijing in March, when it was still known as V. Although the crowd appeared excited about the show ("I'd never, ever seen anything like that!" said one college student), reporter Julian Baird Gewirtz noticed that many women were unwilling to shout "bi", a slang term akin to pussy, when one actress tried to start a chant:

But there was one particularly revealing moment from the audience that may itself capture the current cultural situation in China as much as the action on stage. As in the English-language version, the actress Lin Han concluded one of her pieces by chanting the word "bi" over and over again, zealously calling on the largely female audience to do the same. But from this Beiing crowd, a few male voices yelled out the word once; not a single female voice could be heard.

Like the change in title — which director Wang Chong said was necessary in order for him to book a venue — the lack of audience participation points to the conservative beliefs many Chinese still hold about female sexuality. "They are . . . the second sex" in China, Wang said. "In Mao's period, women had a better position in society: equal to men. But now those socialist ideals have disappeared."

Chinese producers first tried to bring Ensler's play in Shanghai in 2004, but the show was canceled by officials, who told the director that the play was "not yet mature." Five years later, and several months after the successful run in Beijing, The Vagina Monologues has returned to Shanghai. Wang has translated the script from English to Chinese, trying to stay as close to the original as possible. Of his decision to change the name for Beijing, Wang said: "In China, things should be handled Chinesely."

"Chinesely" apparently means discreetly. As Time reports, sexual freedom in China is a strange and elusive beast. For the most part, sexual limits are "set by parents, not the Communist party." However, the government has been known to issue crackdowns on sex-related events and pornography, but they do so in a manner that is unpredictable and confusing (the gay pride festival is OK, as are drag shows, but a screening of The Laramie Project is not). The initial name change was not endorsed by Ensler's camp, but it may have been necessary for the show to go on. Although there is a certain irony to the censorship of the word "vagina," as noted by a professor of women's studies at Sun Yat-sen University, Wang hopes that his production will help free women from social restrictions. He also advises men to see the play: "I highly recommend male audience to see this show because really finding a vagina is about really finding a female and at the same time when you know what a female is you know what a male is. It's about both sexes."

In China, V Is For The Vagina Monologues [Time]
The Vagina Monologues Are Coming To Shanghai [The Shanghaiist]
The Vagina Monologues Comes To Beijing [Huffington Post]

In the clip at left, Haskins takes a look at the Schick Quattro ads in which ladies trim their bush, Australian ads where a woman is shown frolicking with her beaver, and a tampon commercial that depicts Mother Nature delivering her monthly gift in person. Clearly, we must devise natural metaphors for our vaginas, for, as Haskins explains, "we are ladies and when our delicate lady parts are mentioned we cannot bear it." Which is why, at her suggestion, we will now only refer to our genitalia as our "Sarlacc the sand pit from Return of the Jedi."

Sarah Haskins in Target Women: Your Garden [Current]

Earlier: Schick Quattro Ads Are About As Subtle As Bai Ling's Wardrobe
Leave It To Beaver
Feminine Hygiene Commercials Are Rarely Genius
Sarah Haskins Overwhelmed By Oscars "Ex-Plosion"
Sarah Haskins Calls Out Jez Commenters
Condoms, Cleaning Supplies & Crap: A Q&A With Sarah Haskins
Sarah Haskins Worries That Ann Curry's Life Is In Danger
New Year, New You: Sarah Haskins Teaches You How To Diet
Sarah Haskins Wishes You Happy Period Control
Sarah Haskins Targets The View
Sarah Haskins Has A Problem With Marketing Family Meals To Moms
Brides, Botox & Yogurt: Sarah Haskins Targets Those Who Target Women

Related: The V-Day Event Of The Decade [VDay]
Earlier: Why Is The Word Cunt Still Such A Big Deal?

The founder of the studio is a onetime actress who played a stripper in a movie and found that she not only lost the weight following the birth of her baby but a road map to self-actualization. Her "journey" began there, going from the installation of a pole in her home to setting up studios across the U.S. to instruct women to embrace their inner strippers and celebrate/exploit their sexuality for their own betterment. Pole-dancing as a means to self-discovery? I had my doubts. After the jump, my day as a pole-dancer.

The studio itself is nondescript, except for the boas hanging from the ceiling, and the corsets, stripper shoes, and thigh-highs on display and for sale. The other women look normal and seem nervous: browsing the racks, comparing garter belts, giggling excitedly. Our instructor, a petite African-American woman who looks to be in her 20's, guides us to a dimly-lit room with candles and a bordello-esque red lamp. Yoga mats are arranged in concentric circles. After choosing a place on which to sit, our instructor begins to tell us her story. NYU graduate and former head of a marketing consulting company whose crippling insecurity was solved by stripping, through which she learned to shed both her inhibitions and her clothes.

We learn a little about one another as well: In my class there is a young woman in her 30's going through a divorce who is hoping the class will help her rebuild her confidence; her friend who said she realized she had hit her 30's and wasn't in touch yet with her sexuality; several graduates of Mama Gina's School of Womanly Arts; a woman who says she simply always wanted to try stripping; and of course, me. I tell the class that I work from home and am looking for something to help get me going. "Oh, we'll get you going!" hollers the instructor. The other women join her in applause. This must be what AA feels like.

At last, class begins. We begin the warm-up, which is comprised of standard yoga/dance/Pilates moves... except for the one devoted to slapping our own asses and screaming. The moves are given sexy stripper names and we do a lot of them. One, meant to exercise the abdominals, includes the exhortation to "explore your curves". "Feel your breasts! Feel your neck! Feel your thighs! They are your curves! Love them! You look beautiful!" the instructor encourages. Clearly, the instructor has no idea that I am convinced I am moments from death as I furiously pedal my feet in the air while balanced on my ass only, groping myself all the while, praying I don't tear a hamstring, and wondering how badly I will be mocked on this site if I were to die right here and now. After we're done feeling ourselves up / working our abs, we are instructed to lounge seductively on our sides, our heads propped in our hands. "Every woman looks beautiful in this position," our instructor intones. "Let's take a moment to explore our bodies while in this position. Just close your eyes and focus on your body. She is beautiful. Listen to what she is telling you." I feel like I have stumbled, unwittingly, into The Vagina Monologues.

The instructor then talks us through the ever-important "stripper walk": Right foot over left, drag one foot to meet the other, weight shifting from one hip to the other. "You should look like you've had a few too many to drinkl!" we are told. Then comes the moment we've all been waiting for: The pole. Our instructor approaches it and effortlessly swings herself around it, then does it again, this time breaking down the motions. I break out in a cold sweat. I'm up first. I trip doing my stripper walk, take a preliminary strut around the pole, and then begin my swing. I have lift off! But then I freeze, plop my feet down on the ground, and land standing up dead-straight. "Stick your butt out!" the instructor encourages, "When you stick your butt out, you own it! When you stick your butt out, you always look good!" (A few minutes prior we'd been informed that our breasts should always arrive at the party a few minutes early and our butts a few minutes late.) Now it's time for me to give the pole a second shot. This time I succeed. The instructor gives me a big high five and tells me I will be even better if I only stick my butt out more.

The other women take their turns. The divorcee and her friend who wants to get in touch with her sexuality are naturals. I hate them immediately. This is no different from ballet class, it dawns on me, where your only option is to hate yourself because there are other women in the room and your performance can only be measured in comparison to the others. It all just makes me sad. When the girl who "always wanted to try stripping" takes her turn, for instance, she is less than graceful on the pole itself, but then finishes her trick with an over-exaggerated, RuPaul-esque finish, working her hands up all over her body, wiggling her butt out in a hyper-feminized moment of performance. And though she finishes with the biggest grin on her face and says how amazing it felt, I am not proud for her that she feels good even though she doesn't (none of us do) hold a candle to the divorcee's friend who is tall and blonde and looks like she was born to do this. No, I feel a strange empathetic hurting that she needed to grope herself up in front of strangers to feel beautiful, yet alone accomplished.

The final portion of the class — a cool-down, perhaps? — involves a "dancing" routine: We stripper-walk to a wall, press up against it, stick our butts out, roll our hips, turn around, and then slowly grind our way down the wall until we hit the floor, at which point we get on all fours and do our best "sexy crawl." We do this several times, to music of various tempos. In between sets, the other women start cooing about how liberated they feel. I can't help but feel kinda silly. Who would ever want to see me do this? Despite all the talk of loving my body and being proud for women everywhere, I think that anyone who has ever or would ever want to see me sexually sees me that way because I'm me: Clumsy, geeky and usually outfitted in giant sweaters and leggings. To pretend otherwise isn't empowering, it's just disingenuous. Nor would my female friends would think me a stronger woman. We already support one another, like when someone gets the raise she worked really hard for, or is willing to take a risk and put her heart out on the line, or drops everything to be there for her friends and family. These things make us feel good. And they take courage. Pole dancing? Well, that just takes a skimpier wardrobe.

Another little-mentioned reason why many men would rather not be in the room for the birth is that the whole performance is seriously unsexy. The one bit of advice all men give other men is: 'Stay up at the top end.' But, like all the best advice, it is destined to be ignored. The average guy thinks: "Well, a quick peek can't hurt, can it?" Yes, it can. Jewish religious laws forbid the presence of the man at the birth, to preserve their wife's dignity. What smart thinking.

In today's horribly un-ironic news, word reaches us that the worthy citizens of Atlantic Beach, Fla, think vagina is a dirty word. And that 'hoohaa' is an acceptable alternative for anyone over the age of three.

"'We got a complaint about this play The Vagina Monologues,' said Bryce Pfanenstiel, of the Atlantic Theater....

'We decided we would just use child slang for it. That's how we decided on Hoohah Monologues,' Pfanenstiel said.

They did this after a driver who saw it complained to the theater, saying she was upset that her niece saw it.

'I'm on the phone and asked 'What did you tell her?' She's like, 'I'm offended I had to answer the question,' Pfanenstiel said.

We're disappointed, frankly. We'd have gone for 'The See You Next Tuesday Monologues', ourselves.

[ And don't get me STARTED on the clitoris issue ]