Another racist comdian

Discussion Open Forum
1

So, now Rosie O’Donnel has joined the ranks of being racist in Hollywood. Is this becoming the new career booster?

[quote]NEW YORK -
Rosie O’Donnell says she’s sorry for mocking spoken Chinese on “The View,” but an association that represents journalists from diverse ethnic and racial backgrounds, including Chinese American, says it wasn’t enough.
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Pursuit of Happyness

In a Dec. 5 segment, O’Donnell joked about how
Danny DeVito’s recent — and seemingly drunken — appearance on the ABC daytime talk show had become international news.

“You know, you can imagine in China it’s like `ching chong, ching chong chong, Danny DeVito, ching chong chong chong, drunk, “The View,” ching chong,’” the 44-year-old comedian said.

On Thursday’s show, she told the audience: “To say ching chong to someone is very offensive, and some Asian people have told me it’s as bad as the n-word. Which I was like, `Really? I didn’t know that.’”[/quote]

Watch the video at youtube ( :notworthy: ) Rosie mocks Chinese speakers

My God what country am I about to return to :loco:

2

When is the world going to realize that no one gives a flaming shit about celebrities and what they do or what they say?

3

I remember there was a similar mini-furor when Shaquille O’Neal once pulled the same thing in regard to Yao Ming a couple of years ago.

4

People are just too self-obsessed. They really need to get over themselves.
So someone is offended. Big fricken deal.
Where is it written that “One shall go through life and not be offended.”

Offense exists. Deal with it and continue the trip.

5

Since when is “ching, chong, ching, chong” anywhere near as bad as the N-word? It’s just an example of the victim mentality that’s making a mockery of the real problems of racism.

“Ching chong” just shows the comedian’s utter lack of understanding of the Chinese language, not any sort of racism. If she had said, “Bopomofo, bopomofo, Danny Devito, bopomofo, drunk, bopomofo” the joke would have been the same. But I doubt Rosie knows any real Chinese sounds. So, what can she say to make people understand herself? “ching chong ching chong”

Give it a rest. There was no racial slur here, two languages and two cultures that are so far removed that without training it’s indecipherable. It’s nice that she’s willing to apologize for the perceived slight, but those perceiving the slight are showing their hypersensitivity about their cultural identity.

This is totally different from the Richard’s case, where the guy, whether motivated by inner racism or not, deliberately used a well-known racial profanity directed at a specific person.

6

Rosie’s apology:

[quote]
“You know it was never (my) intent to mock,” O’Donnell said on Thursday’s show, “and I’m sorry for those people who felt hurt or [color=darkred]were teased on the playground[/color].”[/quote]

7

No offense to any Danish here, but it’s all just blah blah blah.

8

[quote=“R. Daneel Olivaw”]Since when is “ching, chong, ching, chong” anywhere near as bad as the N-word? It’s just an example of the victim mentality that’s making a mockery of the real problems of racism.

“Ching chong” just shows the comedian’s utter lack of understanding of the Chinese language, not any sort of racism. If she had said, “Bopomofo, bopomofo, Danny Devito, bopomofo, drunk, bopomofo” the joke would have been the same. But I doubt Rosie knows any real Chinese sounds. So, what can she say to make people understand herself? “ching chong ching chong”

Give it a rest. There was no racial slur here, two languages and two cultures that are so far removed that without training it’s indecipherable. It’s nice that she’s willing to apologize for the perceived slight, but those perceiving the slight are showing their hypersensitivity about their cultural identity.

This is totally different from the Richard’s case, where the guy, whether motivated by inner racism or not, deliberately used a well-known racial profanity directed at a specific person.[/quote]As usual, excellent post RDO. :notworthy: Agree with you 100%, and I have nothing else to add.

9

Clearly I put my “amen” in the wrong thread.

10

[quote=“Namahottie”]Watch the video at youtube ( :notworthy: ) Rosie mocks Chinese speakers
[/quote]

What else could you expect from an ignorant fat cow?

Mooooooo

11

[quote=“R. Daneel Olivaw”]Since when is “ching, chong, ching, chong” anywhere near as bad as the N-word? It’s just an example of the victim mentality that’s making a mockery of the real problems of racism.

“Ching chong” just shows the comedian’s utter lack of understanding of the Chinese language, not any sort of racism. If she had said, “Bopomofo, bopomofo, Danny Devito, bopomofo, drunk, bopomofo” the joke would have been the same. But I doubt Rosie knows any real Chinese sounds. So, what can she say to make people understand herself? “ching chong ching chong”

Give it a rest. There was no racial slur here, two languages and two cultures that are so far removed that without training it’s indecipherable. It’s nice that she’s willing to apologize for the perceived slight, but those perceiving the slight are showing their hypersensitivity about their cultural identity.

This is totally different from the Richard’s case, where the guy, whether motivated by inner racism or not, deliberately used a well-known racial profanity directed at a specific person.[/quote]

Well, I agree it’s not racist per se, and it may be different from Richard’s case (depending on which side of the fence you’re on), but it’s still demeaning and insensitive. It certainly wasn’t funny. Best case scenario, she’s just an ignoramus.

As an example, I remember as a kid asking an “adult” if Indian people had their own language as I’d always just heard them speaking English. The woman in question told me, “Sure, it goes miao miao miao miao…” For some reason it stuck with me, and as I became older (and hopefully wiser) I felt it was kind of racist in that it showed no respect. She could have said she doesn’t know, or in fact said they speak Hindi etc…
Looking back I think she was just a stupid old woman who didn’t know any better. Sad in a way, as she’s a family member whom I try to avoid.

12

well im half chinese and i dont really get offended by ‘chinese’ jokes you hear all the time here.

as long as the speaker really had no malice.

i laughed when my bud at work said "hey how did the chinese surnames come about? (answer: when the emporer dropped some coins on the steps in the palace and they went CHING CHANG CHONG ) "

or

“what is one of the most popular old songs in the KTV there in Taiwan?” (answer: Moon Liver)

:slight_smile::slight_smile:

as long as no malice was intended. I think its good to have a laugh now and then.

13

I agree that if no malice is intended… But the look on her face didn’t convince me of that. Neither that nor her tone of voice convinced me she was entirely without malice.

And yes, a good laugh now and then is harmless, we need to be able to laugh at ourselves and being overly PC is irritating in the extreme.

14

Those sounds do seem to represent well-formed phonetic utterances for Chinese, though it would be implausible to hear them all in a row like that. I think the question is whether it is permissible to make fun of the way the Chinese language sounds, whether this spills over into racism towards Chinese people.

Some other “Chinese” cultural artefacts which treat Chinese-ness as an occasion for humor, or else as a symbol of undisciplined chaos (like the “nonsense sounds” of the language):

  1. Children’s rhyme: “Me Chinese / me play joke / me put pee-pee in your coke”

  2. Children’s rhyme: "Chinese [pull eyelids so that they slant upwards], Japanese [pull eyelids so that they slant downwards], teacher’s knees [imitate knock-kneed look], look at these! [pull out shirt, imitating breasts]

  3. “Chinese cuts”–Person A lets person B cut ahead of him in line, then person B reciprocates for person A"

  4. “Chinese fire drill”–at a stoplight, everybody gets out of the car, runs around in circles, then gets back in before the light changes.

  5. “Chinese downhill” [skiing race] --no rules, e.g. it’s okay to hit each other. [Source: “Hot Dog: The Movie”]

So, what does all this say about our traditional perceptions of Chinese? Of course there are other aspects too, like the sinister Yellow Peril / Fu Manchu, or the exotic Suzy Wong / Dragon Lady, but here we’re dealing with the comic side of the stereotype [like Charlie Chan? I never watched it]. It’s closely related to the WW2 comedy depictions of Japanese as bucktoothed clods.

What are some equivalents from other cultures? Africans wearing grass skirts and bones through their noses (or is that more Pacific?) going “ooga booga”? Eskimos wearing parkas ice-fishing next to igloos? Arabs with harems, waving scimitars?

Interestingly, in the first “Mummy” movie with Brendan Frasier, one of the supporting characters tries to stop the mummy with a cross and a mumbled Christian prayer, to no avail. Then he holds up a little Buddha and mumbles something in Chinese. The catch is, what he said really was Chinese. (I caught the phrase “bao hu wo”). So which matters more–that the joke mocks Chinese culture (incidentally, since the real joke was his religious indifferentism), or that the phrase really was Chinese?

15

You forgot “Chinese Line” where everyone sort of stands behind one another but off to the side just enough that they can see what’s going on with the person in the front of the line: seen often in banks and post offices.

16

peoples the world over do try to be funny by trying to emulate the french accent, so is it now ok for me to look all upset and sue the cunts?

[quote=“Namahottie”]
My God what country am I about to return to :loco:[/quote]

a very PC place where you can sue your neighbor if he has got a car in a tone of red that isn’t to your liking?

17

Please tell me you aren’t supprised that that b did something like that.

18

[quote=“dablindfrog”]peoples the world over do try to be funny by trying to emulate the french accent, so is it now ok for me to look all upset and sue the cunts?

[/quote]

That eez differeent, monsieur, a people zat speak through their noses deserves zis mockery.

19

[quote=“Screaming Jesus”]

Interestingly, in the first “Mummy” movie with Brendan Frasier, one of the supporting characters tries to stop the mummy with a cross and a mumbled Christian prayer, to no avail. Then he holds up a little Buddha and mumbles something in Chinese. The catch is, what he said really was Chinese. (I caught the phrase “bao hu wo”). So which matters more–that the joke mocks Chinese culture (incidentally, since the real joke was his religious indifferentism), or that the phrase really was Chinese?[/quote]

How about “Dodge Ball”? The whole explanation behind it was the result of the Opium wars and the Chinese losing their heads and tossing them around. I saw the movie here, and thought that it was mocking history and taking a piss out of it, but also felt a bit pissed.

I have found myself getting a bit pissed at people’s comments on Asian culture when it’s evident that they aren’t even attempting to understand the culture.

20

It’s a replay of the the Gaoxiong mayoral election. At time of posting, in an on-line poll about whether O’Donnell’s comments were offensive, 45,083 votes have been cast - 51% for no and 49% for yes.

Click here for a video clip and the on-line poll.

I voted “no.” The victim mentality is such a waste of mental energy. Get over it, guys!