New SNL hire Shane Gillis was found to have made disparaging remarks about Asians, including calling them chinks and mocking Chinese accents. Presidential candidate Andrew Yang weighed in and took the high road. He said he would forgive Gillis and would sit down and talk to him, using this as an educational moment.
That is very generous of Yang. But I don't agree. Gillis also said in the past that one can get away with making fun of Asians. The implication to me that he is too much of a coward to attack another group the way he attacked Asians. Can you imagine if he used the N word and mocked black speech? We would not have a discussion of if he would be fired by NBC. NBC would have fired him the same day the news came out. It has been a weekend so I will give NBC another day or so. If nothing happens, I say we need to boycott NBC.
I believe in forgiveness and not punishment in every instance. But in this case, Gillis believed that he could get away with mocking Asians. I am sure a lot of people do too. Thus we need to send a message that they can't get away with it. Gillis says that he is just pushing the boundaries as a comedian. Is there a joke somewhere when you call people chinks? He has fell over the boundaries and into quick sand.
Take Gillis' "apology". Yes, take it and shove it up your you know what. He said he would be happy to apologize to anyone who is actually offended. This is a non apology. It implies that there is nothing wrong with what he said but that if someone is so sensitive that he feels offended, then Gillis would say he is sorry to him. If someone says the N word in front of only white nationalists, nobody would be offended. So does it means he is not wrong and does not need to apologize? If one is sincere about making an apology, he should say he is sorry about what he said because he knows that it was horribly wrong.
Yang has been criticized for enhancing Asian stereotype by saying Asians are good at math and that lots of Asians are doctors. I agree that those remarks are not funny and adds little to his campaign. (Although MATH stands for Making America Think Harder is pretty good,) But if you remember Obama, when asked about people claiming that Bill Clinton was the first black president, replied that he has to see if Bill can dance first before calling him a brother. I don't think blacks were offended by the implication that they dance better than whites. So I can live with people giving us Asians positive stereotypes. When the false negative stereotypes go away, the false positives will go away also.
Monday, September 16, 2019
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Well, I am surprised that NBC didn't fire him. In fact, I'm shocked. I am not sure why he hasn't been let go yet, since NBC is pretty much on top of that stuff.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I am more concerned about other hate speech against Asians and blaming them for things that happen in this country. The Chinese Exclusion Act is still one of the most blatant racist acts this country has ever enacted and it seems to me that some haven't learned from the past.
One thing is that this was based on something said a few years ago for a comedy podcast and to my knowledge, he hasn't done it since. So maybe we should forgive him if he shows that he is truly sorry (which he hasn't yet). If he doesn't apologize, then give him hell.
This reminded me of how some people were upset with Kevin Hart's comments about gays. I guess most people didn't care because most people are not gay. So maybe there isn't much uproar here because most people here are not Asian. I don't know. It just seems to me that Asians never get a fair shake when it comes to this stuff. I agree with you that had this guy said something about Blacks, it would be a different story. That would be worse than Don Imus' comments about the Rutgers womens basketball team.
I am interested to see if the Asian guy on SNL will address it. Maybe they will do a skit about it. Am I the only one that thinks the Asian guy will play Andrew Yang in a skit? This is progress since we probably would have had some white guy playing him before!
I guess the movement for Asians in America is still slowly growing. We won't get much representation or political clout until our numbers increase. I see some growth in politics but as you know, there is a split among Asians in how we vote. That's a good thing but also hinders any political movement we have as a group.
Onto other things...you are correct about how the big 3 got more time in the last debate. However, I think the moderators did a better job of cutting them off and not letting them talk over each other. True, the big 3 still were able to take most of the attention, but maybe that's the way it should be. I'm sort of sick of seeing these debates already. I didn't realize there were going to be several more. I might just have to come to your blog to see what happened!
I read this morning that your favorite show is back tonight and that Christy Brinkley is out due to breaking her arm. So her daughter is taking her place. I will now call that she will do well even though she is weeks behind. I don't see any clear cut favorites so I guess I'll update on the next blog on who I think will win. Hopefully, I'll get a chance to watch it this week after watching football and Monday Night Raw!
-LBOAYM
So NBC fired the guy so I won't have to boycott. Don Lemon of CNN, who is black and gay, thought that by today's standards some shows in the past would not be allowed to be on. He gave example of All In The Family. But Archie Bunker and George Jefferson, the white and black guys with racists lines, were important in tv history. They said what many people said behind closed doors. What they said may have made people cringed back then but they also made people think about race relations and racist attitudes. They were also funny. This is not true of Gillis who simply mocked Asians and was not funny. By the way I heard he also mocked gays.
ReplyDeleteYou mentioned Kevin Hart. He did lose his Oscar gig. He is a big star so he has rebounded. The guy who played Kramer on Seinfeld never did after his rant on stage. He is a much bigger star than Gillis so it may look bleak for Gillis. I hope he takes Yang's offer, learn, and make a new beginning. But I guess you have to be a big star to get redemption now a days.
Christy Brinkley's daughter looks exactly like her. She did very well given only 3 days to prepare. It is hard to pick a favorite after one dance because there is a big difference between Latin and slow dances. So the actor who danced last was great but I need to see how he does when he has to move his hip on Latin dances. Lamar Odom continues the streak of bad basketball dancers. But two 3s and worse score than Spicer? That was embarrassing. Of course Spicer was bad but no matter what scores he gets, it will be inflated when he talks to the press.
There was a young woman who looked pretty good. I think she is a singer but not the country singer. Her scores weren't the best but they were OK. So I am going to pick her after watching the show. I thought Spicer handled things well but when he was later interviewed somewhere else...maybe a conservative talk show, he reverted back to his right wing ways and then blamed the judges and media for what he anticipates bad scores next week.
ReplyDeleteKevin Hart actually was asked to do the Oscars after the controversy happened and he was going to do it, but backed out at the last minute.
-LBOAYM