When "Funny" ain't so Funny

When do you draw the line between “haha, that’s funny!” and “WTF…that’s effin racist!”? Well, when comedians like Kat Williams or Danny Cho drop racial slurs or depict stereotypes during their acts it’s funny right? But how come when other people use racial stereotypes for humor, it’s not funny, but actually hurtful and demeaning?

Well, these thoughts were buzzing through my head when I was watching NigaHiga’s “Rant on Stink People,” specifically around 1:09 when he talks about the “Indian” guy.

Here’s the video:


Don’t get me wrong, I think NigaHiga is hilarious and I still love him, but how do you respond to offensive stuff like this video? I went through the Text Comments section and I was blown away by what some people said. You know, there was the usual response from non-offended people “it’s supposed to be funny, stop getting hurt so easily” to racist stuff that I don’t want to repeat, while the offended people responded with stuff like “you’re racist, I hate you”. Well, good riddance. That kinda talk is gonna get people to No-whereland.

I’m no expert in resolving these kind of disputes, but I’m pretty sure the first thing to do would be an apology from the maker of the video (yes, it’s an old video, he was young, he didn’t mean it, but an apology and editing the video would be cool. Why? Because that’s how we learn to be respectful to other people). The second part is harder, and it’s more of something to think over and chew on. How do you get the non-offended group of people to see why the video is so offensive? Do like Micky D’s and recruit Mr James? Well, that's another story.