Is Rosie O'Donnell a racist or a bigot?

I don't know that I'd go as far as calling Rosie O'Donnell a racist or a bigot, but the following clip of her from "The View" certainly shows her to be pretty racially insensitive toward Asians.  I mean, imagine if she had made a bunch of nonsense sing-song sounds about how Danny Devito was news all over the world, including in Mexico; or some other kind of noise that was her effort at "simulating" Swahili.

Comments

[dobst]

Hello Mr. Yin. I am supposeing that is your name and am also guessing you are Asian. sentences If you are offended by those few sentences, try being a white male in this country. Watch TV commercials for short time; or the other media. I bet 90% of commercials are maidly about having a stupid or ignorant white male in it. It is now one of the '5 buying motives'. Please make a comment about that.

Thanks (your average wite male')

[Dave!]

I'd just say she is overwhelmingly not funny.

[janet]

Dear "average white male". Good comment. It's true. Most all commercials these days do depict white males as idiots. The majority of new sitcoms do the same. It seems that everyone can be offended these days at the smallest slight(ching-chang) except for white/caucasian people. I really like Rosie the majority of the time, but wow am I sick of everyone(Rosie's homosexual/Kelly Ripa rant) being offended at every little thing. We all have foibles that can be fodder for humor. Humor for the most part is based on truth, and all of us can, and will be made fun of. We should all get over it and enjoy the humor that is only meant to be funny. Not meant to hurt.

[dobst]

When I made that first comment I tapped it out very qickly out of anger, I guess and didn't really explain what I meant. If you demonize a group (white guys in this case) ie. republicans, you don't have to listen to what they say because, after all, they are stupid, dumb and evil. You don't have to engage them interlectually because they are wrong. That is bad enough but worse; it is like a canary in the mine. It shows the state of our society where a person will buy a product basicly because it gives them a good feeling that a white male is an idiot. Advertisers know more about us than we know about ourselfs, that is why they do it so much. It works. Just like negative campaigning, it works.
I wish this was brought up more on other websites and discussed and brought out into the open.

What this all gets down to is what this is doing to the Black Community. I think this is just killing the Black community and society in general. (Maybe a little overstated but not much).

Average white guy

[Arthur Chaney]

Get over it Rosie was trying to do comedy she wasnt attacking anyone or any race, She has done this before when she had her talk show and noithing was said or done. She is not racist or a bigot so please stop all the nonsense and attack people like michael richards or mel gibson who deserve to be talked bad about, Rosie did noiting wrong leave it alone and move on

[Rolloff DeBunk]

she's not funny - get her off the air and onto radio in Kazekstan - they like big donkeys in my country

[Jamie]

I'd agree with Professor Yin as to say that I can't assess whether O'Donnell is racist from her attempt at humor on the View with her "ching-chong" remarks. I do think that I need to address previous comments that she "wasn't attacking" a particular race and that it's a "small slight." She certainly was targeting a particular race. She said it herself when she said she was referring to the people of China. And she was using the words "ching chong" which has historically been used in the American media and public as ways to make fun of and cast Chinese Americans as foreigners in this country. If the significance of these words are lost on the commenters and Rosie O'Donnell, I'd like you to take careful consideration of your ignorance about these words and it's impact on a particular group of Americans in this country.

I don't know what the specific criteria would be to characterize which words would be considered to be racial slurs, but I know there's an argument that "ching chong" could fall under that category. Consider the instances where it is important whether words like "ching chong", "chink", or "chinaman" are racial slurs in the context of hate crimes where these utterances are used as evidence in establishing a hate crime (note that I don't have any background in criminal law except what I read in the newspapers).

The Asian American community has a duty in this racially charged society to make the community at large aware of the offensiveness regardless of whether it was used for commedy. And if you think that is taking advantage, Rosie O'Donnell was taking advantage of a whole nation of people and an insult to be funny.

[Taeyoung]

Re: Jamie

And she was using the words "ching chong" which has historically been used in the American media and public as ways to make fun of and cast Chinese Americans as foreigners in this country.

True . . . but you have to remember, many Americans are only dimly aware that there's a difference between Japanese, Korean, and Chinese, or, for that matter, the East Asian and South East Asian countries. So from O'Donnell's perspective -- and from the perspective of some of the other commenters -- the China-specificness of her remarks may not be immediately apparent. And the whole idea of a common "Asian-American" identity does nothing to disabuse people of this misapprehension.

That said, I think getting worked up over this is a bit much. Certainly I think she's a bit of a bigot -- apparently this is far from the first time she's done this, and she has no intention of stopping her imitation -- but it doesn't really hurt anyone. It's not like she's trying to get San Francisco to start segregating Asians out again, or stirring up anti-Asian riots or anything.

[Tung Yin]

For those who've said that it's not a big deal, sure, I'll agree that O'Donnell's "mimickry" wasn't a hate crime and it wasn't an assault. It wasn't anything more than obnoxious and boorish. But for someone who wants to be seen as so open-minded, tolerant, etc. -- and especially one who wants to complain about others' mistreatment of her demographic, it's pretty damn ironic, isn't it?

[Jamie]

Just to clarify...I wasn't calling what she did a hate crime. I just mean that the Asian American community's reaction to it in media impacts whether a word is considered to be a racial slur. I'm just pointing out that if our community as a whole doesn't go on the public record in saying that what she's saying is racist then it's harder to prove that it is down the line and in other contexts (both within and outside the Asian American community). I brought up hate crimes because, from what I read, racial slurs are often brought up in that context at least in the media in terms of whether something is being considered a hate crime.

I lived in Iowa for 3 years and I had people come up to me shocked that "ching chong" would be considered mockery. I've had a number of people actually say they don't consider "chinaman" to be racist ("it's what Chinese men are right?" "China" "man"). And I'd say the reason why there could be a cross section of people who think it's ok to refer to me or members of my family as "chinaman" is that when instances of this come up, the Asian American community hasn't been vocal enough.

And the reason why I say that she knows and the public knows that she was associating with it with China was b/c she said "the people in China..." and I don't know how it gets more apparent than that.

And I was addressing "attack" in what I thought was the context of a previous post that she wasn't "attacking" a "particular" race. She specifically chose China for that particular show. I took the prior poster's use to mean "targeting" since she was talking about specifics. I do think she was targeting the Chinese people. And I don't think she gets the benefit of claiming she engaged in a broader spectrum of racial humor (re: her "apology"). It wouldn't make me feel any better if I hear a guy at a bar refer to a Chinese person as a "chink" only to find out that he refers to white people as "crackers" and black people as "niggers" or Hispanics as "beaners". And I'm not privy to those conversations as I'm not interested in sitting through hours of Rosie stand-up.

And so far, I think the reaction is appropriate. As far as I can tell major Asian American orgs and APA leaders have only asked that she apologize and acknowledge on the show that it's offensive. I haven't received any e-mails or read anything asking me to boycott the show.

And she apologized.