Comedian and actor Jimmy O. Yang is currently facing intense criticism from K-Pop fans for a resurfaced clip of his stand up comedy.
The clip is from Yang’s Amazon Prime comedy special Guess How Much?. where he talks about the K-Pop giant, BTS. The joke starts off with Yang seemingly praising BTS and their extensive reach in the US, as he says, “I love my BTS. Man, even white people know BTS now. That’s progress.”
He then talks about how once a “15-year-old” white kid tried to introduce him to the different BTS members, and, the punchline comes, that to him, all the seven members look the same! “I didn’t wanna say it, I couldn’t say it as an Asian person. But they all just look like me, with pink hair,” he continued, drawing laughter from the audience.
He ends the joke saying, “I can turn this whole show to a BTS concert right now.” Pointing to himself, he says “This is Jimmy,” and then taking off his glasses, he goes, “and this is Jimin, right here. You don’t know.”
This clip is the very beginning of the set Yang did for Guess How Much?, but the topic of BTS didn’t just stop there. He continued talking about the boy group. mentioning their mandatory military enlistment. The “pink hair” punchline reappeared as he joked that people at war against South Korea will be “scared” to see seven “pink hair” pop up and give them the finger-heart. “That’s some gangsta sh*t,” he jokes.
Though Yang’s special had quite favorable reviews when it was released in May, 2023, it is mostly the part where he jokes about all BTS member looking the same, and by extension, all Asian people looking the same, that has gotten him flack on social media. The 40-second-clip has left a sour taste in the mouth of BTS fans, who expressed disappointment in Yang resorting to cracking “jokes” using harmful stereotypes against Asians created mostly by the West, despite being a Chinese-American artist himself.
nothing is more devastating than seeing a person of color mock their people for the sake of a few laughs and unfortunately this isn’t just this one idiot that’s enslaved to this mindset . people like him never get ahead in life https://t.co/lKMdGvuvYj
— niaz HUH?! (@rkivegenre) June 28, 2023
as an Asian person, this sht disturbs me.. like you’re really trying to play into and entertain stereotypes white people made of us and for what?.. a few laughs, a nod here and there?..
this is so played out and pathetic
— maria⁷ (@J00NSBFF) June 28, 2023
Some also pointed out the irony of the situation, given that Yang starred in the music video of “Waste It On Me,” a song that featured BTS members RM, Jimin, and Jungkook. The music video was an obvious celebration of Asian representation, a discourse that is completely contrasted by the punchlines of Yang’s BTS jokes in the special. Though there are some people who are coming in the comedian’s defense, stating that comedy is supposed to be “offensive,” the other side is still questioning how offending a marginalized community that he himself belongs to, would serve any constructive purpose of comedy.
Were the laughs worth it?
And he is in the BTS x Steve Aoki waste it in me video too… https://t.co/qjbAlTaRhF pic.twitter.com/03ACRHUSgY
— Dr. omeroz ⁷
⍤⃝
(@omermeroz) June 28, 2023
poc who make fun of their own harmful stereotypes just to get a little giggle out of a majority white audience are the most pathetic losers in the world https://t.co/OuRZQo8RMb
— taeyongie day ^_^ (@hckism) June 29, 2023
As a Very Tired Asian American
I can confirm that the worst kind of asian is the type who not only thinks it’s funny to be racist to his own people but does so in order to pander to yt folks just so he can get that netflix money. Be better Jimmy https://t.co/QVYcXmOoPr
— yoongisfave
TAKE TWO¹⁰ (@yoongisfavecat) June 28, 2023
