by Michael Nachbar | Why Family Guy is funny and not offensive.
“There are two types of people in this world. There are bullies and there are nerds. And there are hot Asian chicks. They’ll do what you want, oh yeah. Oh yeah, you better believe it buddy, they will do what you want. Because they know, they know what you want. Don’t be afraid, I won’t hurt you, me big American man.”
In print, this seems like a typical example of a bias incident that a Tufts anti-bias organization would show students. The only difference was that when they presented this statement, in the form of a video clip, said by Family Guy’s Peter Griffin, everyone in the audience laughed.
On March 7, 2007, the Bias Education Awareness Team, as part of its Bias Awareness Weak, hosted a discussion entitled Family Guy: Promoting Social Change or Reinforcing Stereotypes. The event attempted to explore the elements that make Family Guy, which draws its humor from many sensitive issues, funny rather than offensive.
The aforementioned quote about Asian women certainly possesses all the makings of a bias incident. It objectifies women and perpetuates a stereotype about a specific race, specifically that Asian females are timid and subservient. Despite these facts, the students who viewed the clip agreed almost unanimously that it was not offensive, but rather hilarious.
The main reason that people saw the clip as funny was that it clearly did not represent the show’s creators’ actual beliefs but merely an example of buffoonery. Peter Griffin, the character who delivers the statement, is known to make foolish and illogical statements meant to be laughed at. One student at the panel presented the concern that a viewer not familiar with the show might not realize this, but another countered by stating that even that short quote offers cues that viewers should not take Peter seriously; he follows the preface “there are two types of people in the world” by listing three and quickly forgets about the advice he is attempting to give his son mid-sentence to begin a tangent on a completely unrelated subject. Discussion participants agreed that the scene did not mock Asian women, but actually mocked ignorant and horny white men.
The lesson to take from this discussion seems that the key to making racy jokes without offending is making clear through the context of a joke the satirical nature and whom exactly the joke satirizes. The Source itself made the mistake this winter of not clarifying the exact nature of one of its humor sections which excited a controversy.
Recognizing the importance of context when making such jokes offers insight into why racial humor is possibly more taboo than any other type. It may seem illogical that “dead baby” jokes, 9-11 jokes, and rape jokes can be seen as humorous while racist jokes cross the line, but consider how some one hearing the joke would imagine the context. When hearing a stranger tell such a joke, even those people whose lives have been affected by the events mocked are much more likely to let the joke go as long as they are confident that the joke is being told in a tongue and cheek manner. The vast majority of Americans do not support the murder of infants, terrorist attacks, or rape, so someone telling one of these jokes is usually given the benefit of the doubt. The same cannot necessarily be said about racism.
One of the defining features of the groundbreaking Chappelle Show was that because Dave Chappelle is black, he could make jokes employing stereotypes about blacks without facing accusations of racism. Had a white person made the sketch “Reparations 2003,” in which blacks are given billions in reparations, causing KFC to merge with FUBU, a man with a hot streak in a dice game to become the world’s richest man, and the crime rate to drop to zero percent, it is safe to say the public would not have received the sketch nearly as warmly.
The context of a joke is impossible to determine completely. No one, including the person who told the joke, can fully recognize every thought, both explicit and subconscious, that catalyzed the joke’s creation. The irony of this situation is that the method used to determine the intent of a joke is the exact stereotyping that critics of racism so widely condemn. It is impossible to know that Chappelle does not actually consider blacks an inferior race, but because he is black, people assume that this is not the case. If he were white but possessed the exact same opinions on all racial issues, people would make very different assumptions about his comedic intent.
Satire is a skill, and not everyone has the ability to make shocking and seemingly offensive statements while still assuring listeners that they do not actually possess a malicious intent. In South Park’s recent season premiere, a fictional Michael Richards explained that he spewed racist tirade because he wanted to create shocking humor, but lacked the comedic ability to do it with any grace or wit. Fortunately for Family Guy fans, Seth MacFarlane has this skill, and uses it to help people see the lighter sides of the most sensitive issues.
Mr. Nachbar is a sophomore majoring in Quantitative Economics.
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