Another Uncle Tom Comedian: Edwin San Juan

Alvin Lin
June 15, 2008

This guy is the Asian American male equivalent of Esther Ku, in terms of self racist humor.  Check out this clip, I fail to see any clever satire or commentary from the jokes (which would be the only possible defense):

Youtube Clip

Here is a much better comedian, Eliot Chang

Categories: 
Performing Arts
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Alvin Lin

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Alvin Lin was born in Taipei, Taiwan and hails from New England. He blogs about Asian American pop culture, film, music, literature and politics, as well as relevant news around the world. He also writes for Imprint Talk. Alvin has degrees from Cornell and MIT.

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Comments

Comments

Cat wrote on Mon, 06/16/2008 - 8:44am
I laughed a little bit; like about filipinos looking like stoned mexicans... but for the main part I thought it was lame. and PS I HATE the Asians have small penises things... not only is it racist, but it's old.I kind of wanted to hear what he was going to say about filipino who act black. Growing up in a Filipino/Black community, you couldn't help taking on your cultural surroundings, especially when your life experiences matched.
sylvie wrote on Mon, 06/16/2008 - 10:39am
I just saw this guy on this special called the payaso comedy slam. it had a mostly latino line-up and audience. edwin actually lambasted the crowd for singing racist anti-asian songs as kids and for laughing at squinty-eyed caricatures (think mickey rooney in "breakfast at tiffany's"). he's not very funny, but i wouldn't call him an uncle tom either.http://www.hulu.com/watch/22718/the-payaso-comedy-slam
hmm wrote on Tue, 06/17/2008 - 1:32pm
i agree w/ Sylvia. increasingly in what seems to be his later comedy (he's more bald and less slim), what started off as unsophisticatedly uninflected Asian jokes, have developed this interesting spin. where he frames his act as a case in point of how people are comfortable laughing at Asian-directed mockery in a way they're really not comfortable laughing at black-directed mockery. he'll say something Asian-mocking, the audience will laugh, and then he'll say, "Eff you all for laughing at that." it's really kind of stealthily disturbing--makes people uncomfortable in their laughter--in a way that works for me. and the penis jokes have disappeared, thank god.so i think that his act has grown over the years (gathering from what i've found on youtube in the last few minutes). and that it's gotten more intelligent at riding that line on which comedy has to live: between offense and mockery. because it's always about making fun (of people, ourselves & others)--and if it works, often we're thinking, "I can't believe s/he just said that!", while also laughing, in our own mix of guilt, enjoyment, and catharsis.which is also why Eliot Chang does *not* work for me: comedy w/o guilt (i.e., humor that doesn't implicate the laugher) is a) too self-righteous, and b) not very funny.