Former talk show host and comedian Jay Leno apologized recently for making anti-Asian jokes throughout the entirety of his decades-long career.
The apology came during a zoom call with Media Action Network for Asian Americans, which has been calling on Leno to cut it out for 15 years.
“At the time I did those jokes, I genuinely thought them to be harmless,” Leno told MANAA leader Guy Aoki, according to Variety, regarding 2020 comments about North Korean people eating dog meat. “I was making fun of our enemy North Korea, and like most jokes, there was a ring of truth to them.”
The United State is not currently at war with North Korea, but its citizens are some of the most nutrition-deficient people on the planet. The stereotype that Asian people eat dogs has a well-documented, racist history.
“At the time, there was a prevailing attitude that some group is always complaining about something, so don’t worry about it,” Leno added. “Whenever we received a complaint, there would be two sides to the discussion: Either ‘We need to deal with this’ or ‘Screw ‘em if they can’t take a joke.’ Too many times I sided with the latter even when in my heart I knew it was wrong.”
“I am issuing this apology. I do not consider this particular case to be another example of cancel culture but a legitimate wrong that was done on my part. MANAA has been very gracious in accepting my apology. I hope that the Asian American community will be able to accept it as well, and I hope I can live up to their expectations in the future.”
According to Variety, MANNA secured the meeting after making a plea to Fox. Leno currently hosts the game show “You Bet Your Life” on the network.
The apology comes after a shooting spree in Atlanta that killed eight, including six Asian women.
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Give me a break, Leno should have never apologized. The North Korean people are starving to death. I am sick and tired of the politically correct woke crowd. The “woke” crowd’s goal is to make everyone a “perfect” left wing robot. We are the “borg” resistance is futile aka we are communist group think.
Well, what little respect i may have still held for him, just got flushed down the crapper.
‘Woke’ is increasingly used as a byword for social awareness.
Or socially acceptable.
But stay woke and woke became part of a wider discussion in 2014, immediately following the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. The word woke became entwined with the Black Lives Matter movement; instead of just being a word that signaled awareness of injustice or racial tension, it became a word of action.
But Socially acceptable is like political correctness, it all depends on Who is making the rules and Who is giving any value to the rules.
I.A.W. U.S. Census & FBI (Table 43a) Black males make up about 6% of the U.S. population but commit 53% of all the murders and 55% of all robberies in the U.S… Every year in the U.S. there are ~5,000 African-Americans men, women and children killed and 96% of them were killed by fellow African-Americans. Is there social awareness here? Is this socially acceptable? How come the “Woke” culture does not want to make this an issue?
But the “Woke” crowd are ready to destroy someone over ethnic jokes or the gender of a plastic Mr. Potatohead toy or the romantic escapades of a cartoon skunk.
Polish jokes. Italian jokes. Japanese jokes. Blond jokes. Greek jokes. Chinese jokes.
Generations grew up with these and others. A little cruel? Maybe. So what?
Nobody sued.
And a lot of people laughed.
The only humans the PC police allow jokes about or nasty satire are white hetero Republican men and Christians, now relabeled “white supremacists”. All the rest are untouchable “victims”.
unless they are conservative too, then they’re fair game as ‘white supremacists’ also.
How sad. No one has a sense of humor anymore. I’m offended that he apologized. Maybe Jay should apologized for trying to be a “comedienne”. Maybe he should apologize for ever being born. One was the last time any of these jokers made anyone laugh. Late night talk shows are nothing but hate disguised as comedy.
As a straight White guy of Scots/Irish descent, I do not give a rat’s *** if anyone wants to tell any joke that could be construed as offensive to Whites, Scots, Irish, or Heterosexuals – in fact I might enjoy the laugh and try to remember it so I could tell it to anyone who will listen! I have always been this way – for many decades on this cultural roller-coaster called America.
Spineless Coward.
As I recall, Barack Hussein Obama boasted of eating dog. Most likely where he was raised in his birthplace. And has there ever been a bigger joke than BHO and the unfunny things he did to the nation?