Most of the discussion about Borat and anti-Semitism misses the point. The ADL wonders if he’s not playing a dangerous game since “not everyone will get the joke.” But they may be missing the point: The prejudice that Borat is promoting is not against Jews, it’s against Kazakhs, branding them with one of the most toxic slurs in Western discourse — the charge of anti-Semitism.
There are a couple of reasons, I think, that humor based on ethnic slurs tends to be the mostly exclusive province of comedians who share the ethnicity of those he or she is caricaturing: The first is obviously simply the awareness bred of intimacy; they know their subject better than any outsider. But there’s a second, more complex set of reasons: Ethnic slurs are going to be make people very, very uncomfortable for no reason other than their ethnicity, and that’s not something we like to do in polite society. It puts the victim in an awful position, really: Either he or she laughs along with a caricature in which they can’t recognize themselves, only the prejudice through which others see them. Or else they’re a party pooper. Either way, as my vague memories of being around the occasional Hymie joke as a kid tell me, it’s a deeply uncomfortable experience.
So Chris Rock or Dave Chappelle can rant about “niggers” and get a laugh — and make a double-edged point about stereotypes applied to black males both within and outside of the African American community. Margaret Cho can mock the Korean immigrant nuclear family; Jon Stewart or Adam Sandler can do the Jews; John Leguizamo can do Puerto Ricans etc. But things get complicated when comedians target another group with the same venom they reserve for their own. Not saying that’s the way it should be, but that’s the way it is. Nor does it mean that it shouldn’t happen, although I think people have to take responsibility for what they say and do, and the impact that could have.
I always liked Sascha Baron Cohen’s Ali G character, who seemed to me to be less of a caricature of Black Britain than of hip-hop obsessed white boys trying very hard to seem like they come from “Yard.” But the first time I saw Borat, I cringed: That “throw the Jew down the well” segment in which his Kazakh bumpkin leads a Texan Country and Western crowd in a song with that as the chorus seemed to me a bad, bad joke — not bad taste humor, which I rather like, but a bad joke. Not only did his Texan audience seem to be rather innocently indulging him, it immediately struck me that he was painting an horrendously inaccurate picture of Kazakh attitudes — horrendous because, in the West, there is no charge quite as toxic as that of being an anti-Semite. And the reality is that Kazakhstan is one of the least anti-Semitic polities in the Muslim world today.
This from the U.S. State Department report on anti-Semitism in Kazakhstan last year: “In August 2004, the Chief Rabbi of Kazakhstan, addressing an international religious conference in Brussels, stated that in 10 years in the country he had never faced a single case of anti-Semitism. He praised the Government of Kazakhstan for its pro-active protection of the Jewish community.”
Similar sentiments are echoed by just about every other source I’ve read on the issue.
So, you wonder what the Kazakh’s must make of being tarred with the brush of anti-Semitism when the reality couldn’t be further from the truth? I’d say that Sascha Baron Cohen is a prat, and a racist prat at that: Essentially, he’s operating his own stereotype, i.e. that Muslims are inherently anti-Semitic. And I can entirely sympathize with the exasperation of the Kazakh government in having to respond to this nonsense.
Let’s just say Baron needs to go back to Oxford and learn a little history — he might learn that over the long haul of Jewish history, we’ve done a lot better under Islamic rule than we’ve fared in the Christian West. Then again, if Sascha Baron Cohen did a skit of some provincial Catholic bishop singing “throw the Jew down the well”, he wouldn’t be opening his movie all over America right now.
Thanks for the post generally and the history lesson about Kazakhstan in particular. So this turns out to be another example of Islambashing. How convenient for the times, no?
Apart from the racism, I just don’t see the funny, but I guess that makes me part of a minority.
Came to your blog through Mark Elf. I’ll be back.
This brand of alterity-based satire began with Montesquieu’s Persian Letters then peaked with Voltaire. And it’s fair to say it’s been going downhill ever since. Now it’s “deep in the swamp” with Borat. Vulgar, thuggish humor premised on the proposition that it takes prejudice to expose prejudice. No, it does not.
Let’s see: if I drown you to see how people fail to react, does it say more about the people or about me?
Not to mention that Candid Camera has always been the most shameful comedic device.
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According to Borat, the Kazakhs actually worship the hawk, possibly in evocation of their nomadic roots.
Borat is just playing an idiot, he isn’t a racist.
If you see this video, you could say he IS a racist.
But Sacha Baron Cohen is a Jew himself, so what are you making problems about?
Great post. Definitely thought- provoking. I just can’t see the popularity of the Borat character. It’s like if you took all that was unfunny about Tom Green and tried to mix it with what was funny about Andy Kauffman’s Latka. Except, Latka left the funny with Andy, so now all you have is a heavily accented Tom Green.
I haven’t seen the movie yet, and I’m not sure I will.
My first impression of it is from the ad blitz; I’ve read a couple reviews as well. Nothing was as analytical as the piece in Rootless Cosmopolitan, though.
I believe the movie is popular through an appeal to American xenophobia. Few Americans–in my flawed opinion–are as anti-Semitic as they are simply anti-foreigner. Borat gives them somebody to laugh at because his mastery of language and culture is even worse than the yobbos who guffaw at the funny man from Kazakhstan.
I understand that some of the scenes in Borat may have the depth and acidity of some of Andy Kaufman’s best work and the heart of Lenny Bruce’s approach to such topics as racism and prejudice.
Surely the rodeo sing-along and other scenes in which people would rather be racist than rude have a lot to say, all the sharper because the scenes are not staged but real.
Until I see the movie, though, I will keep my mind open on Mr. Cohen’s motives in his portrayal of a visitor to our nation who is trying hard to fit in. ( I do wonder how Peter Sellers would have played the role of Borat.)
What is the best gun to kill a Jew? Which car can go fast enough to run down a gypsy? Sure- parts of this movie are purposeful to display the ignorance of average America. And just like the throw the Jews down the well song from HBO, This point is proven over and and over. Yet, I am not surprised by the ignorance of these people. Disturbed, maybe-but lets be real there are alot of people who simply hate other people for whatever reason and that is just life.
My problem is that during these unsurprising, and maybe disturbing scenes- the one thing that I wasn’t feeling was that this is funny…
Really. What is funny about portraying a racist who wants to kill Jews.
I am conflicted about this movie. I am not a religious person. I am am not screaming to boycott this movie for Anti-semitism. But I was pretty silent during the running of the Jews, the 9-11 comment, and the bed and breakfast scene. And that’s fine. Everyone has their own personal tolerance level of what is offensive.
But what I found the most bothersome was that so many others were laughing at those scenes. I asked myself whether they were laughing because they were just as ignorant as the jack-ass that Borat was supposed to be?
Imagine the Borat sequel… Video cameras were hidden in the movie theaters and further demonstrated our ignorance by displaying how funny people thought this movie was.
See this site…
http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/news/opinion/15940410.htm
He may be a prat, but he is a very funny prat – that is the point.
It reminds me of the joke: Should we laugh at racist jokes?
No !
But what if they’re funny?
And by the way, he went to Cambridge, not Oxford.
Don’t get me wrong, I think humor — dark, edgy humor that makes people uncomfortable — is a great way of exploring prejudices — like Dave Chappelle’s blind black man who doesn’t know he’s black, so he joins the Klan etc. It’s like you need to laugh at racism to reveal its absurdity.
What I’m objecting to is that he attributes these attitudes to Kazakhs because there’s no objective basis for doing so. If he’d created a character who was, for argument’s sake, Italian, and had him saying all these things about Jews, real Italians would be justifiably upset because the caricature has no relationship with the reality. That’s the problem with “Borat” being Kazakh
Good post. I would argue that Borat is Larry the Cable Guy for Northerners: his sole purpose is to appeal to our basest instincts about how dumb those rural folk really are. I also find it particularly weird that a British guy is so obsessed with ridiculing the American South: it would be like if I spent all my time making comedy making fun of London’s East End despite being an American.
I too have always hated this candid-camera cringe humor. It’s OK with Larry David because everyone on the show is playing along, but with Borat you really have no idea if people are just trying to make him feel comfortable as their guest, even at the expense of being racist. If you watch “Throw the Jew Down the Well”, you’ll notice plenty of bar patrons sitting their silently, looking anything but enthused about the whole song.
Sitting “there”. Wow, I can’t believe I still made that mistake.
Humor at someone else’s expense is not humor at all but exploitation of the lowest kind Humor only exists when both sides are laughing. I don’t think Kazakhs are laughing with Borat.
Pat — agree, I had the same take on that Throw the Jew Down the Well thing. In fact, a lot of the stuff he did in America seemed to me to be taking advantage of American hospitality and politeness
However, if the “Throw the Jew Down the Well” scene were in the movie, I wonder how many people might be tempted to sing along with him…
I wonder how many people are singing that song in hatred and not humor.
I wonder if somewhere someone is throwing money at a cockroach or in a school some cruel kid is stepping on a cockroach in front of a Jewish child and saying a just killed your sister…
After all it’s OK for Sacha Baron Cohen to do it. He’s Jewish. It’s only a movie right?
It’s not humor. It’s something. But I don’t like it.
I believe the movie is popular through an appeal to American xenophobia. Few Americans–in my flawed opinion–are as anti-Semitic as they are simply anti-foreigner. Borat gives them somebody to laugh at because his mastery of language and culture is even worse than the yobbos who guffaw at the funny man from Kazakhstan.
Er what?
The entire point of Borat, and this isn’t an excuse or “interpretation” but something obvious and clear, is exposing American cluelessness and bigotry.
Borat is an obvious fake, following dubious gangsta rapper Ali G. Ali G was not Sacha making fun of black people, but of the people who were taken in and let their guard down and showed their true nature. Similaly Borat is saying “some idiots think Kasakhs are really like this, aren’t they worthless and thick.”
It’s also saying “Some people think this is making fun of kasakhstan, aren’t they even more dense than the bigots.”
I see two things in Borat,
a) cleaver marketing, huge amont of money is being spend to promot him. The guy has been in almost every TV show there is promoting his movie. All long with image that somehow the movie is outside the Hollywood mega marketting effort. Interestingly almost all of his movie is also available on YouTube or else where on the net. It is one movie you really don’t need to see, as it is all available on the net. Unless the marketing is about making money on Borat merchandise, the campaign doesn’t make sense.
The other alternative is that
b) It wants to promote “Jews are victim” story.
Agreed, I have never liked his lame, low life, stupidity that is as humorous as a log.
Uh-oh, now we’re going to see someone do something about the lack of anti-Semitism in Kazakhstan with a false-flag incident.
It’s pathetic that the U.S. State Department has to waste public funds on preparing a report on anti-Semitism around the world, for it only reinforces a perceived “need” for anti-Semitism (which is a false construct, anyway, since most Jews are NOT Semites).
Thank you, you said it better than I could. This is what bothers me about it too. What we don’t need is one more stereotype of Muslims as anti-Semites. It is not funny, especially when we look at what is actually happening to Muslims in Iraq, Palestine and Afghanistan, it is not harmless fun.
You know what they say, there’s no such thing as bad publicity. Before Borat I’d never even heard of Kazakhstan. Thanks to Borat I’ve come to learn a little about that country, and not just the crazy one he portrays. I took the time to do a little research and found out about the real country, which is more than I’d ever have done if it weren’t for him.
I haven’t seen the movie but I’m sure I don’t “get” Borat.
The real problem is that these things get distorted. There’s no telling how children of a simpler mind will misinterpret and redirect these kind of things.
More than likely, such humor will suggest to some people that bigotry is acceptable “if it’s done right.” That’s how you get kids being tossed in prison for beating bums on the street “for the fun of it.”
You’re wrong, Borat is hilarious. It’s not a racist attack on Kazakhs any more than it is on Jews, but an expose of the insularity, ignorance and arrogance of Americans, who know nothing about the cultures of other peoples and nations, but blithely assume them to be inferior. When he claims to have worked as a “gypsy catcher” back in his native land, it is only the stupid Americans who find such an outrageous statement believable who come off looking bad.
I’ve just spent the last 1/2 hour viewing Borat clips on the ‘net. Then, I conducted a search and used the words “Borat + not funny”. The bottom line for me is: The dude is not funny and if I had met him on the street I would have said: ‘You’re not serious, right…….This is obviously a put on’? Well, I thought ‘There’s Something About Mary’ was awful too, turning that off 1/2 way through the pic.
“Borat” took a spanking from a yank. Now that would have been really funny to watch.
A FOREIGN exchange firm is thanking Borat for sparking a surge in travel to Kazakhstan. Travelex has ordered £500,000 worth of its Tenge currency to cope with the boom and a spokesman said: “It’s down to Borat.”
Adam, if you don’t know your own birthday by now……..
With his Borat character, Cohen is not as much promoting prejudice against Kazakhs as he is revealing the racism, especially the anti-semitism, that is present in America today. He does this through an offensive, comedic method, which I find very effective. Others may be repulsed, and some may laugh hysterically for the wrong reasons, unknowingly revealing their own prejudices to the rest of the people in the theater or room.
Hi Cosmopolitan (love the name by the way). I feel it fits me without being Jewish.
Anyway, you have written the most intelligent thing I’ve read about Mr. Borat. The central Asians are easy to ridicule, they have little power.
Merci!
“Cohen is not as much promoting prejudice against Kazakhs as he is revealing the racism, especially the anti-semitism, that is present in America today”
It is a peculiarity of America that the less instances there are of a certain social malady, the greater the sensitivity to it. 21st Century America is the safest nation in the world for a Jew to live in, yet some Dershowitz-wannabees insist that we are all justa bunch of Goebbels wannabees, simply biding our time.
Agree. That’s just silly.
Borat is simply another character in a long tradition of “outsiders”. The device of using someone who is “other” to expose the nature of insider communities is a very old one, but also very common in Hollywood and on TV. Rod Serling sent aliens down to observe human foibles. Brendan Fraser climbed out of a nuclear shelter to look at America through a second world war prism. The only reason why Borat is attracting criticism where a martian pulling the same trick would not is because he is attached to a particular nation. But by the very nature of Cohen’s schtick, he couldn’t make Borat a Martian. His aim is to get close to real people, not scripted observations of real people. To do so he needed a plausible “in”. The bumbling foreign journalist provides the perfect cover…. and allows him a lot of freedom to work into the subject. So could he have devised an equally effective cover, one that would not necessitate a link to a real country? Maybe. Would chosing a different country have been more acceptable? Perhaps. You can question almost every artist and performer on their approach to their craft. So surely we need to judge Cohen on the quality of the performance rather than the framework of it’s presentation?
After another think, I conjectured why lots of people like to watch others acting stupid.
In Canada – and it’s headed south, apparently – Trailer Park Boys attracts a big audience. Apparently many enjoy imaging themselves superior to folks who are poor plus drunk, doped, and/or (through no fault of their own) mentally sub-average.
Mind you, the TPBs are less unbearable than Adam Sandler.
As my Irish granny used to say ‘the things you see when you haven’t got a gun’.
1. He is funny. The movie is funny.
2. Some sort of personal guilt is driving you to attempt to convince others that it’s bad to like the movie.
Stop crying, little baby.
Ali G, Borat and Bruno (Sasha Baron Cohen’s various alter egos) all work from the same premise: that you can get people to reveal all sorts of things about themselves, including ignorance, prejudice and dogmatism (and not just Americans – Sasha Baron Cohen’s own compatriots in the UK expose themselves in the same way in his earlier work). And it is uncomfortably hilarious, as good satire should be.
Using Kazakhstan as a vehicle for Borat works because little is known about the country and there is little controversy surrounding the place. And Kazakhstan has been at pains to point out that there is almost no anti-semitism in the country, which makes using Kazakhstan very logical. It would be politically much more serious if there were virulent anti-semitism in the country. Just as using an African country in the same way would just not have worked because of the history of racism and colonialism and because it would in fact have fed existing prejudices people have about African people.
By the way, the Kazakhstan Foreign Minister has now invited Cohen to visit the country and admitted that Borat has been good for the country – more people know about it and are visiting the place than ever before. Both he and the President’s daughter also acknowledge that it is important to be able to laugh at oneself. Seems that Americans can, given the extraordinary turn-out at the box office.
I couldn’t agree more with the last comments about the softball politics. Then there’s this whole, ‘making fun of ignorant Americans’ thing (which Canada’s Rick Mercer did years ago).What’s so damn funny about that? It’s really kind of sad and abusive. It’s all jes’ like shootin’ fish in a barrel for a smug, middle class guy from the U.K. – I’m not sure his Jewishness is important one way or the other.
Tony, Your reply to Maurice suggests that your dislike has now evolved. It’s not really the Kazakh element or the Jewish element you object to now; you just think that he should have been “edgier” or more “credible”? Are you really suggesting that “throw the muslim down the well” somehow passes the “acceptable satire” test where the “Jew” alternative doesn’t?
It’s all a far cry from your inital accusations of “racial slurs.”
One very interesting sidebar to all this is that Borat has managed to highlight how even the most reasonable people, (and your posts are always eminently reasonable, and readable) are often a little too quick to jump on the bandwagon of outrage, especially when Judaism and related issues are involved.
No, you misunderstand my argument — I think humor that presents racism in order to mock and challenge it is a good thing, although it’s often edgy and makes the audience uncomfortable. The point I was making about “throw the Muslim down the well” was hyperbole, not an actual suggestion — it was in response to the idea that Borat is somehow doing this to expose a deep vein of antisemitism in redneck America. And I’m suggesting that that’s hardly a pressing problem at the moment, to the extent that it exists — which I’m sure it does, but I don’t think it’s that much of a factor in American public life. But hostility towards Muslims and Islam is far more widespread, I think, not just in redneck America but probably in many establishment quarters. And I’m mocking Borat for suggesting that somehow he’s being edgy by tackling the “taboo” of antisemitism which is socially insignificant in the US, whereas hostility towards Muslims is pretty mainstream…
Maybe I shouldn’t have laughed then. Borat set out to entertain through being shocking. It did and it was and I did laugh a lot. The butt of the joke was not Jews, Kazaks or Muslims but America and Americans. In a sense it was a reflection on American values .. not a deep one to be sure but it did offer some insights. There is a time and place for ribald humour just as there is for serious philosophising and fine art. The popularity of Borat suggests that it found its time and place.
“…an expose of the insularity, ignorance and arrogance of Americans, who know nothing about the cultures of other peoples and nations, but blithely assume them to be inferior.”
Posted by Wayne Hepner
Mr. Hepner, thanks for your generous summation of “Americans” and their attributes. Given that the police were called, according to the director, “at least 50 times” during filming, do you suppose it’s possible that the highly edited result you saw may not accurately reflect the attitudes of many Americans?
There is cunning behind Borat, which hides behind being an exposure of anti-semitism. In reality it is a blood libel against moslems, with built-in amiguity excuses in its choice of nations.
The fact that Borat is in reality a Jew just makes it worse.
An arab portraying a stereotypical vulgar or avaricious Jew wouldn’t be tolerated for a second.
I think you all suck and HAVE NO sense of humor whatsoever! LONG LIVE BORAT!
The guy is pathetic, this movie appeals to ignoramuses among us. Some guy on one of the forums said: “Come on, the Kazakhs need to get a sense of humor”. That alone tells me what caliber of people like Borat.
What is this Jewish dude from UK doing making fun of Americans who just politely stare in disbelief at this idiot. That movie does not even remotely reflect the American psyche.
jeez, you can’t go anywhere these days without having to sift through the pointless postings of idiots. Borat’s much funnier than “Sampson” and “Helen” “Peter” et al.
Anyway, back to the subject at hand. Who ever said that Borat was trying to poke fun at “America”? He’s poking fun at those Americans who display the ridiculous characteristics that everyone on this forum finds offensive. Nothing wrong with that, so why generalise?
More importantly, who ever said that poking fun is offensive? In the UK it’s a comedic staple and victims take their ribbing with good grace and give back as good as they can and everybody moves on.
In the US, however, the politically correct movement has done a fantastic job of demonising such antics. Now, the partially-informed and those who simply want to make a noise have access to a (vaguely) credible intellectual tool to make noise about almost everything. But let’s not forget that the majority of people who express the most outrage over irrelevancies like this do so just because. Because they want to be seen, want to be regarded as having something to say, because they’re just having a bad day. It’s fun to get involved in the cause du jour.
None of this explains people like Tony, who are thoughtful and reasoning human beings. My assumption is that Tony simply doesn’t respond to this kind of humour, and that’s perfectly acceptable. He’s not alone. But why not let those with a different sensibility just enjoy the film and go on about their business? Let’s not turn a moment’s whimsy into something more than it is.
But then, I could be wrong.
this may help:
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/sacha_baron_cohen_the_real_borat_finally_speaks
US got kicked out of Uzbekistan. Kyrgizstan is no longer as friendly to the US as it used to be; the rent for the military base there was raised by a factor of 1000. Azerbaijan is the only
reliable ally from which US could hit Iran. But think of the possibilities after a regime change in Kazakhstan. Borat is a movie to program the minds of the Americans for a regime change in Kazakhstan.
Funny how some of you take Borat’s comedy/ethnic-warrior shill routine at face value.
Like the Texas sing-along – it’s a smear piece, folks! He gets the crowd singing throw x down a well (had them singing about throwing their own grandmothers down a well at one point), then he swoops in with “throw a jew down a well,” edits out all the x songs he used to massage the crowd, puts it on film, and you suckers buy it.
Those Texans weren’t anti-Semites.
I’M an anti-Semite, precisely because of behavior like Cohen’s.
P.S., the author forgot to mention the irony of Cohen using Roma (Gypsies) as stand-ins for Kazakhs, and how he was too much of a chickenshit to use Armenians (who are thugs and might’ve gone looking for him) as he originally planned before switching to Kazakhs.
I really don’t understand why every is so upset with “Borat”. Since when does exposing the truth about people, good or bad, justify the label of racist. Plus, isn’t Sascha Baron Cohen Jewish himself? Therefore, how can anyone call him an anti-Semitic? The only problem with the movie “Borat” is that he highlighted absurd misconceptions regarding race, gender, and social stereotypes. Ever seen “Day without a Mexican”, or “Space Traders”? Both of these films are parody’s on the repetitive immigration issue and ongoing racial tensions between whites and African Americans, but nobody refers to Arau and Bell as promoters of racist propaganda due to the obvious satire on the subject matter. Sadly, humor is sometimes the only manner of addressing the lack of unity between culture. I see these three examples of satirical film portrayals of extreme situations very effective in conveying a message. If you want people to listen, or god forbid think, you have to deliver the point in an extreme way. Sadly, our generation is numb to a vast majority of issues addressed in these films, but the nature of the adaptations allows for a broader audience and response. In the same manner, “Borat” is also a parody of the multiple cultural cross-roads of America. I believe the true reason everyone is quick to blame Sascha Baron Cohen is that he exposed the reality that racial issues still dictate personal opinion. Just as “The Space Trader” points out, people are only comfortable with their personal beliefs in the privacy of their own home, therefore, they are more than happy to bash concepts, but heaven forbid their comments go global. This aspect of “Borat” highlights the vast hypocrisy of our democratic nation. We preach equality for all, and all that crap, but when a silly movie about a traveling Kazakhstan citizen exposes a few embarrassing situations we jump to lawsuits. Talk about a real embarrassment to America culture.
Thanks Nick, it helps when you’re a web developer by trade 😉
idk bout u, but Borat was da shit
I am glad you mentioned what I felt about the “Throw the Jew Down the Well” singalong. I felt they were pretty much indulging him. No one with sense thinks Randy Newman’s “Short People” is to be taken seriously.
Yet this is mentioned over and over as supposedly establishing the racist nature of the bar patrons. I also agree that Cohen’s got some nerve depicting a real nation (of which most people know little about) as inherently stupid, backward, and racist.
I agree with your observations about comedy and what areas become problematic. To see this is true one only needs to imagine a non-Jew/Israeli making dispariging comments towards Jews/Israelis, let alone if they were actually false.
P.S. It wouldn’t hurt to delete the spam comments.