'Fresh Off the Boat' Author Eddie Huang Criticizes Steve Harvey for Distasteful Asian Jokes

BY Josiah HughesPublished Jan 16, 2017

Mistaken Miss America presenterFamily Feud host and Trump BFF Steve Harvey has gotten himself into another PR mess, this time for some distasteful jokes he made about Asian people on his daytime talk show.

The mustachioed menace used his television platform to make horrendous, outdated jokes about old dating books. One of them is called How to Date a White Woman: A Practical Guide for Asian Men. Of the book, Harvey said, "That's one page. 'Excuse me, do you like Asian men?' 'No.' 'Thank you.'" He doubled down on the terrible joke by saying a sequel called How to Date a Black Woman would have the same contents.

Naturally, these utterly pathetic "jokes" have caused quite a stir. Now, Fresh Off the Boat author and Huang's World host Eddie Huang has responded with an op-ed in the New York Times.

In the piece, Huang detailed the stereotypes perpetuated about Asian men in pop culture. "We count good, we bow well, we are technologically proficient, we're naturally subordinate, our male anatomy is the size of a thumb drive and we could never in a thousand millenniums be a threat to steal your girl," he wrote before clarifying that he doesn't identify with any of these claims.

"Yet the one joke that still hurts, the sore spot that even my closest friends will press, the one stereotype that I still mistakenly believe at the most inopportune bedroom moments... is that women don't want Asian men," Huang added. "Attractiveness is a very haphazard dish that can't be boiled down to height or skin color, but Asian men are told that regardless of what the idyllic mirepoix is or isn't, we just don't have the ingredients."

"That's why this Steve Harvey episode is so upsetting," he continued. "He speaks openly about issues facing the black community, he is a man of God, and he has a huge platform to speak from. Unfortunately, he's also the type of guy who orders Krug champagne for himself and Cook's for every one else. For his own personal profit, he's willing to perpetuate the emasculation of Asian men regardless of how hypocritical it is. He isn't the only one doing this in 2017, but as I told myself on New Year's, I'm not drinking anymore of this Cook's they're trying to pour, and neither should you."

If you need more proof that Harvey's jokes were outdated, The Hollywood Reporter has traced their origins all the way back to the 1800s. 


 

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