I've been seeing this series of idiotic commercials for Six Flags, featuring a barking, accented Asian man. There are a whole bunch of these commercials floating around, like the one below, and they're basically all the same—the crazy Asian man's head pops up to tell you what is fun (Six Flags) and what is not (i.e. puppet show). "More flags! More fun! Six Flags!"
It's no coincidence that this crazy dude happens to be an Asian man. The campaign was apparently designed specifically with an Asian guy in mind. A little while ago, I actually heard from one reader who went out on an audition for this commercial:
Recently there has been a Six Flags commercial where they show an Asian man randomly speaking in a stereotypical Engrish accent. I, in fact, did go to the audition for that a few months ago. The casting call said nothing about speaking in a fobby accent. When I got there, the casting guy said stuff like "think about those Charlie Chan movies" "talk like your grandfather." My grandfather was born in the United States! I was so disgusted that I left midway.Charlie Chan? Your grandfather? What kind of ridiculous stereotyping is this? Because, you know, shouting Asian guys are funny. It kind of reminds of that Hot Pockets Dojo campaign from last year. It also reminds me quite a bit of that Banzai show from a couple of years back, the one where the bald Asian dude had a similar schtick. And we all know how awesome that was. That's racist! (Thanks, Douglas.)
