Self-described comedian Esther Ku’s racialized act (that demeans Asians for white audiences) set off a battle on Twitter. The story was picked up by Nextshark and NY Post. Chris, Teen, and Mark discuss the incident and try to layer some sense over the chaos, including recognizing similar patterns in other minority communities.

Twitter:

The following are edited excerpts from “Asian Twitter vs. Esther Ku,” the 20th episode of Plan A’s podcast, Escape From Plan A.

So let’s go through it though. It’s laughable but then if you really put it to the test, I don’t think a lot of Asian people fully know what the responses are to the justifications. Which is why they kinda work. The first being: I can’t be racist, my wife is Asian. Actually, up until recently, there was a certain kind of power to that.

— Teen

And [Ku] is not really that harmful to Asian men. Sure, it’s hurtful because the comments are directed at us. But it’s more harmful to Asian women, because it goes back to that idea of the permission slip that Teen talked about. It just gives that permission slip to especially white men to objectify Asian women more and assume that a lot of Asian women have these hostile feelings towards Asian men. Because it’s not as if the white men are treating the Asian women really nicely.

— Mark

[Ku’s white male supporters] know what they’re protecting here. This is their golden goose of easy sex. These are probably the same guys who get triggered by someone as mainstream as Amy Schumer and probably think she’s promoting white genocide or something. And then they come in here like they’re defending free speech and female comedians. Get the fuck outta here.

— Chris