Eliot Chang, of Comedy Central’s Premium Blend, entertained students with racial humor and jokes about stereotypes at the College of Communication, a production sponsored by the Asian Student Union Thursday night in front of approximately 40 students.
In addition to performing, Chang led part of a workshop on uniting Asians in America. Introduced by ASU Vice President Christina Cheung, a School of Management junior, Chang took the stage with energy, promising the crowd, “show me love and show me energy, and I’ll show you the same.”
Chang’s performance dabbled in college drinking, but soon dove into much deeper issues. His comedy, although received well, had a deeper message to the Asian students attending: Asian pride.
Race relations were one of the first topics Chang brought up, and said his favorite channel is the Spanish channel because their energy makes everything seem more exciting. Not until the end of his performance did Chang directly mention racism and race relations, but in his carefully crafted act, he worked his way up to it.
Chang bonded with his audience by classifying them all as college students through his college drinking act. He then addressed them directly until everyone in the room felt comfortable.
“It’s a comedy show” he said.
Near the end of the show, he began discussing Asian stereotypes.
“People ask me, ‘Hey, do you know karate?'” he said. “No, I own a gun.”
As he pretended to get in a fight with an imaginary person next to him, Chang said, “you trained for nine years, I bought this gun yesterday … but actually, I do know Karate.”
Chang’s final and most relevant skit began, “If there is a petty conflict, someone always has to make it racial.”
Chang told a story about how one day in an elevator on his way to work, he pressed the wrong button in front of people going to the 15th floor. Using this last antidote, he saved his greatest shock for last. In front of a packed auditorium filled with the ASU, he let loose his punch line.
“I heard a guy in the back of the elevator say, ‘damn chink,'” he said.
Seeing that the room was dead quiet, Chang said he got out of the elevator and pressed every button between the floor he was on and 15, where the man was going.
After the show, Chang’s question and answer session was opinionated and morally based. He began by talking about Asians in the media.
“Some people are unable to make distinctions between the [people of the] countries [of Asia],” he said, “[and] some people don’t want to make the distinctions between [people of the] countries.”
Chang said power in the media is based on the perception of reality. As an example, he said Japanese interment camps were never widely publicized in the media, unlike Martin Luther King, Jr. or the Holocaust-therefore, no one was aware of them.
He said the media gives people the feeling that “we’re not cool just being Asian.” Chang said Asian women are depicted in two ways: “as a sex object, or as a complete bitch.” He said the media wrongly portrays Asian men as sexually undesirable. He said audiences never see an Asian man on television with a woman of any race, or an Asian couple over forty.
“How many times do you hear your friends make a joke with a racial slur?” Chang asked the audience, insisting that those jokes must be stopped.
“Be proud of your culture,” Chang said. “Get involved and spread awareness.”
ASU Treasurer Lisa Tobari said the Union thought Chang would be a good representative of Asian themes through a comedic perspective.
“He has a lot of experience performing on college campuses,” the College of Communication sophomore said in an email. “Also, New York City, where he makes his home, is not very far.”