I googled Two Broke Girls and racism and there are plenty of articles about the show being racist going back to 2010. My favorite quote was from a 2011 New Yorker article: “so racist, it’s more baffling than offensive.” It’s low brow humor for the not too bright, of course it’s racist.
Yeah, actually I think you *do *need to be familiar, or otherwise how would you know the point is that Aborigine is supposed to equal ugly? Again, as someone else said, we don’t have a people here who we refer to by that name, so I can see that line completely going over peoples’ heads. Whether or not that’s an indication of Americans’ at large stupidity is a subject for another thread.
If one didn’t write the joke, vocalize the joke or laugh at the joke, must one be labeled an ignorant, hypocrital, racist American? Could it be possible that no one gives a shit because it’s a non issue?
Depends on the character; from Archie Bunker or Cartman it would be the expected thing.
“Stupid show makes stupid joke” really is a non-issue, I agree. Shock humour is about as easy as it gets, which is the most offensive thing about the whole incident.
But seriously, “She’s X but she has a great personality” is one of the oldest jokes around, up there with “Take my wife… please!” Again, you don’t need to know anything about X to know the humour comes from X being undesirable and a sign of physical unattractiveness.
“She’s a redhead, but she has a great personality!”
Do you take that line to be complimentary to redheads? I mean, let’s not kid ourselves here. Anyone who can’t figure this joke out is probably too stupid to operate a remote control.
I don’t group the “she’s X but she has a great personality” with the other two examples you provided. Shit, I myself am guilty of sharing the joke “. . . but he’s real nice” back in the day of petty high school snark.
The “take my wife please” always struck me as more of a basic complaint about a nag or just the state of being in a rut.
The red head thing, well, I don’t know your country of origin, but I think that may be more of a UK thing (?) I don’t recall red hair being synonymous with ugly in the U.S.
My point is, everyone’s perception is colored by their own histories / experiences. You are correct; Americans in general aren’t particularly aware and certainly not passionate about the plight of Aboriginal Australians. Why must they be?
While I think the whole thing is a storm in a teacup (offensive show makes offensive joke, details at 11) this statement is makes no sense at all.
What else could the joke be if not that the subject is supposed to be ugly or otherwise inherently offensive? “She’s ugly/smells bad/stupid/criminal but has a great personality” is the only thing that works.
Can you explain what else it could possibly mean? “She funny but has a great personality”? She has a PhD but has a great personality? She’s rich but has a great personality?
How could this joke possibly work except with an understanding that the person has inherent negative traits that are counterbalanced by a great personality?
Can you possibly explain how else this joke could possibly work?
I’m an Aussie, and the redhead thing is a random example. Blake is spot-on about this.
The joke only works based on the old saw “It’s what inside that counts.” It boils down to, “Her personality is so great that it offsets the obvious undesirability of her external appearance (which can be inferred merely from race)”.
The other posters making the case that this show trades on offensive racial humour have sold me. But this one line of argument, that the joke only makes sense if you already think Australian Aborigines are meant to be ugly, is baffling.
That’s not what I’m saying.
I’m saying that a significant number of Americans, if pressed to say anything about Aboriginal folk, would come up short. The line in question says, “I’m in a relationship with a woman in Australia! She’s part Aboriginal, but has a great personality!” So folks would guess that “aboriginal” is something someone in Australia could be. They might not know that the word describes an ethnic group. Seriously, I think you’re underestimating just how little Americans know about Australia.
And I just watched the clip, and the actor who delivers the line doesn’t have any intonation or other cues that he thinks she’s ugly. I think either he’s an incompetent actor or (less likely) doesn’t want to give the line the beat it calls for from the racist script.
Honestly, I know a weeny bit about Australian aboriginal folk, and if I was watching the show for some godforsaken reason, I’m not sure I’d parse the line the way it’s clearly intended, just because I’d be baffled by what it was supposed to mean.
Obviously the point of the joke is that she is inherently undesirable because of her racial / cultural background, yet her great personality balances that. Nobody(at least not I ) am disputing that. My point was (which has really become meaningless) is that for someone not familiar with that specific group of people, “ugly” isn’t neccessarily what comes to mind. Had I been watching the show, the first thing that would have sprung to my mind is perhaps"uncivilized, unsophisticated, poor" or something along those lines.
Does it really matter what her implied deficit is? We all agree that it’s a tasteless joke but I don’t know that it matters how you parse it.
What’s so baffling about it? If you’re not familiar with who Aborigine are, why would you know that the stereotype is “ugly”? Yeah, as we’ve already established, you get the gist that there’s something supposedly undesirable about Aborigine women, but it doesn’t neccessarily mean ugly.
And again, why does it matter what the undesirable trait is?
But now they know it’s a bad thing–something that needs to be or can be mitigated by other, more positive characteristics.
Is this a joke (if so, sorry to be dim) or are you making a point, or . . . what?
Exactly. The joke hinges on a certain race being inherently undesirable. No inside knowledge of the Australian racial landscape is necessary to divine this.
As noted, “great personality” is an established American colloquiallism that, with the right context and delivery, implies ugliness, all by itself. It doesn’t need any other knowledge, any correlation with any specific other stereotype.
But you’re right, it doesn’t really matter. The word “but” does the important work.
A bad thing, sure, if you can parse the line (as I said earlier, the actor delivers the line in a bizarre intonation that in no way suggests what the writers intend, and I suspect that a lot of viewers won’t even get as far in parsing the joke as getting the idea that the character thinks “aboriginal” is bad). But if someone does get that far, but is unfamiliar with the word, they’ll still be stuck. Does “aboriginal” mean “flaky”? Does it mean “fat”? Does it mean “superstitious”? Does it mean “punk rock”?
If you’re unfamiliar with the word, as I suspect a lot of the audience is, there’s no particular reason to infer that it’s a word for an ethnicity.
Ah, now I see the point. Isn’t aborigine a pretty standard and well-understood work for “native”?
Let me try again. Who is “they” and what is “it”?
Let me put it this way. Suppose you have a young child, who has never yet needed to encounter the subject of sexual orientation. And from other children, this child of yours learns that “gay” is a put-down. None of them knows exactly what it means, but it’s clearly a bad thing!
Do you want them taking up this ‘innocent’ usage? Doesn’t it set them up for a negative perspective toward gay people, as soon as they learn that “gay” is an intrinsic characteristic of some people? (Substitute “jew,” or other terms, as you like.)
It’s standard, but in the US it’s not used very often at all. I understand that it’s a much more common word in Canada and Australia. It’s not ever used (at least I’ve never heard it used) to describe Native Americans in the US.
It’s pure speculation on my part, but I’d guess that a very significant number of Americans couldn’t tell you what the word means at all.
So, correct me if I’m wrong, you are positing that now the innocent, ignorant American masses have now been exposed to another country’s ugly stereotype,and that now because of this we might further the already unsavory plight of those downtrodden people?
I feel pretty confident in saying that any American that has any knowledge of Australia’s Aborigine people is probably the kind of person who is a seeker of knowledge outside their normal scope and therefore is not the kind of person that is given to buying into ,or otherwise practicing, that kind of stereotyping.
Unless you mean the stereotype that Australian men are all strapping, funny, handsome men; 'cause we do all eat that one up 
FWIW, there is no stereotype that Aborigines are ugly. There are plenty of other terrible stereotypes about them, but being ugly isn’t one of them.