The Comedy Cellar: Live from the Table - Jocelyn Chia

Episode Date: June 16, 2023

Noam Dworman, Dan Naturman and Periel Aschenbrand are joined by Jocelyn Chia, to discuss the recent controversy surrounding her joke about Malaysian Airlines. Also joined, from Singapore, is comic, Sam Cee.

This is Live from the Table, the official podcast of the world-famous comedy cellar, coming at you on Sirius XM 99, Raw Dog, and wherever podcasts are available. Dan Aderman here, host of the podcast, along with co-host Noam Dorman, owner of the world-famous comedy cellar, the ever-expanding world-famous comedy cellar. We have Perrie Alashenbrand here. She's our producer. And we have guests all the way from Singapore coming via the internet. Mr. Sam, he's a stand-up comedian and MC Singapore-based, but he performs all over the world.

Award-winning stand-up comedian and headlined in over 25 different countries. Okay, very interesting. We also have with us Jocelyn Chia, also of Singaporean origins, but now currently residing in the United States. Ni hao? Ni hao, yes. Currently residing in the United States and working here at a regular comic here on the Comedy Cellar.

And we've discussed on previous episodes the shitstorm, I guess, is the right word for it? How do you say shitstorm in What's the language We all speak English but I also speak Mandarin How would you say shitstorm in Mandarin Closer to your I mean it's probably not an exact translation

So let's give a quick overview Okay go ahead you can do that Jocelyn now do you think we should play the clip on Oh my dear god I think everyone's seen it don't you think Well describe Well you can describe You'd prefer that we didn't play the clip on on oh my dear god i think everyone's seen it don't you think nothing well describe you're just listening to this well you can describe it we didn't play the clip you'd prefer that we do not know i don't mind but i've just been seeing it so often you know well maybe maybe so because we want to tell so jocelyn um uh the seller released with a co-release

with jocelyn i guess a a clip of her doing a a bit that she's been doing for how long a year and a half a year and a half put the mic closer oh? A year and a half. Put the mic closer. A year and a half. So often, I think the seller staff is sick of it. She kind of roasts Malaysia a bit because there's a rivalry between Malaysia and Singapore, sort of.

This clip went viral and many people in Malaysia were quite offended and it set off an international incident where one of the ministers of Singapore had to apologize or didn't have to but chose to apologize to the country of Malaysia. Minister, high commissioner. Malaysia has asked Interpol to track down Jocelyn's whereabouts. I got 14 calls from a Malaysian number today. I don't pick up Malaysian numbers, but that could have been Interpol calling.

There was a protest at the American embassy in Malaysia. The comedy seller was hacked. Our website was hacked. So this is quite an incident. So I guess if we're putting on our journalistic hats here, let's play the clip, Nicole. Let's play the clip and then we can talk about it and try to understand

and have you explained why this clip was so offensive. What it was culturally that we don't understand and how you feel about it, what regrets you may or may not have. So go ahead, play the clip. My country, Singapore, after we gained

independence from the British, we were a struggling little nation. In order to So go ahead, play the clip. When my prime minister went on TV to announce that you guys had dumped us, he cried because he thought we're not going to survive without you. But then 40 years later, we became a first world country. And you guys, Malaysia, what are you now? Still a developing country. Now, up until this point, do you think you would have gotten in trouble? Maybe. Maybe. Maybe.

But this was not, this was, this was, this could have still This could have still This could have been like Tongue in cheek This probably has still been Considered tongue in cheek Yeah I agree There was no cuss words yet Nothing No

Well you said Fuck you Oh I really did say F you Yeah that's true I did say that Now that's That's considered to be That's like you know

Nothing in America There's nothing in America Right But that's a big deal there I didn't think so But I also haven't been in Asia. I haven't lived in Asia more than half my life, right?

So maybe it's more of a big deal there than here, now that I think about it. Okay, so, because there was a lot of cursing on Twitter by Malaysians. Right, right, right. They cursed me back.

So I saw that, but they actually, and even use like, like hood vernacular and stuff, like stuff like, you know. Really? I heard the one. Sister, please,

and stuff like that. Sister, please. I heard the one they're using a lot is wash your poop. I that I didn't know was a phrase to wash your poop. Poop. Wash your poop. It's a direct translation, I guess, of an expression that they use. Oh, maybe you guys don't wash your poop.

So go ahead. Continue. Oh, boo. You Malaysia. Aww, boo! F*** you Malaysia! Isn't that the best breakup revenge? Now Malaysia, y'all trying to come around like Eh, Singapore, you're looking good lah And we're like, I know

But why haven't you visited me in 40 years? And you're like, ah yeah I tried, but you know, my airplanes cannot fly. Malaysian Airlines going missing, not funny, huh? Some jokes don't land. This joke kills in Singapore. We're definitely getting a bad yelp from you. I get a bad yelp from you from the Malaysians.

That's okay, they don't have internet. When you said getting a bad yelp, was the Malaysian person in the audience angry? No, no, that was from Red, the drummer. Oh, that was from Red. Yeah, Red was like... Was the person in the audience angry? The Malaysian person?

I couldn't see. They're quite far away. I don't think so. I mean, no Malaysian has come up to you afterwards to say, I mean, I even get, oh, I really like your bit. And I'm from Malaysia. Well, how often do we get Malaysians in the audience? Not super often, but every now and then for sure.

Not as common as like, you know, we get a lot, for some reason we get like a lot of like Norway and. So we did get an email from someone who said they were there complaining, but I wasn't sure if they were actually there or not. It's hard to say. All right. So having said that. Oh, you did get an email from a person who was at that particular show?

They said they were. I didn't. Anyway. So if you can, can you explain to us from the Malaysian point of view, why are they so angry? And what is it that we don't understand as Westerners that you must have some understanding for? What's going on there? You know, I too had to listen to some analysis about what's going on. I am pretty Americanized by now.

It's kind of true, right? Like we broke up. They were the powerful country back then and now we're better. So of course, you have a bit of an ego about it. I'm just like shining light to it. And what commentator was saying was that I was stirring the pot. Like it was stuff that's already brewing under the surface. I was stirring the pot, stirring all these hidden emotions and underlying resentment that

they may have. So that's what someone was saying. I could see some truth to that. But for me, my personal point of view is that I basically went into their living room, showed up in their phone and was like, fuck you Malaysia. So I think that's where I think things got out of hand, right? In the comedy club, this has worked for over a year and a half,

everyone sees me from a distance, I'm on stage so I can act out a little bigger so people further back can see me but when it's translated now into a video form and that's why stage actors always sort of tone it down when they go on camera right because the camera picks up everything so i think translating a stage act into a phone that you're now viewing complete out context you're on your toilet bowl taking a dump or whatever or washing your poop, I don't know. And that, I think, is what made them more incensed.

Also, it's a Chinese girl, right? Malaysia is 70% Malay, 30% Chinese. I think Sam can speak to, like, there is some racial-ish, like, I don't know what's the right word, but there could be

a racial component as well. There's a Chinese person and a woman, right? And a Singaporean. They thought I was Singaporean at the time and there's that rivalry. So like these three factors, Chinese, woman, Singaporean,

shouting to their face in their phone. I could see people kind of aggravating. But what about... Well, you're not Singaporean? You said... No, I'm American now. So at first they thought I was... But you are Singaporean.

My accent, you know. But you are Singaporean. Not by citizenship anymore. Yeah, but... Right, but in their mind, I was sounding and looking like a Singaporean But is there something about the plane crash Which is considered to be a national I don't want to use the wrong word

They take it very much to heart that in some way Before the world This makes them look second rate. Is that right? Yeah, I never saw it that way. I mean, I could see them thinking that. They have a bit of an embarrassment about that. You definitely touched a nerve with this plane crash.

I touched a nerve with this plane crash, yeah. Which seems to me to be more than just sympathy for the victims. It seems to me like this is like a synecdoche. All the world knows about us is this goddamn plane crash. The first thing they think about is this plane crash. We're a very capable nation. We're smart people.

We do great things. And now this is what they... We become the butt of a joke. Right. Yeah. Yes, I totally get that and the weird thing is Malaysia Airlines

jokes are done in Asia I had Asian comics like, what the hell Jocelyn, I hear these jokes in Malaysia all the time, or I hear these jokes on the Singapore stages all the time, but I think it's because mine was the first to go on social media at least the first with some kind of platform the seller also co-posted it.

So we had our joint following sharing it. And also it's being consumed by people who don't go to comedy shows. So when we do it in Asia, in Singapore or Malaysia, it's always within the confines of a comedy show. So when people are joking about Malaysia Airlines, everyone knows they're joking, but a lot of these people watching this clip

don't go to comedy shows, right? They don't have a very strong comedy scene in Malaysia. I mean, they shut down a comedy club because someone made a bad joke. And Sam will have more details. But yeah, someone made a bad joke and they shut down the comedy club. They arrested the owner

for making offensive jokes online. So their comedy culture is not as developed as America. They don't go... Not just comedy culture, but they have no concept of free speech in the sense that i know there was a well this is singapore not malaysia but i i'm sure there's some sort of similarity to the mentality there was a choir in singapore

called the complaining choir oh yeah where they they do uh songs about like complaining about, fetching about everyday life in Singapore. And then one year they had a non-Singaporean member of the choir, a foreigner, and then the government shut it down and said, you cannot perform if you're going to have a foreigner in the choir. Because again, it's like a humiliation to have a foreigner singing songs about problems with Singapore.

Now, that's so beyond anything an American would ever, even a million years, think about. But in Singapore, it's like, oh, okay. Well, we have the advantage in America of being the most powerful country on earth, you know, and we're not insecure about our place in the world. We also have a First Amendment. I mean, it's a deep, deep... Well, we have both things. We have, you know, we can...

England is like that, too. Well, I mean, England might have some insecurities about their lost empire. I don't know. But, you know, Sam, no one brought up the point... Wait, wait. One more thing. We're bringing Sam. One more thing.

What is it, Dan? I thought I was a co-host of the show. Go ahead, Dan. No one mentioned that the Singapore Airlines crash might not just be a national tragedy, which it certainly is in Singapore, but it also might be a national shame in that they think that they're viewed as incapable. Can you speak to that? I know you're Singaporean, but

I was wondering if you could speak to that at all. I love that he got Malaysia and Singapore mixed up. People get Asians mixed up all the time. No, he's Singaporean. I'm Singaporean. He's a Singaporean ally and a Singaporean. I'm a Singaporean. I'm a Malaysian.

Oh, you white people. Happens all the time. All the states are the most powerful country in the world, right? Most powerful country in the world? Can't pick up a book. So, the whole thing behind it, I guess... Am I lying? So, well, good evening, everybody.

So, the whole thing that's gone down is quite fascinating because I have a little bit more experience talking about this particular subject because I also have gotten into trouble experience talking about this particular subject because I also have gotten into trouble with Malaysia for jokes in the past. I too have had issues, I've had police reports, I've also been banned from the country

so it's almost like a rite of passage. Of course, yeah, it's a rite of passage as a Singaporean comedian or someone from Singapore to piss off the Malaysians because here's the thing. Of late, Malaysia's been a bit touchy about jokes. Justin did bring up the situation.

There was a very popular comedy club called the Crack House Comedy Club in KL, Kuala Lumpur. Don't ask me how they got that name passed. But basically, to cut a long story short... We don't know what crack means. Yep. We'll get... There's a whole fun story but we don't have enough time for that

so the whole thing that went down was that they pissed off the Muslims, the Muslims shut the place down, the owner is currently waiting for trial he might be put in jail for a year or two for not even doing the joke himself for just vaguely letting somebody on stage on an open mic

not even a professional show on an open mic. Not even a professional show. An open mic where she filmed it, put it online, and the Malaysian internet went crazy because they're not used to seeing this. The idea of comedy is, oh, look, it's a guy dressed as a woman. Look, it's an inferior race. Let's make fun of them. The comedy isn't quite advanced yet. So when Jocelyn did touch on Malaysian Airlines, they're a little bit like, ugh, this is not just making fun of them. The comedy isn't quite advanced yet. So when Jocelyn did touch on Malaysian Airlines,

they're a little bit like, this is not just making fun of us, this is a national shame. But it's also done by a Singaporean whom we don't really like and a woman. They are quite sexist sometimes. Hence and therefore ho halabaloo.

Malaysia also has something called the cyber, I don't want to say cyber police more like a malaysian netizens they're like keyboard warriors but they really have nothing better to do with their lives uh to uh no one might understand there has also been a singapore comedy club that also has been review bombed in singapore because of jocelyn although she has not played in that club for five years yeah Yeah, Comedy Masala in Singapore got reviewed bombed. Wait, I thought it doesn't exist anymore. Oh, Comedy Masala!

Yeah, they got reviewed bombed because of you, young lady. Yeah, they went back years. So I guess, like, why it all went down. It's all about, like, there's so much stuff going on. It's not just a joke. It's the culture of the joke. It's the person telling the joke. It's the whole surrounding.

But in the day, it's just people that don't quite understand what stand-up comedy is, how it feels, how it's meant to push. Also that American sentimentality of we're here to challenge what it is. And Jocelyn honestly did a good job, although maybe superimposing a picture of the plane

that crashed over the joke might not have been the best choice, Jocelyn. It was not me. That was not my doing. Yeah, so that's a very good point. So I usually approve all the clips. I'm supposed to approve all the clips that go up. And I didn't approve this one. I didn't see it

before it went up. And I was furious because it's not a surprise to me that this, I mean, I, that it went viral to the extent it became an international incident. Obviously no, but it wasn't surprising to me that it was received negatively. First of all, it encouraged people to leave the bad reviews. So that was stupid enough.

But more than any other brand of humor, we get complaints about jokes which ridicule tragedies. This is something going back to when Sam Morrell got in trouble for making fun of the child that was eaten by the alligator in Disney. If you remember, Louis got in big trouble for a Parkland joke, even though he actually didn't make fun of the play. He referred to the kids who survived Parkland and spoke before Congress. I can think of a few other examples. People don't like this. It's a small group of people. But for the people who are bothered by that kind of thing, they're quite bothered by that and uh so yeah and and and i don't know if i if i'm going

to violate the uh americans with disabilities act here but i'm told that danny our guy who does the clip thing he's told me that he's on the spectrum andosed a plane he thought oh no this is a great way it's a visual tool so they can imagine the crash it's perfect so apparently if I were to fire him now for this I'd be in violation of the law retribution against someone who has

a disability of some kind so I guess I would never fire him for this. He didn't mean bad. But so that's how it happened. And it started as a trickle, a couple of bad reviews. And I lost my shit as a couple of bad emails and stuff. But then, I mean, I've never seen anything like this. We had more people coming to our website over this than we've had since we've been open.

Like it was unbelievable. It was like – so yeah, it kept me up at night. And then I woke up our web designer in the middle of the night and I said, Steve, you got to get up. You need to back up the website onto a local drive now. Wow. I said, why? I said, they're coming after us. And sure enough, the next day.

What about the fuck you, which I guess in the room seemed like a jocular fight. Like, oh, fuck you. But I don't think they took it that way. They did not. They took it as a full on fuck you. But I don't think they took it that way. They did not. They took it as a full-on fuck you. What role did that play? Oh, I think it was a big role

because, like you said, there's almost never Malaysians in the audience who at least admit that they're Malaysian, right? So I think it may have been twice that I had a Malaysian and I could roast them.

So in the moment, because comedy club culture, you roast members of the audience. I was like, oh, fuck you. And then the whole audience laughs, et cetera, because they know that you're just roasting the audience because comedy club culture you rose members of the audience i was like oh fuck you and like the whole audience laughs etc because they know that you're just roasting the audience because they know that's what comedians do but i think taken out of context they and what i heard was that they thought i was yelling fuck you with so much hate in my heart they thought i had hate in my heart i was like wow these acting classes have paid off how shocked were you? And how did you find out that it

went so crazy? I think my gnome called me the next day. I was like, oh, this is bad now. She didn't respond to the call right away, by the way. I was sleeping. I imagine it's scary to... Malaysians are right. You're a liar.

I mean, I imagine it's scary. Were you at all liar I mean, I imagine it's scary Were you at all frightened by all this Venom coming at you? Were you receiving threats of any kind? I'm sure, I don't read most of them I mean, once I saw that things were getting really personal And they were attacking me

I mean, I got somewhat lucky Meaning that I could kind of curate what I saw Had people to like safeguard my inbox and everything. So I was pretty protected. So really all the hate they're directing at me is like, I don't know. You got to safeguard your inbox. So let us tell you, by the way, we have people get upset about,

you know, and I get it. Like peanut allergies are like a common thing to make fun of. But my goodness, you have a kid with a peanut allergy who's almost died. Of course, it's going to be hard for you to laugh at that. Totally, yeah. Right. It's a broader concept out there, but it's still human, right? So, and we have Zach here as a comedian too. Why is it okay to make fun of tragedies in your opinion? I don't think we're making fun of the tragedy. We're trying to find the humor in it, right? We're not making fun of the victims or that it's so funny that a tragedy happened.

But, you know, I think when we try to find what's actually funny about this thing, then we can laugh about it, maybe healing. Medicine's, I mean, life is supposed to be healing. So I think that's why it's, I wouldn't say important, but a definite argument for being able to laugh at sad stuff in life. Like comedy is a reflection, comedy is a mirror to reality, right? So if we want to have our comedy be truthful and a reflection of the real world, then tragedies are part of it. Zach, you want to take on that?

It's interesting. I have, I lost a friend of mine in world, then tragedies are part of it. Zach, you want to take on that? It's interesting. I have, I lost a friend of mine in the Virginia Tech Massacre. And so sometimes I have bits about, they never do as well as other bits. So I retire them usually, but I joke like, oh, it was awful. 18 year olds should not be writing eulogies because 18 year olds are bad writers. Like in this eulogy, I will argue, blah, blah, blah. And so I think, I think, I mean, in some ways, nothing is off limits. In some ways, some things can be sacred to different people.

But I think you have to joke about, maybe not the day of a tragedy, unless that's your persona. Like, everyone's waiting for Jessel Nick the day after something awful happens. Like, what's his hot take can be. And so it depends on people knowing you, your persona, what you can, like, get away with. And then are you, like, punching up or punching down, I guess is the question too. Ari Shafir got in huge trouble. Remember when Kobe made a tweet about Kobe Bryant? Yeah.

I mean... Oh. Someone said to me something comforting. If LA is willing to let Ari Shafir back into LA after that Kobe Bryant tweet, you'll be fine going back to Malaysia in a couple years. I don't think I'm going to risk it. Sam, what's your take about...

Let me put it another way to you. Do you feel in some way some sympathy for the way the malaysians feel about this oh definitely some sympathy and a lot of it because uh i know people who have were on the plane like i know people as in not personally as i know people who had friends who are on the plane some of them are performers but here's the thing we have to joke about tragedy not directly about like mocking it but to go through it somehow to understand it somehow by talking about it we are now no longer letting it have that grip on us and here's the thing people in malaysia have been joking about mh370 themselves because they also need to find a way to get over it a bunch of malaysian comedians have been doing jokes for years about it and some of them who had criticized Jocelyn,

saying that went too far, were the ones who were doing it in the first place. They were the ones that were outrightly doing it. But that's different in some way when you make it within your community. Yeah, but they've also gone all over the place. Joking about tragedy. It's like, they had... No, right, there is a comedian

whose friend... There is a comedian in Malaysia whose friend was on MH370 and she's made jokes about it. If anything, she should have the most right to talk about it, but she didn't say anything about the situation because she knew Jocelyn is a comic and there does not need to be commentary about that.

And when it comes to it, it's like everything comedy, it's subjective. Comedy is subjective. If you like it, that's great. If you don't like it, you don't have to come. That's you'd like it that's great if you don't like it you don't have to come that's all my opinion is as follows yeah i don't do it uh unless i feel i have something interesting to say about the nature of tragedy and and the and the the nature of the fact that we're all living in a in a world of horror but i think a lot of people that joke about tragedy um to be perfectly candid are not

interested in healing or interested in an interesting take. They're interested in being considered edgy and getting an easy laugh. I'm not saying this is the case with Jocelyn, but I think it's all fine and good to dress up comedy as comedians, as these great healers and these great voices that need to be heard. And that can certainly happen. But what can also happen is comics trying to say, hey, I want to be the edgy guy. I want to be Jezelnik. I want to be the cool guy that doesn't give a fuck.

And not offering healing. It's fine. I don't condemn it. It's just not what I do. I think oftentimes we make more of comedy than it is. Most comics are not great truth tellers. Most comics are just doing shtick. What about the point that I had made in The Times?

By the way, The Times kind of wrote it as if it was their point and they asked me about it, if you read it. But that wasn't the case at all. Anyway, the point I made in The Times was that there's a certain vibe in a late night where people are drinking. It's a small group of people. That was a good point. And it's a little bit transgressive, a little bit naughty. And you say things that – I can't believe you said that. You're not supposed to say.

Right. But within that time and place, everybody kind of understands what's going on and they take it for what it is. And A, isn't that a legitimate vibe? And B, then we do understand that it's to try to transplant that vibe, as I said at a time, into a small screen watching over morning. Let me finish, Dan. To try to transplant that vibe into a small screen, we're watching over morning coffee.

It flops in the same way, as I said to Zach, listening to a tape screen, we're watching over morning coffee, it flops in the same way as I said to Zach, listening to a tape recording of yourself having sex over morning coffee will sound psychotic. But it was in the time and place, it sound, you might even be underachieved, right? But it's like certain things

don't transplant to another moment. So what about – Yeah, and also it was – Yes, I agree. I just think that sometimes we give – we dress comedy up as this crusade for free speech and we're healing the world through humor. I think that's – in 90 percent of the cases, baloney. We're trying to get laughs.

She didn't claim that. She didn't claim she're trying to get she didn't claim that she didn't claim she was trying to well but that's what that's what that's what has been said on this podcast is that tragedy we joke about tragedy for healing maybe or maybe we just joke about tragedy because we're trying to get a laugh and i think comedians see everything as a premise yeah i think that's true too i had a cousin who didn't talk to me for a year because did a joke about john benet ramsey who's the little girl who was in the um beauty in the beauty pageant and she was it was a horrible story and i think to exactly what you guys are saying it was like i wasn't making fun of the

little girl right you're sort of exposing the situation more i want to hear the joke well i don't i actually don't remember what it was it was a really it was a really long time ago but she was i was like wow you've forgotten her death it was the culture of like you parade these little girls around and the whole media circus about it is really the thing that you're critiquing, right? Like, I don't know. I think that it is really important to be able to bring light to those tragedies and to find a space where it can be okay to talk about. Because a lot of tragedies are taboo, right? I mean, we just had Dara Godfrey, Gilbert's

wife. Gilbert got in trouble for a very similar thing. And actually for me personally, it's not so much the tragedy that I found humorous. For me, the beauty of the joke was that I actually do lose the audience. For the most part, unless the audience is really wild, I will lose them when I mention the Malaysian Airlines.

And then the fun part for me is winning them back. But because the clip was edited, you can't really see the full, like, me losing the audience and then I turn around like, oh, not funny? Okay, well, never mind. And I act like I'm giving up on the joke and I turn around and stick the punchline and then they go like, oh! And so for me, that is more like a play on

losing an audience and then winning them back. To me, that's what the joke is about. Obviously, people are going to think it's about the tragedy, etc. No, but that's really interesting, actually, because I thought of that because you would imagine that most Americans actually don't have a sense of that rivalry or all the nuance in that joke, right? They don't understand that part of it.

Well, you hit a perfect storm of a lot of things. Perfect storm. Mazel tov, Justin. That our clip exacerbated the in-your-face aspect of the airline thing, that this culture takes these things, I think, more seriously than other tragedies would have been taken in other countries. What else? seriously than other tragedies would have been taken in other countries that uh what else that they don't have a free speech culture that i mean all of it no not much of a comedy culture either um yeah so they know like a lot of malaysians had no idea what stand-up was so they just saw a woman yelling fuck you malaysians with no context they don't understand that it's an economy club it's for jokes they're just like who are these people laughing how dare these people laugh i will say i got i got some emails uh from

malaysian people and i tried to answer them uh thoughtfully that's nice of you and and they answered me thoughtfully back i was quite impressed with the the i mean i i have one example here now maybe my answer but it answer it's a long exchange so I'm not going to send the whole thing I'm not going to read the whole thing but

things like it's such a shame the comedy seller has not made any statement regarding the disgusting insensitive behavior of one of your so-called comedians

Jocelyn Shear it was totally inappropriate how would you feel if we make fun of 9-11 Jocelyn Joker failed to mention she forgot you did forget to mention this

by the way that the so-called first world country still depends on Malaysia for water yes still today and the famous country

still flocked to Malaysia to buy groceries to fill up on petrol blah blah blah but that's just not funny but and why I mention it

it's not funny then she then she answered me about is it a sheet yeah she answered me about some stuff I said in the Times. And anyway, and then I answered her. I got a little, maybe a little below the belt.

I wrote, I don't think you realize people are offended every single day at comedy clubs. I get emails about jokes all the time. Often I agree. Often I'm offended myself, but that's the way comedy clubs are. If I get involved in one dispute, I have to take a stand one way or another on all of them, and that's just not possible. I read that your former prime minister had said things that Jewish people were offended by. He called them

hook-nosed and questioned the Holocaust. But in my opinion, he can say what he wants. The proud Malaysian people have powerfully made their point here. I don't think she'll tell the joke anymore, but I don't know that. And if she does tell it, it's her right to do so. I'm sorry.

I know you won't agree, but honestly, I have respect for the fact – I have total respect for the fact that you were offended. And then she wrote back, which impressed me, which is why we should – not this part. This is why we should have rules on what is allowed, not allowed, and deemed offensive when running a business or making a statement. Of course, that's nuts from an American point of view. She said this. Yes, I agree. Our former prime minister's statements were offensive and unacceptable. But he's not in the good books of his own people either, hence why he lost the last election.

We don't easily brush anything under the carpet. Anyway, good day to you, my Jewish friend wow impressive and you know what i got a message from a friend very nice i had a similar nice discourse i mean she's completely yeah go ahead she's completely incorrect about how uh the she was absolutely incorrect about the prime minister though the prime minister is still very much loved the winning was primarily heavily muslim so she's talking out of her uh unwashed ass i think that was well jocelyn the question was the question was posed uh or not posed but addressed that uh you will not according to noam chances are you will not be telling this joke again.

But if you do, it's your right. So will you be? I told it the first day the shit hit the fan. I was ranting about it on the stage. I mean, at a bar show, not at the cellar. But I was talking about the reaction I was getting and my feelings about it. I was like, you guys want to hear the bit?

They're like, yeah, I did a bit. Again, same reaction. They all lose them, win them back when I stick the landing. And then I just joke about it. And I think I'm going to put in my Netflix special. That's whatever she wants to do. I was trying to make the point, but I didn't. To them, that, you know, how much more do you want?

How much more do you want to accomplish here? I only read excerpts, right? But that the whole country has come after this poor woman. She's getting threats. She's this and that. You want to take it even further than that. Whatever it is that you think that she should have gotten punished, she's gotten it. And now it's up to her.

Do you want to tell the joke? She doesn't want to tell the joke. I'm not going to get involved in that. It's been suggested that any publicity is good and that this will help your career along the lines of Ariel Elias getting a beer thrown at her. Are you in accord with that?

I think the end result remains to be seen, but yes. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, we are in a career where this has happened to so many of our comrades. Comrades sound like communists. So many of our colleagues, right? And so I have had enough friends who have gone,

I mean, I just talked to Shane Gillis about it, right? So I've had enough people who have gone through similar, maybe not to the extent that I have. And the uniform opinion is that this will end up being a net positive. The negative will blow past in a while. And then the positive seem to stay on. I mean, are they trying to make me feel better? Maybe.

Not 100% sure this is going to be a net positive, but I think the most important thing, like Shane was saying, is just to keep working your craft, keep putting out good content. And then your fans, now you have the eyeballs of the world, right? And so if you do use this time to then still keep putting out good content,

then it'll be a net. But have you had a large increase in followers on social media? I wouldn't say it's a large increase because Instagram deleted my Instagram. Okay. They deleted the whole account? Yeah, her account got taken down. It got taken down. I mean, we are working on getting it back.

So, you know, behind the scenes. But it has been taken down for a while. And based on what they said, what, you violated community standards? Yeah, they said I was impersonating a celebrity. There are all these fake accounts of me, so I'm now being accused of impersonating myself. Oh, I see. So they took it down like thinking that it wasn't really you.

But I think it's because the haters have been reporting my account and Instagram couldn't get me any other thing other than impersonating. But you don't know that. You'reating. But you don't know that. That's your suspicion, but you don't know that. I'm sure they are because whenever I put it back up again, it gets slammed like right away and, you know, it gets suspended right away until like after the third suspension.

Then Instagram is like, you know, we're permanently deleting this. That's annoying. Very annoying. Instagram is very lazy. I think they, when people report, if they get like three reports, they're like blocked or banned. I want to do, I want to say just part of what, about all of this is how sinister the internet is. Like the real winner in this is Instagram. The real winner is the eyeballs that they get.

Totally, yeah. Because our phrase I wanted to drop was the idea of contextual collapse. That like in a comedy club, there's a context, there are rules, there's engagement. But the internet, something could be seen by one person or 10 million people if someone invited you tomorrow to give a speech to 10 million people in uh to malaysians for singaporeans you're probably not going to say fuck you right yeah but the internet takes a thing that's meant for a certain context shows it to the world and someone once said if something gets more than 10 000 likes like it's it's beyond you this is no longer about your material.

People are airing their own disagreements, their own ego, to your point. But yeah, the winner in the end is the tech company that's managing it all. I'm going to start buying meta shares. I do want to say one other thing. And this applies well beyond this particular incident. You quite often hear people say, well, if it's her free speech right to say it, it's my free speech right to complain and to be offended. And that's true as far as it goes.

But often they use that to justify a kind of call to action to punish that person who said it. And I think that's almost always wrong. And I was thinking about the other day, like, when do I think even a boycott is okay? And the reason I think it's wrong is because if you believe in free speech, what I think you're supposed to really believe in is the idea of discourse. It's not the idea of freedom to say what you want and my freedom to try to make sure you get fired. Although you may have that right to try, but if you use your free speech as a way to try to get somebody fired or to try to have somebody's business shut down or take damage.

That's a different view of free speech. That is not the free speech which comes from your respect for the idea of discourse. And I don't think that point gets made enough. So while I guess there are some hypotheticals, like I always say Hitler can break almost any hypothetical. There are some hypotheticals of somebody who just stands for something so outrageous and so racist and has a big sign with the N-word. I say, yeah, I guess we ought to boycott that person. You have to go to the bathroom? It wasn't me, no.

Oh, is it me? Oh, it's me. But having allowed for the fact that there might be certain cases where even I would have to say it's okay. I think that it's wrong to try to bring consequences to rain down on somebody who said something that you don't agree with. I think it is a bad social norm to start doing that, and it cannot be controlled, and it will dumb its way down to boycotts and retribution, especially now.

Let me think. It was talking about the internet where you can ruin people with just a few thousand people on the internet if you can get them to do it. You can really cause trouble for somebody, especially when the places like Google hide behind this Section 230 protection where they actually won't even get involved. Like when there's a bunch of bad reviews for a business, there's not even somebody at Google you can call. They literally don't even have an employee in charge of dealing with online attacks. Oh, so how do you make them do it?

They have like – somebody should do a whole story about this. They have Google like product specialists who are volunteers who don't get paid by Google, who maybe have some connections with – nobody even knows how it works. It's opaque and they can escalate you. But it's big brother. You have, nobody's accountable. You have no rights. It depends on who you get and what their predilection.

They're not accountable for any decision they make. You can, they can, they can say to you, no, this was not a personal attack and you have no one to call up and say, well, you're missing something or you misread it or anything. There's no fucking rights. And to make it even worse, Google, you know, it's like you Google New York Comedy Club. I don't know why you would, but New York Comedy Club. And I'm kidding. And you want to make a reservation there or you just want to get their address.

The first thing you see is Google shows their stars. So Google intervenes into your essentially non-commercial transaction and tells you, let's say they have bad ratings. Oh, this is a two-star place. No, a comedy club is not a two-star place. But this is a two-star place. You may not want to go there. And the owner is like, they didn't fucking ask you was I a good place or not.

And you have no recourse for that because of this. So it's a thicket of things which haven't been thought through, laws which were passed to deal with things which nobody contemplated. It's taken our life. It's mushroomed. And it will have to be revisited at some time.

You know, I don't know when the next time we're going to have a functioning government that can revisit everything. Anything is one of the reasons I'm kind of against this whole Trump indictment is because like, great, Biden's going to win. And his as inauguration, we're going to see Biden being inaugurated while Trump in his jail cell with a, you know, exposed commode. And for four years now, 30% of the country is going to view the president as the guy who put his, you know, the opposition candidate in jail. And whether he belongs in jail, it's not even like we're going to have to live this way for yet another four years. I just, it's like, when will we ever have a government that can get to anything? So I'm getting off on a tangent here. But anyway, this this this whole Internet thing does need to be untangled in some way.

And that's it. No, I'm not. You know, I train a thought. But I thought of what you were saying about getting people fired. I read that Ryanair recently on a flight from Rome to Tel Aviv. One of the flight attendants took it upon herself to say that we'll be arriving in Palestine. And, you know, of course, part of her job is to give you your destination. But I thought to myself, I really like to see that person fired.

But then I said that's not a free speech issue. She's an employee. But go ahead. But yes, but but it is an issue if if if the whole incident, if there was a big movement online to get her fired. And I said to myself, no, I don't want to – I actually thought of that, of what you were saying. Like, no, I don't want to be part of an online mob to get somebody fired. But I did think to myself, I really like to see that woman given the boot. Yeah. And of course, you're not doing your job properly if you're giving somebody the wrong destination and taking it upon yourself.

You should have said Occupied Palestine. Well, no. No. That's a commercial. Yeah. If I have a waitress who insists on – we have a dish of Israeli salad and she insists on calling it Occupy Palestine salad. I might have to – but if she goes online and tweets or tells a joke in an artistic expression or whatever it is within a forum where it's her right to be doing such, she doesn't have that right as a flight attendant.

But within a context, Jocelyn has the right to tell jokes and her jokes may have a point or whatever it is. If you want to take issue with it, that's fine. But to try to ruin her is not... You don't say you agree with... I believe in free speech, therefore I have a right to try to ruin her. That's just bullshit. Are you calling upon Ryanair to fire this flight attendant?

No, I wouldn't fire her, but I would tell her, don't do that again. If you insist on doing it, you might leave us no choice. I mean, there's an interesting legal aspect here since we're all former lawyers or legally trained that if incitement and offensive content is against the law in Malaysia, right?

And my content that was uploaded in America, but somehow via the internet gets consumed in Malaysia, am I actually liable under Malaysian law? Under Malaysian law, they can do whatever they want. I don't know what the Malaysian laws are. Are you going to be traveling to Malaysia? Hell no.

This flight attendant thing reminds me of Colin Kaepernick because he, you know, I always thought they shouldn't let him do that. Not because I care what he's saying, but because he was intruding his politics into what is a commercial thing. And as I had said at the time, well, if he had taken a knee for all the lives that are lost in abortions, you know, the same people were defending his right.

He's like, get this guy out of here. You have no right to be taking a pro-life stance during a football game. I thought that the proper response by the football team should have been, listen, we're not going to force you to go out there for the national anthem. But if you go out there for the national anthem, you have to stand. If it's against your conscience to do so, then stay in the locker room until the game starts. Because so much of it,

the support was based on the fact that people happen to agree with that particular stance of his, but you give them a stance they don't agree with and immediately they would change. But what she's doing, the flight attendant is doing is exactly the same thing. She's taken a knee, right?

Kind of. And you can see in that context, well, you can't do that. Like you're getting paid. You know, you have to say the destination as we say it. If you disagree

with it, maybe we can find some other solution. Do another route. You can't just impose your politics. You can't impose your politics on the airplane. You can't impose your politics on the football game. So, you know. Anyway, these are interesting topics. The idea is

that if you support free speech, what you're really supporting is for somebody to be able to say the thing that you don't agree with, right? Yes, yes. That's the idea. But not in the commercial context. Sure, sure. If part of your job is to say something and you don't say it, then that's not a free speech issue. Right, right, right. I mean, the owners of the football team are within their rights to say, listen, half our

audience agrees with you, half our fans don't. By the way, we pay you with the money that we receive from the fans. Right. You can't do something which is antithetical to our business here. You can go, you can leave this game and go say whatever you want about this issue. But when you come to work, now you're at work. But that argument didn't get much sway.

And apropos of work, is there any situation in which you would tell a comic, you work for me and don't say what you're saying? I mean, there... Of course, but I wouldn't... It'd be a last resort or I would just stop booking them. I mean, I'm not, you know,

I'm not going to go down with a ship. I have to make a living. But I don't think... Comics want to go over. So normally when a comic comes out with something that is perceived by the audience as being over the line and that can be a magical thing

they correct on their own. Yeah, exactly. I would not have done this bit if it didn't kill so hard. But Jocelyn's been doing this joke for a year and a half, right? And it always like this is just because it went online. Right?

I'm not known to be an edgy comic. I'm not an offensive comic, right? So this was really surprising. Yeah, no. I mean, she'll tell you. I didn't say, in all this time we spoke, I didn't say one word to you about saying it again, not saying it again. No, you never did. Yeah, he gave me whatever.

He beat him at one. Or I told her, I said, if you want to post it, post it. Not even a little. You really respect the work of an artist. What, does Sam Morrell still tell the joke about the alligator? Well, it's not topical. I know, I know. I don't remember, I don't remember.

I thought she would stop telling it, or she might stop telling it just because of all the grief she got for it. But again, that's her career. It's like, what can I do about it? My concern is that she gets laughs. You think in a commercial setting your free speech is limited or you shouldn't impose politics in a certain way? In a commercial setting, your free speech is absolutely limited. So can I wear – or like Target just told all their stores to not put up pride flags of any kind, like no pride merchandise.

They can't decorate the stores. This is something people have been doing for decades. I feel like every Starbucks employee is gay that I've ever met, and they're upset. Wait, Starbucks or Target, you said? Starbucks. It's in reaction to the Target stuff. Yeah, well, Starbucks, I don't blame them for being upset. Starbucks?

The employees. Oh, right. Yeah, but that feels like a limiting of, hey, this is a commercial environment. We're getting some feedback from – Yeah, they have the right to. I mean let's – again, it's what I agree with. So let's say my employees wanted to put up a Palestinian flag. From the river to the sea, like end of Israel flag.

Because there's various degrees of what Palestinians might believe in. But let's say Hamas. It's Hamas Day. My employees – I say, no, you're not doing that in my place. I said, I mean you're free to do that when you check out of work. You might not have a job to come back to. Oh, OK. I mean these are very difficult questions right

and you would hope that like i think is my gut is that i do these take any action as a last resort i will look the other way like i've had this is story i told before farrakhan yeah i had a right when farrakhan was saying all these horrible things about the jews i had a musician i worked very close to wearing a farrakhan t-shirt you know it's like fucking with me and i just decided to let it go and i know full well if it had been reversed and one of the uh white musicians had worn something that was very offensive to black people politically they would have expected me to tell them, go change your fucking shirt or don't come back to work.

They would have cheered me for that, right? Now, here I was on the opposite end of it, and I was, but I didn't. I just let it go. You would hope that Starbucks and Walmart, I guess they feel burned by this Dylan Mulvaney thing with Budweiser and they're overreacting in some way. I'm just guessing.

I don't know. Right. No. Yeah, yeah. A bunch of corporations as pride are like dialing things back. But I would say without regard to pride, if corporations in general decided to dial back from politics as part of their brand and all that stuff, I think it's better because politics is very, very divisive and it's not necessary to know. I mean, I noticed on the New York State thruway now, they reopened this rest stop that it closed and it had been Popeye's Chicken, but now it's a Chick-fil-A.

And I remember it was only a few years ago that Chick-fil-A was considered reprehensible because I think the owner was against gay marriage. And all of a sudden now in New York, Chick-fil-A has this prime spot again. They still are. They still are reprehensible. Right. So it's so much hypocrisy that goes on to it. And I feel like it's none of my business what the owner of Chick-fil-A – I don't really care what the owner of Chick-fil-A feels about Palestine or gay marriage.

I mean I wish he'd agree with me on everything. And I think that Chick-fil-A should keep the politics out of its store. It should not have anti-gay marriage banners. That would bother me too. Just leave it out. Just be a store. Just be a store. I know that's not perfect.

There is no perfect solution to this. There is no perfect solution. Right. That's what makes it interesting to talk about. Yeah, it is interesting. Deciding what is and isn't political is sort of – yeah. But in general, I think we're not doing better as a nation and our social fabric has not improved by the fact that we're basically having to wear our politics as a visible thing on our forehead now. You got to know what everybody thinks about every issue.

And you can only hang out with the Zen diagram of those people who happen to agree with you. The Zen diagram? Of everybody. Beautiful. Let's go from Pamela Harris. with the Zen diagram of those people who happen to agree with you. The Zen diagram? Of everybody. It's from Pamela Harris. And we're not getting better because people who disagree with you. Yeah, you know... They just are.

So when the New York Post caught wind that I had... I mean, it wasn't that I said I refused to apologize, but the New York Post had the headline, US comedian refuses to apologize to Malaysian government. So now all the conservatives were picking this up. They're like, oh, let's follow her. She soundsian government. So now all the conservatives were like picking this up. They're like, oh, let's follow her. She sounds so funny. So now apparently on Twitter, I have all these conservatives following me, but they're all asking, is she

Democrat? Like they need to know whether or not I'm a Democrat in order to like fully support me, I guess. It's out of control. The whole thing is out of control with politics in everyday life. It's a really interesting thing because on the one hand, it's like you sort of want to support businesses

that you know are doing quote unquote good things, right? Like are doing the things that you want to support. And on the other hand, it's true. Like, why do I need to know where the place that makes my chicken? I mean, I don't eat chicken, so. Businesses are free to do it. And like, you know, if you have a business on Christopher Street,

it's very, very wise to be very clear that you're. I mean, it's a little easy, you know. But in general, in general, I just think as, you know, a lot of everything is like social norms. It's just like what – as we've just – it gets more and more normal to expect these businesses to go on record about the most contentious issues of the day. We're not gaining anything. Right. Nothing is – as a matter of fact, we're losing respect for free speech.

We're literally losing respect for free speech. We're normalizing the idea of that people should suffer consequences. And I just – I don't agree with it. That's all. Free country. No, I totally agree with you. It's almost like we're being badged into toying one certain party line and this is the only viewpoints that can be espoused and nothing – everything else gets canceled. One thing is for sure, those people in Malaysia feel as strongly and righteously and in good faith

bothered by what Jocelyn did, which gave them the green light to try to ruin the... as you and many people will feel about gay marriage, someone who opposes gay marriage. It's the same thing. Now, you might say,

yeah, but I'm right, and they're wrong, right? But that's not a plausible argument. So you try to find some grand system which accounts for the fact that everybody thinks they're right. So how are we all going, how are we going to be a society?

Well, one way is to not put in people's faces on a regular basis the things where we know we're going to upset each other. It's like what Zach said, that you go home and you don't talk to your parents about politics, right? No, it's true. Thanksgiving dinner. Can we ask?

Because what's interesting, I'm sure you've all had this experience. Many people, you think they're the nicest people in the world. They are nice until you actually find out that they had this one opinion. You didn't even realize. I was at dinner at Perrielle's house with this dude who's like, January 6th is a false flag. And he's the whole Trump supporter. Now I kind of laugh it off because I don't care about that stuff. But there are people, friends of Perrielle, who would have gotten up and left the house. And this guy's a nice guy. Well, I think I got up and left the house and this guy's a nice guy well i think i got up and left the house like i said where did that come from you know i mean this is like fighting words to a lot of people i said you know whatever you can believe that can we ask

sam what the what uh is is is jocelyn a hero in singapore should she go there and can she fill a theater i mean with jocelyn it's like here's the fun thing with singapore everyone just saw it and it's like we know Jocelyn if she did that joke in Singapore hell if she did that joke in Malaysia in a comedy club

she'd have been fine it just went online and that was the issue and I mean look at it see if I could get away with it probably would have we have spent about

50 odd minutes talking about all this the nuance of it yeah we spent 50 minutes talking about the nuance about freedom of speech and everything

and these people only saw 89 seconds and that's the beauty and the horror of it yeah yeah no it's like we spent 15 minutes talking about the nuance about freedom of speech and everything and these people only saw 89 seconds and that's the beauty and the horror of it of like all these stuff online is that we don't have a chance to have a dialogue anymore now it's about yelling at each other how dare you say this how dare you say that instead of asking oh what's the context why do you say this do you have a right what is the right and no one has the answer i don't think we're ever going to unless we just sit down and actually talk to each other, which is difficult, but someone's got to do it. Yeah, and to your point about your nice message, my friend messaged me this.

Hey, Jocelyn, you went viral in Malaysia. Just to let you know, I have five family members on that plane that didn't land. We are still trying to cope with grief, even though nine years has passed. My family members are not happy and do not appreciate you making it as a joke. I replied, I hear you, I apologize to you and your family members

for what this joke must have triggered. Thank you for reaching out to me nicely about it. XO. She replies, No worries, I know you didn't mean

any harm. Kissy face. You see? Right? All's well that ends well. Kissy face. Kissy face. Because we had

a simple conversation about it. Yeah. Alright, that made us a nice way to end the well. Kissy face. Kissy face. Because we had a civil conversation about it. Yeah. All right. That made us a nice way to end the show. Should we all send a kissy face to one another? Bye, Sam. It's very nice to meet you.

I'll boost you in New York. Absolute pleasure. I'll bring you the book. Absolutely. Yeah. Okay. Well, anyway. So, yeah.

Yeah, go ahead, Sam. Oh, yeah. I've only made it out to the West Coast, but I love to hit the East Coast to see everything there. And Jocelyn has spoken very highly of everyone there. So I'm very excited to come. I can't promise you'll work at the cellar because I don't own the cellar. But you can certainly come here and get a chicken kebab.

He left right in time before he could make that promise. Thank you, everybody. Once again, we did a podcast that i think is more interesting more insightful than many of the podcasts you'll hear from the top rated podcast um i'm not going to mention their names but i don't know why this podcast isn't isn't a bigger deal i don't know what's coming out of certain people's mouths it's so goddamn interesting that they have millions of listeners. But anyway, thank you, everybody. Wait, wait, wait.

Sam, where can people find you? You can find me online at MrSamC. That's M-R-S-A-M-S-E-E on all the social medias. Come by, say hi, and damn you, this American life. We're taking over the seller's podcast. The seller is better than you, American life. That's not the one I was thinking about. Singapore, we are not good at sports.

Take a look at the Olympics. We've only won one gold medal in the history of our country. And it was in swimming. And we were so proud. However, that same year, another country, one person, won seven medals at swimming. And you're like, who is it? Was it the Americans?

Was it the Japanese? No, it was Zimbabwe. Yeah, we lost at swimming to Zimbabwe. Yeah, how? They are known for having droughts. They don't even have the water to swim. We have state of the art swimming pools. We have coaches.

We have everything. We have state-of-the-art swimming pools. We have coaches. We have everything. They have dehydration. Podcast at ComedyCellar.com for comments, questions, suggestions, compliments, and constructive criticism. Jocelyn Chia is a regular

here at the Comedy Cellar. My Twitter is up. It's Jocelyn Chia at Jocelyn Chia. And that is all. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.