My thoughts on…Kazakhstan vs. Borat
I’m looking forward to the release of Borat, or to use its full title, Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. I’m not a fan of Sacha Baron Cohen or his work, like “Da Ali G Show”. Not saying that it isn’t good, it just never captured me. Borat however, does. He was a character on “Da Ali G Show,” doing satirical interviews with the unsuspecting. But now he has grown more popular than Ali himself. Once I saw the trailer for the movie, I fell in love with the character. And how could you not? I mean how can you not like Borat? His Marioesque mustache, relentless butchering of the Queen’s English, odd foreign expressions and mannerisms, astounding ignorance, quest to marry Pamela Anderson, not to mention controversial opinions about Jews, the war in Iraq, just to name a few.
And lets not forget the stories of his glorious homeland, where they drink fermented horse urine, eat cheese made from breastmilk, cars have horsepower (as in, they are pulled by horses), prostitutes are aplenty, and anti-Semitism, homophobia and incest are the order of the day. A truly atrocious painting of the country. You’d think the Kazakhs would just dismiss it as untrue and have a good laugh. But they are not amused. They’ve launched a website against Borat (but with the numerous grammatical errors on the site, one has to wonder if Sacha is lampooning the effort against his character), taking down borat.kz, adding a supplement in the New York Times describing Kazakhstan as thriving and industrious, releasing a movie called “Nomad”, which should portray the nation in a different light, and President Nasarbayev inviting Sacha to Kazakhstan to see how they really live. It has reached such a point that it has become a diplomatic issue.
Borat’s response was, “I’d like to state I have no connection with Mr Cohen and fully support my Government’s decision to sue this Jew. Since the 2003 reforms, Kazakhstan is as civilized as any other country in the world. Women can now travel on inside of bus, homosexuals no longer have to wear blue hats, and age of consent has been raised to eight years old.” My words to the people of Kazakhstan, have a sense of humor! If you want Borat to fail, SHUT THE HELL UP! This is the kind of bad publicity that satirists thrive on. Plus it’s giving his movie and character more publicity. Though it may be too late now. It’s being hailed as one of the funniest movies of all time and a potential box office hit. And if it’s any consolation, he has offended Americans too:
Borat gets served by a black guy.
Borat: “He is…your slave??”
American: “Noo…we don’t have slaves anymore.”
Borat: “Oh…is good for him…not so much for you…”
American: “Yeah.”
Borat at a rodeo.
He told the audience, “I hope you kill every man, woman and child in Iraq, down to the lizards!”
“And may George W. Bush drink the blood of every man, woman and child in Iraq!”
Why is every body thinking of killing. hat is outrageous. What have the victims done. They do not deserve dying.
Good luck in the pam anderson quest:)
I think that he is an idiot with no pride and self respect. I would equate him to ‘your’ Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie and K.Fed. He is enhancing his notoriety through embarrassing publicity stunts. But, the Kazac people shod ignore him, cuz they are making him even more popular.
His resemblance 2 Howard Stern & Weird Al is uncanny.
I’m surprised that you like such lowbrow humour!
Yeah Da Ali G show never did it for me but the borat character was funny. Not sure if it’s enough to cary a film however.
I want to see Borat. It looks really funny.
You’ve got a lot of interesting posts as usual.
Familiar with Ali G but never watched his show so don’t have a clue who Borat is … but you made me wanna know!
First off, I am ethnically Kazakh, so obviously my opinion will be biased. But I am also a fan of politically incorrect humor.
I haven’t seen the movie yet, but from what I have seen and heard thus far I am not sure I want to spend $8.50 on it.
Personally I don’t think it should be politicized so much. However, choosing Kazakhstan was not accidental. Most Americans have a very vague idea of where it is, let alone be familiar with the country’s culture which makes it an easy target. Does the fact that he is a Jew making fun of Jews make it ok? Well, he certainly gets away with it…
Of course, ideally most people should be able to tell it’s humor/satire, but there will always be those who will actually be ignorant enough to believe it.
shut the fuck up !
Why don’t you?!