Status Quoted

The scene: I’m watching TV with three French women. The mega-hit nighttime soap opera we’re watching is called “Plus Belle La Vie,” and features a diverse cast of people living in Marseille, including a female Japanese tourist who is astonishingly not too bad a stereotype. I’d give her a 3 on a scale of 1-10 for stupid racist characters. It’s actually the French women who decry her as being such a cliché as to be a major distraction from the narrative. They say the comic relief she’s supposed to provide goes so far as to interrupt the show’s flow completely. I’m prematurely proud of my friends for their disgust with such a mild stereotype.

Then, one of the women says, “she’s nothing like that Mongoloid-looking Asian actress on Grey’s Anatomy,” and continues, ”What were they thinking when they cast her? She’s so ugly!”  The rest of the women agree. They turn to me and wait for a response.

I’m speechless. Now. My quandary: Do I explain that beauty is the sometimes in the slanted eye of the beholder? Or do I ignore the situation completely because it’s going to take a lifetime to explain this shit to some of my best friends?

My response:

She’s Canadian. What can I say?