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Chirol
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Chirol

Date

November 5th, 2005

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Kazakhstan’s 6th Most Famous Man

This one’s for Nathan and all you other Borat fans out there. I can’t believe it was featured on RFERL!

Kazakhstan: MTV Europe Awards Host Caricatures Kazakh TV Journalist

The live broadcast of the 12th annual MTV Europe Music Awards last night featured a controversial host who pretends to be from Kazakhstan named “Borat Sagdiyev.” But the rude host isn’t from Kazakhstan at all. Borat is a fictional character created by British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen that satirizes a Kazakh television journalist.

…

Last year in Washington, Kazakhstan Embassy press secretary Roman Vassilenko told “The New Yorker” magazine that Borat was responsible for spreading many misconceptions and falsehoods about Kazakhstan.For example, Vassilenko lamented, women are not kept in cages in Kazakhstan as Borat has claimed. Kazakhstan’s national sport is not shooting a dog and then having a party. Wine in Kazakhstan is not made from fermented horse urine. And a person cannot earn a living in Kazakhstan as a “Gypsy” catcher.

Comments to this entry

Younghusband
November 5, 2005
4:17 pm
bq. Borat is a fictional character created by British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen that satirizes a Kazakh television journalist.

He does not satirize a Kazakh television journalist, he exposes differences in British class and culture. That he says he is from Kazakhstan has nothing to do with anything. The point is he is supposed to be a foreigner from an obscure country that people in the UK don't know much about and assume as "backwards."

bq. Last year in Washington, Kazakhstan Embassy press secretary Roman Vassilenko told "The New Yorker"Â? magazine that Borat was responsible for spreading many misconceptions and falsehoods about Kazakhstan. ...

This is known as not having a sense of humour. If Borat said he was Canadian there would be no problems here. We get the joke, why don't Kazakhs? Cultural differences?
Chirol
November 5, 2005
4:29 pm
And I just finished watching the second season on DVD!

You're right about why they used Kazakhstan as his home country. But I think they overestimate viewers. Though you and I are already familiar with Kazakhstan, how many people run to wikipedia after Ali G to even see where Kazakhstan is. Do many people even know it's a real country? If so, I doubt they think twice about it anyway since it's so obvious its just an excuse to do outrageous things.
Chief Wiggum
November 5, 2005
4:55 pm
Have you ever tasted Kazahk wine?
Chirol
November 5, 2005
5:12 pm
Chief Wiggum: It tasted like horse urine =)
Younghusband
November 5, 2005
5:39 pm
bq. Do many people even know it's a real country?

That's what I mean. I think most people just dismiss what he says about Kazakhstan. The audience is in on the joke, even if they don't know Kazakhstan exists they know that Cohen is making all this up. So why are the Kazakhs so pissed?
Chirol
November 5, 2005
6:20 pm
Because they are getting more publicity for their country from a pretend Kazakh than from real ones =)
Nathan
November 5, 2005
8:01 pm
Did you hear what he said about Madonna at the show? Awesome.
Younghusband
November 5, 2005
9:15 pm
Nathan, that's brilliant!! The dude has some serious stones.
Chirol
November 5, 2005
9:40 pm
But the all time best quote is when Borat is doing the wine tasting, in Missouri I think, and he tells the guy "you're my best friend" and how his mother never loved him. THey say, no no, she just had a different way of showing it. Borat says "She say, she wish she was raped by somebody else." Priceless!
WLB
November 6, 2005
4:26 am
When mentioning in the US that I live and work in Kazakhstan, I have encountered 3 or 4 times, people who ask me whether Kazakhstan really is like Borat says or not, and ARGUE with me that it must be based on some truth. Even a guy who was born in the Ukraine! I assure you he does damage to the reputation of Kazakhstan because the ignorant don't realize they're being satirized.

And yes from the national pride versus sense of humor about themselves scale, he could not have picked a worse country. Most Kazakhs I have told about Borat, have become incensed.

But then many Kazakhs think US police have the right to shoot anyone anytime anywhere, and I doubt we think that's so damn funny/
Kazakh Boy
May 1, 2006
3:09 am
What is Borat said,not based any truth,it`s just his negative eye...
Kazakhstan's 6th Most Famous Man is Borat....there no any feeling from my side about it..
Elizabeth
May 2, 2006
5:31 am
Honestly, I hate that guy's act. I have to point out, since I am not a Muslim, that if a Muslim in the west were to make fun of Jews as serially and vehemently as this guy makes fun of Muslims (first, Ali G, now "Borat") they would be ripped to shreds. Don't tell me that the Jews would take it. No way- such a thing would never be shown on television. I was really shocked when I saw the amount of anti-Muslim, anti-Asian sentiment that went into the act.

I don't mind the occasional ethnic joke, but to have an entire act (two, actually) designed to debase a religion and the peoples who follow it does start to look bigoted.

"Even if they don't know Kazakhstan exists..." That's the key. Many Kazakhs know that people in the west don't know they exist, which is why it's so infuriating to find out that of all countries, they have been picked on as some kind of example of Muslim backwardness. Come on, it's the last thing they need. If he wants to make fun of a people, why not make fun of his own? That's the comedic tradition.
Gollios
May 2, 2006
1:45 pm
Actually, Sasha Baron Cohen/Ali G./Borat is Jewish...
Elizabeth
May 3, 2006
7:11 am
Gollios: if that was to me, yes, exactly my point...
Gollios
May 3, 2006
3:32 pm
"If he wants to make fun of a people, why not make fun of his own? That's the comedic tradition."

I think Ali G. IS making fun of his own--he's making fun of ignorant westerners. And his responses to the Jewish Anti-Defamation League (who objected to the "Throw the Jew Down the Well" song) were clearly intended to make fun of over-sensitive Jewish people--also a group he could fairly lampoon.

To tell you the truth, I think Ali G. is a one-trick pony, and he'll go away soon. But if all comedians only made fun of the groups they self-identify with, the world would have lost out on the comedic stylings of Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, & Chris Rock.