PewDiePie’s racist jokes against Indians, normalizing discrimination

Edit: A few PewDiePie fans reached out to me and we had a positive dialogue on this controversy. I have retracted some of my statements and have also added some good points that I’ve received via mail in the article below. Added contents are in italics.

A few weeks ago we read the news which revealed Christchurch shooter yelled “subscribe to Pewdiepie” and live-streamed the incident on Facebook the Youtuber is at it again, normalizing racism using funny undertones and sarcasm as an excuse. Dissing on an entire country to get an edge in a battle between a no-face, corporate Youtube channel and himself is a bit of a low blow. Let’s take a look at what hate he is spewing this time shall we?

LYRICS:

0:31 – “Guess to beat one Swedish boy, you need a billion Asians”

1:14 – “I love my Indian bros from Bombay to Bangladesh”

1:21 – ‘Bout to cause a genocide so you can call me Hi****” (Hitler)

2:00 – “had a problem with me telling them to hold their defecation”

2:14 – “did you know that Indians have poo-poo in their brains?”

2:25 – “How ’bout next you figure how to fix the caste system? (Oof), Maybe all those ads will solve your crippling poverty”

2:35 – “But never mind the poor people, we just here to party”

RACISM:

0:31 – “Guess to beat one Swedish boy, you need a billion Asians”. An insult against the intelligence of Asians.

1:14 – “I love my Indian bros from Bombay to Bangladesh”. This of course is not an insult, but is deliberate ignorance of Bangladesh (Bangladesh fought a bloody war in 1971 to be considered its own nation).

1:21 – “Bout to cause a genocide so you can call me Hi****” (Hitler)”. This is a poorly delivered holocaust joke. At best this is offensive and anti-semitic. At worst, it’s some sort of vague threat. It has been pointed out that this was a self-jab at himself.

2:00 – “had a problem with me telling them to hold their defecation”. Assuming a joke on open defecation in India. Maybe he hasn’t read the recent report done by WHO itself which said 93.1 per cent of households in India had access to toilets during 2018-2019. This is a reference to a lyric in his Bitch Lasagna music video, and even then it was more meant to translate to “hold your shit” as in “brace for what’s to come”. 

2:14 – “did you know that Indians have poo-poo in their brains?”. He is aggravating the “Poo In Loo” and “Street Shitter” stereotypes that already exist outside India. Kids all over the world are going to be making Indians have poo-poo in their heads jokes now thinking it’s funny. That sort of expression is degrading and humiliating, and it shouldn’t be said at all.
This line is supposed to be taken as a joke due to the fact that T-Series presented their feud with Felix as a fight between PewDiePie and India, trying to make his insults towards the company generalized towards the country. So Felix decided to go with that idea and tell T-Series to fix issues that aren’t directly related to them at all. This is difficult to explain, but you can learn more in the BTS video.

This is followed by the words “that is a blatant lie”. Invoking a racist stereotype and then saying its not true is racist. Drawing on the “it’s a joke” defence, it seems that he wants to give offence without accepting the consequences – that people will be offended.

2:25 – “How ’bout next you figure how to fix the caste system? (Oof), Maybe all those ads will solve your crippling poverty”. This can hardly be considered a genuine suggestion and crudely and insincerely mocks social problems that India is dealing with.

2:35 – “But never mind the poor people, we just here to party”. Reinforcing the narrative of India being a country of ‘poor people’.

OTHER:

• In his ‘bitch lasagna’ song, there is a line that says “I’m a blue eyes white dragon, while you’re just dark magician”.
• He has hired a couple of young Indian boys to hold up a sign that says “Death to Jews”.
• that white supremacist Christchurch shooter said the words “Subscribe to Pewdiepie” in the video where he attacks a mosque.
• He has also rallied his fans to raise $239,000 for Child Rights and You (CRY)