Well, this is unfortunate. Jennifer Murphy, a beauty queen and former contestant on The Apprentice, made a godawful music video called “I Want to be Neenja.” Yes Virginia, it is as utterly mortifying as you think it is.
From Angry Asian Man:
Hyped as a “sneak peek” of her new song, the video shows Ms. Murphy performing the song live at the “Pink Carpet Launch Party” for her company, Jennifer Murphy Beds. It is an epic narrative tune about martial arts, somebody referred to as “Chow,” and Jennifer’s own quest to become a so-called “neenja” — largely performed in a shitty faux ching chong accent. What any of this has to do with selling beds... somebody tell me.
The blog points out that the video actually came out last April, but was rocketed to fame recently by Reddit, bully for us.
Murphy was crowned Miss Oregon USA in 2003, and starred in the fourth season of The Apprentice. According to Wikipedia, she was fired for “being involved in one of the worst defeats in the show’s history.”
Murphy issued the following apology on her Facebook page:
Dear Everyone,
I did a song in front of a group of friends that was meant to be silly and self-deprecating, and I posted it last April and received comments from friends and strangers that it was funny.
It is obvious that I had bad judgment and didn’t understand that my attempt at humor would be seen as insensitive or mean-spirited, and I have removed the video from my channels.
I want to be a person who is positive and uplifting to others. Clearly in this instance, this has not been the case, and I have learned a valuable lesson.
I sincerely apologize to every person that has felt pain and offence because of me, and I ask their forgiveness.
Sincerely,
Jennifer Murphy
Ugh.
DISCUSSION
How does a 37 year-old woman in 2016 not know that this is offensive? Sincerely confused by this. And don’t say “Well she grew up around people like this” or “she’s from some idiotic all white town and doesn’t have any non-white friends” because there’s this thing called TV and movies and the news and various other outlets that clearly advise that this is not acceptable. Same with idiots that are still doing blackface. You don’t have to be woke to know the very basics of what is considered offensive these days. You don’t have to have Asian friends to know this is not how to act. I have Asian friends and we’ve never addressed if this is offensive or not because I’ve known for years and years not to pretend to be Chinese.