Ok to be more serious about it….I think most desis are very comfortable with being made fun of by nondesis who are well aware of desi culture, food, religion, politics, people, etc. Its just the the uneducated nondesis we worry about.

Most desis are educated about these things and most nondesis are not, but there are many exceptions both ways.

So I agree with you, ethnicity shouldn’t be one’s passport to making jokes against desis. Knowledge and benevolence should.

“cuz its like that, and that’s the way it is! HUA!”

If its an item in pop culture that relates to desis, chances are Sepia Mutiny has already covered it.

What seems to have been lost along the way is that Ali G is basically satirising the way British born kids of S.Asian background have adopted West Indian slang and ‘rude boy’ behaviour.

As his name suggests he is a nice middleclass Jewish boy, he went to a fairly mediocre private school in leafy suburban outer London – Haberdashers’ & Askes’ – which is full of middleclass Jewish and S.Asian kids (proof is here), and went to Cambridge university (ditto!). I’m sure most of his material comes from these quite well-to-do nerdy kids trying to be cool by adopting rude boy slang/attitude/style of dress. In fact, they are everywhere in London and it is not restricted to a particular economic class.

What he’s doing is satirising the young men in all these various ethnic groups, who having realised they will forever be perceived as ‘uncool’ in main stream media/public, have embraced what they see is the style and attitude of the ‘cooler’ under-dogs.

Ali G is not making fun of a particular aspect of black culture, he’s making fun of S.Asian kids pretending to be ‘blackÂ’, and of course heÂ’s also making fun of the assumptions people make of each other according how the other is dressed and speaks and ‘acts’. He mocks all of us, thank goodness.

There is much much more to be discussed on this topic of young men from immigrant communities identifying with a stronger more accepted (yet still considered ‘dangerousÂ’ – and thus cool) community; and of course the irony of immersing themselves in the ‘cooler’ culture but not accepting the people who create that very culture in to their lives, but I will leave it to someone else.

I don’t really see a connection between Dalip Singh & Deep Roy and “desi-ness,” as both are fetished for their relative sizes and not much else. They fit the role because they looked the role and casting a desi as an Oompa Loompa is not the same as casting a desi as a cabbie…

When Attenborough made “Gandhi,” it didn’t piss me off that a Britisher was behind the whole thing, but it did rub me the wrong way that South Asians were listed after Edward Fox, Athol Fugard, John Gielgud and other whites in the original credits. That seemed like something worth protesting, but this…

I don’t know, it seems odd to pick on little things like this when Penn, Chadha, Rai, etc. do more to stereotype desis than anyone (but somehow still get props here). Why not get on them a little more, as they’re the ones that are reinforcing the bias rather than trying to change it.

Anyhow, if you want trip on a dwarves, check this: Ron Howard in talks to direct remake of ALBUTHA DWEEPU