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Ashton Kutcher’s ‘Racist’ PopChips Ad Pulled From YouTube

by Jada Wong | 1:53 pm, May 3rd, 2012

We were so caught up with Ashton Kutcher‘s hilarious spoof of Karl Lagerfeld yesterday that we barely noticed the other videos that the actor made for PopChips. Now one of them is being dubbed racist and has been pulled from YouTube.

The video in question has Kutcher’s portraying a 34-year-old Bollywood producer named Raj. Kutcher wears brown makeup (brownface?), speaks with an Indian accent, says things like “these are the Bombay”, and imitates a Bollywood dance.

According to Page Six, a PopChips spokesperson explained that the clip was ”created to provoke a few laughs and was never intended to stereotype or offend anyone”.

Check out the original video here and watch the clip below to get acquainted with Raj. Do you think this imitation is racist?



  • http://twitter.com/BaybiiAyo Ayo. O

    I guess these days a person cannot portray someone of another race without it being seen as racist, racially offensive, racially insensitive or all of the above. I don’t know how I would have felt if perhaps he had dressed up a black guy. More likely I would have thought it was funny, as all the other characters were. I would like to know if it’s Indian/Asian people that are questioning how appropriate this video is or if it is the overly-sensitive, ready-to-point-the-’that’s racist’-finger-at-anything-that-involves-a-minority-bunch that seem to have such a loud voice in society.  

  • Steve

    NOT RACIST. For assurance, see Russell Peters. Everything he’s ever done. If he’s racist and deserves to be pulled from youtube, then this is racist. Go further back, see Peter Sellars. The guy is hilarious. Indian people love his portrayals of Indian people. It is called humor. I guess you couldn’t make the comic gem of a movie that is “The Party” (starring Sellars as Indian Bollywood star Hrundi V. Bakshi) today without it being decried as racist. There is a major difference between all of us laughing and joking about everyone’s differences and someone spreading a hateful message based on race. That’s racism, this is comedy. 

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