NOVA commercial insulting to Japanese?
10/02/2006 @ 3:00 am
A friend of mine has written in to posit that he thinks the TV ad for the NOVA English school is insulting to Japanese people.
He says that understanding English is not relevant to the situation. He points out that if a Japanese person were lying on the ground, and not speaking, certainly the girl would understand what happened and call 911 or try to rescue the guy. But this ad suggests that because the girl doesn’t understand English, she can’t deduce what has happened.
If you can’t understand Japanese, the commercial starts out with the girl saying, “Are you all right?” After the guy on the ground pleads for help in English, she turns away and says, “I’m sorry.”
So. . . I is this an insult or just a silly commercial?
Is it insulting? I can see how a person could take offence, that Japanese don’t want to “get involved” if they can’t communicate or something. Obviously people would help.
But it is certainly bloody stupid, certainly. They should have done something where communication was necessary - e.g. if someone was having a medical emergency and needed to tell someone their pills were in their bag or whatever.
October 2nd, 2006 at 3:20 amI don’t get it. It seems that somebody’s gotta have some extremely thin skin to get insulted by that. To me it just looks like a comical approach. If this was a car commercial or a Pocky ad, no one would think twice.
October 2nd, 2006 at 3:29 amIt’s not like Whitey McWhiteman under the metal was covered in blood or screaming. It was just supposed to be tongue-in-cheek as those types of English services skew to a younger audience.
JP, is your friend who finds this insulting a Japanese person?
October 2nd, 2006 at 6:32 amSilly.
Another silly learn English commercial.
October 2nd, 2006 at 6:43 amWarning: Offensive Language
“Relax, dear! It’s just a commercial!”
October 2nd, 2006 at 8:33 amJP, is your friend who finds this insulting a Japanese person?
Acually, it is a gaijin.
October 2nd, 2006 at 10:27 amTell your friend to get over it. This commercial is funny as hell!
October 2nd, 2006 at 11:14 amThat’s far too silly to be insulting, especially given the Japanese majority and the “cult” status of English.
October 2nd, 2006 at 11:20 amhaha that’s a funny commercial. Reminds me of my Russian friend who crashed his bike and was calling out for people to help him but everyone just avoided him.
October 2nd, 2006 at 1:57 pmWell the commercial seems harmless enough. It seems like the girl only understands elementry Engrish. However, the guy is extremely stupid for getting himself in this mess. How can a big guy get in a mess like that and expect a frail young woman to get him out of it? Can’t the woman see what is wrong with the situation without understanding his language? What if he was on fire? Would he have to say “I’m on fire, please call the fireman?” Well, needless to say, the Japanese have more common sense than that. It’s a commercial, get over it.
October 2nd, 2006 at 10:15 pmHeh, remember the ruckus over the Nova CMs featuring the old lady who said, “I am No-ba.” All the gaijin got mad that Nova was teaching bad English, but the joke was on them, since the woman was an old lady farming, e.g. 農婆, nouba.
October 3rd, 2006 at 9:48 amAnd another thing… What is he trapped in? A jungle gym? A grown man wearing all black trapped in a jungle gym in the middle of the city!
October 5th, 2006 at 10:58 amYes but, Alex, he’s a foreigner. Odd creatures, foreigners.
October 5th, 2006 at 1:38 pm:cool:I am the guy in the jungle gym. I got out but only to face another delema in a future part of this series. I am happy there are so many concerned gaijin.
junglejim
November 5th, 2006 at 8:50 pmThank goodness. . . Would hate to think you are still out there waiting for the young lady to finish Lesson 2!
November 5th, 2006 at 10:17 pm