Slant-eyed gestures, Chinese accent: Italian TV sketch launches racism debate
- Hosts Michelle Hunziker and Gerry Scotti say they have received death threats in a ‘wave of hatred’
- The duo have apologised, but the producers have refused, saying that the show is, ‘like satirical and comic programmes all over the world, politically incorrect’
A sketch on a popular Italian television show mocking Chinese people has launched a debate about racism, and satire, in Italy.
While Asian and black people took to social media to share their experiences with racism growing up in Italy, including how it can be fomented by satire, the television hosts at the centre of the uproar said on Thursday they have been subjected to a “wave of hatred,” including death threats.
Michelle Hunziker and Gerry Scotti, hosts of the satirical show Striscia la Notizia (The News Crawls) on the private Mediaset network, apologised for the sketch during which they made slanted-eye gestures and mimicked a Chinese accent as they introduced a segment.
“We are pained, deeply,” Hunziker told newspaper Corriere della Sera in an interview published a day after she apologised on Instagram.
“We were in good faith: we are very sorry knowing that we bumped against the sensitivity of someone. But what is happening is frightening: we received a real wave of hatred that is being spread in an instrumentalised way.”
Hunziker spoke of an organised campaign against the co-hosts, that also targeted the Trussardi fashion house founded by the family of her husband, Tomaso Trussardi.
“We are talking about almond-shaped eyes made by Gerry and me, when in China there are unspeakable things happening, on which we should concentrate if we want to speak of human rights.”
