Comedian Aamer Rahman's Explainer of Reverse Racism Is Going Viral — Again

Australian comedian Aamer Rahman's 2013 bit on reverse racism has gotten a second wind — which is proof people still don't understand the controversial concept.

In the bit, Rahman, who is of Bangladeshi descent, explains that his jokes aimed at white people are often pegged as reverse racism — by white people. Because if a white person is racist for making a jab at another race, it must work the other way, right?

Wrong. Rahman answers the question citing some perhaps familiar examples of systems designed to prop up white populations and oppress everyone else. Think: colonization, imperialism, war and privilege.

He could be a reverse racist, he says. Just hook him up with a time machine. 

"I'd go back in time to before Europe colonized the world, right, and I'd convince the leaders of Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Central and South America to invade and colonize Europe," he says. "Just occupy them. Steal their land and resources. Set up some kind of — I don't know — trans-Asian slave trade where we exported white people to work on giant rice plantations in China."

After all that, Rahman continues, "I'd make sure I set up systems that privilege black and brown people at every conceivable social, political and economic opportunity."

Every now and then, Rahman says, he would facilitate a "fake war" on Europe to decelerate any progress, and "say it's for their own good 'cause their culture's inferior."

Meanwhile, white people would hold themselves to "colored people's standards of beauty so they end up hating the color of their own skin, eyes and hair," he says.

Any of this sound familiar?

"If after hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years of that, I got onstage at a comedy show and said, 'Hey, what's the deal with white people? Why can't they dance?'" Rahman said. "That would be reverse racism."

Watch Rahman's routine below:

Read more: