Watch Aziz Ansari's Hilarious Explanation of Why Racism is Almost Dead
Coming off a hilarious appearance last week on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Aziz Ansari did not disappoint Wednesday on Conan.
Right out of the gate, Ansari capitalized on Conan O'Brien's having two Indian guests (spiritual guru and doctor Deepak Chopra being the other) for a serious yet funny discussion of racism and diversity. He was pumped about having an Indian Ms. America. He was down on the people who sent her racist tweets, but recognized there will always be those kinds of people, like the "racist grandma" everyone seems to know.
He went on to discuss how the casting of minority roles has changed as racism has decreased. His example was that Asian characters were once played by caucasians, but that has stopped and now the opposite can even be true — Lucy Liu playing Watson in Elementary.
"An Asian lady is now playing an old white guy. It's come full circle."
Ansari told the story of how, in an effort to spend more time with paper and less time staring at his phone, he found out the Wall Street Journal thinks his eyebrows are trendy. He laughed, saying, "Some banker out there is going, 'Can you make my eyebrows look like Aziz Ansari?'"
After telling about an unpleasant run-in with a cabbie in New York, Ansari came up with an idea for a great superpower — being able to mess up someone's day. That's because Ansari had the perfect comeback when the driver ordered him out of the taxi.
"I hope you have a lot of inconveniences in your day."
That's the classy way to stick it to rude people, everyone. And having that superpower would be unreal. In the same sketch, Ansari gave a sneak peak at the material for his next special, which is all about dating in the age of texting and missed connections.
If you're in the mood for even more Ansari goodness, check out his not quite real deleted Gravity scenes featuring puppies in space, or watch his new special, Buried Alive. It's on Netflix Instant, so you have no excuse.