I don’t watch 2 Broke Girls. As I understand it, this show is notorious for its bad taste. The writers delight in racist remarks and even rape jokes. There’s a running joke about the girls’ Asian boss and how funny it is that he’s short and cannot pronounce Rs correctly. They mock rap culture because broken English is somehow hilarious. It’s one of those shows that believes anything “offensive” must automatically be funny. The Guardian has long called the show “so racist it’s baffling.” What’s worse is that the show is so widely watched that it’s now in the fourth season.

The show moved on to poking fun at indigenous Australians. The episode, which already aired in the US, played down under last night. The joke people are talking about involved Han (the Asian character) musing about online dating. He remarked about a potential candidate: “She’s part Aboriginal but has a great personality.” Twitter is on fire with the #2BrokeGirls hashtag, and the Aussie media is really upset:

Australian fans of the American comedy show 2 Broke Girls responded in uproar over the racist joke about Indigenous Australians.

During the season four episode, titled And the Fun Factory, a male character is shown chatting up an Australian woman online before explaining, “She’s part Aboriginal but has a great personality,” to a friend.

Social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter and Reddit have been swamped with angry people, and those defending the racial slur joke.

“How dare you make such a racist disgusting joke about Aboriginals. If it had been said about an African American it would never have made it to screen. Not impressed!” wrote an Adelaide-based fan posted to the show’s Facebook page.

“So, I like your show, but as an Aussie viewer, I was a little shocked by the ‘she’s half Aboriginal, but she has a great personality’ line. Being politically incorrect for the sake of comedy is one thing. But the only punchline of THAT joke is ‘aboriginal women are all ugly’. It was racist. It was clearly intended to be ironic, or ‘so racist it’s funny’. But it was not funny,” wrote another.

[From Sydney Morning Herald]

The article quotes showrunner Michael Patrick King, who (in 2012) defended the show’s offensiveness because the jokes are a hit. “People pull away from something if it’s not in good taste. More and more people are leaning in to 2 Broke Girls. It is ballsy. It is right in your face, and hopefully funny.” I don’t know how a show can claim to be funny when it heavily relies on a laugh track, but — ugh — people do tune in.

This was a dumb joke and the laziest form of humor. A casual remark by one of the show’s racist characters, which meant to incite controversy against another race. Why do people reward this nonsense by watching it?

Poster & promotional photos courtesy of CBS