Pranksters and sketch-makers TMD Shanghai are back with another look at relationships in China – and this time, it’s the girls getting sent up. TMD, formerly known as Monkey Kingz, are the team that brought us that ‘Single Chinese Guy vs Single White Guy’ skit. As we might expect from a comedy video playing on ethnic stereotypes, that provoked some decent debate online. Is it ok to make generalisations based on race? Does the comedic context make it more, or less acceptable?
So after watching TMD’s new video ‘Chinese Girlfriends: North VS South’ video, we immediately jumped to the YouTube comments, expecting the usual cries of stereotyping and “WTF man you couldn’t be more wrong.” But we were surprised to discover that, well, everybody loves it!
While ‘Single Chinese Guy vs Single White Guy’ claimed to show the differences between “typical” Chinese and western guys’ attempts to score girls, it somehow ended up showing us more similarities, with both guys coming off a bit hapless.
So how would a “typical” northern and southern Chinese girl fare under the TMD microscope? Let’s take a look!
Let’s break that down, shall we?
The northern girl in the video is fiery, aggressive, and occasionally scornful; when wronged, she chases guys down the street and smacks them with her handbag.
▼ Northern Chinese girl is asked for her number…
▼…chases an attacker away from her boyfriend…
▼ …and is unmoved by scary films (unlike her wuss of a boyfriend).
The southern girl, on the other hand, is bashful, avoids confrontation, and can’t hold her drink.
▼ Here she is red-faced after one sip.
▼ Oh, and she can’t cook.
And the commenters love it! “I totally agree with that video”, writes one; “The video is accurate,” says another; and finally:
“I teach local Chinese dating and relationship skills as my full-time job (also foreigners too)…..so via my own experience and my students I can say that the video is pretty much spot on…there are always exceptions but it was really quite good.”
While it plays on stereotypes, perhaps there’s not too much to be offended by here – and it seems like for most viewers, TMD have really hit the nail on the head with this North VS South video. Let us know what you make of it in the comments!
Source and images: YouTube/TMD Shanghai