Borat and Real Kazakhs

Posted on November 14, 2006 in Ettiquette Film Hatred

Only one story that I have read so far investigates whether Borat reflects Kazakhian culture fairly. Yet surely Sascha Cohen’s depiction of a Kazakhi telejournalist afoot in the United States amounts to little more than black face. Borat asserts, among other things, that Kazakh’s value pubic hair as much as they do dollars, drink horse urine cocktails, rape their sisters, hate Jews, have never seen flush toilets, and practice excruciating drinking games that involve insinuating a baby mouse into the slit of one’s penis. It’s a mortar shot into Islamic culture. And no one seems to be asking if Cohen has commited an act of racism by his invention.

One thing that Borat confirmed for me: that when faced with the prospect of a bizarre foreigner, we Americans will bite hook, line, and sinker. No one questioned Borat’s authenticity, at least not in the segments the film showed. A few years ago, I was having a conversation with another American about my stay in former Yugoslavia. “You know,” the other person stated, “they don’t have flush toilets. They have to go outside.”

An odd thing to state to someone who has been there — it might have been a troll. Still, given that this was a public chatroom, I had to state the facts as they were. Though I had encounted squat toilets which forced me to deliver my payload with my legs spread out like the wings of a B-17, I did not once have to go outside to do my business (not even on a farm that I visited) or make due without indoor plumbing. The antagonist, however, insisted that this was not the norm, that I was the victim of an elaborate dupe which set up flush toilets anytime my bladder needed a break.

Since coming back from the United States, I dare say, I have had to make use of porta-potties on more than a few occasions, usually when visiting a national park or attending a festival. Who says that this is an example of American primitivism, of universal crudeness when it comes to disposing our odure? Yet one scene in Borat shows a woman carefully explaining to Borat not only how to use the toilet but also how to use toilet paper. What is vile is not only Cohen’s prank but also the woman’s assumption that he was a primitive.

Cohen, I suppose, knows better about Kazakhstan and just doesn’t care about the damage he wreaked against our image of the Central Asian nation. It is his racism, his fabrication of and participation in a Islamic-style minstrel show that should be condemned. But that is not fashionable in these days when all that is Koranic must be mocked and ridiculed. The true voices of Kazakhs must be ignored, Cohen says, to support the broader purpose of political correctness. He may have uncovered a great deal that is foul about America in his impersonation, but at the same time, he revealed much that is foul about his own character and deep beliefs.

Picking on the people of a nation who are defenseless because of their distance is not an act consistent with the universal compassion he fakes behind the scenes.

* * * * *

A Kazakhstan Embassy official delivered these answers to questions posed by journalists about his country after a viewing of Borat:

No, there is no annual “Running of the Jews” in Kazakhstan.

No, it is not possible to buy a Kazakh wife for 15 gallons of pesticide.

No, fermented horse urine is not a popular Kazakh refreshment.

“The only fact of the movie is the geographical location,” Vassilenko repeats for the umpteenth time.

He’s referring, of course, to last weekend’s No. 1 box-office hit. The movie stars British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen in the persona of Borat, a sexist, racist and all-around clueless broadcaster from Kazakhstan who bumbles his way through America, documentary crew in tow.

But Kazakh officials, who have found little to laugh at in Cohen’s depiction of one of their own, might be lightening up. After all, there’s no such thing as bad publicity, and this latest flurry is bound to result in a few more Americans differentiating Kazakhstan from all those other Central Asia “-stans” that once were part of the Soviet Union.

For his part, Vassilenko sees this newfound attention as neither PR windfall nor PR nightmare. He acknowledges, “It’s a blessing in disguise, but you have to work hard to remove the disguise.”