 It's 2023 and some people still cannot believe that some Asians actually talk like this. Yeah, this went viral on Instagram from Silly to Sirius. I'm gonna go ahead and put this in the Silly category, but a lot of people had a lot of serious takeaways from it as to do with nature versus nurture, environment, linguistic, self-perception versus societal perception. Let's run the clip from Filipino food influencer, Adonis Eats. Dude, you're Asian, why are you talking like that? Man, let me tell you, I've been hearing that my whole life, okay? And real talk, I only ever really hear it when I'm outside the Bay Area. One of the earliest times I can remember is when I was in the military. I was in North Carolina. On the weekend, we wear our street clothes and I was standing in line with my friends and we're waiting for the child hall to open so we could have our lunch, okay? We're wearing our street clothes. I'm telling the story to my friends so people are cracking up when I'm done with my story. I turn around, this black dude that's behind me, his eyes get big, right? He says, hey, bro, no offense, but let me ask you a question. What nationality are you? I said, man, well, I'm Filipino. He's like, Filipino, what is that? Is that some type of Samoan? I said, nah, it's the type of Asian. He's like, okay, well, where I'm from, we have Asian people, but they Asian, Asian, man. They're not like you. I said, what you mean like me? He said, well, I was listening to your story. I was captivated. It was hella cracking me up, right? I thought you was just another brother, a black dude. And then you turned around and I was like, whoa, he an Asian too. I said, man, where I'm from? It don't matter if you're Filipino, Asian, white, black, Hispanic, Samoan, we all talk the same. He said, I mean, I think that in a way it's pretty simple. It's a very simple discussion. That's the neighborhood that he grew up in. That's how he talks, you know, but people perceive him visually to look a certain way. So they're making assumptions about his culture. And I feel wanna say that this talk has been going on for minority groups in America, Andrew, since the beginning, since the 60s, 70s, but I wanna say specifically for Asian people, it hasn't popped up until like the 90s. Right, yeah, but I feel like even with this age of social media, there's even been more discussion about it recently in the past like 10 years because I feel like back in the day in the 80s and 90s, if you knew the Asian kid who grew up in that neighborhood and the Asian kid talked like everybody else in that neighborhood, it just made logical sense. Right, right, right. But nowadays with the internet, people who are ignorant, who have never been exposed to an Asian from a different neighborhood is seeing this and they're like, wait, what's going on? Right, but to play the devil's advocate, and I'm not saying I fully support this, but I could see where they're coming from. They're saying that people may be exaggerating the accent to seem cooler for social media points. Now, do I think that this is the situation for Adonis Eats? No, not at all. I really think he just grew up in Oakland and he just talks like that and then he's in the military and he's describing this instance where everybody's confused. Probably maybe the guy approaching him that was African-American was from the South or something like that. And then Adonis Eats is explaining like, this is just how it is in the Bay Area. All right, everybody, we're gonna get into the comments section and the discussion at hand, so please hit that like button and check out other episodes of the Hot Pop Boys. Let us know if you like the news we cover in the commentary. Man, I think I read like all 3,000 comments in the comments section and people were going back and forth, but I noticed probably, and I did see this address a little bit, I think the most overlooked aspect is, and I'm saying of this whole aspect that I didn't even see that many comments about is it's literally how you look because Adonis Eats is Filipino, but he may have more of a like be perceived as Chinese immediately when you look at him. Like he kind of looks like a really buff Jeff Staple. So I'm saying that that already could shift everything because we have a friend who was a boxing and basketball coach in Seattle and he looks like Peyton Siva. Like exactly, like he gets mistaken for Peyton Siva when we're out. Like he- He was black and Samoan. He was black and Samoan, but he's full Filipino. Nobody's gonna say anything to him, even if, to be out, I'm not saying that he uses it, but even if he did say like even the N word, probably people are just gonna accept it because he looks black himself. Right, right, right. So you're saying that, especially because Filipinos we know that within the Filipino nationality and identity, they have a lot of different shades, okay? Right, they have like some Filipino, I met Filipinos that like look white, right? And there are certain shades of Filipino people who kind of get the pass and then obviously on the other than people who would not get the pass. Right, and this, and it's crazy because we're talking about this like melanated pass, but literally I think that that is probably how it works to some people. I'm not saying for everybody, but from what I've seen even in the Latino community, sometimes they go off that, oh, you're Dominican. You said, are you Puerto Rican? Are you this type of Puerto Rican? Like it goes like that. I did think it was pretty funny though that he said Asian Asian because like that's actually a term that I heard from even other Asians who are not as Asian. Like they called me an Asian Asian because not one, I think I look like the typical, I guess East Asian look. Right, like you, where else could you be from? Yeah, now maybe if I was fully tattooed and I had a different voice and I was carrying myself in a different way, maybe I don't get the Asian Asian title. I just get the Asian title. I actually think in this story, let's just say this fellow soldier was from South Carolina or whatever. He was just saying, oh man, I've never seen an East Asian talk like that. And I'm perceiving you right now at Donis to be East Asian. And Donis is like, nah man, I'm a Filipino from the Bay. That's how we all are. So I think that that to me is the biggest, like easiest way to explain away this particular instance. But there was a lot of like more macro discussions that came from this. Real quick Andrew, I wanna bring up that in 1992, it was a huge deal when they found out that this guy named Theo Murakai was black, not black. And he was the DJ on 92.3, which was the biggest hip hop station in LA. And then he made an actor appearance on Moisha as a heartthrob and everybody was shocked. Yeah, because he doesn't, because back, I mean, he just grew up, he just talks the way he grew up. Right. So, cause he was from the Bay area. All right, you guys, let's get into the comments section and some of our takeaways. There was a ton of people who just said, Andrew, you do not talk your ethnicity, you talk your culture and you talk your environment. I got a degree in linguistics. It's all about your environment and what you relate to or what you adapt to. He just sounds like his environment. What's the problem? Somebody said America is the only place where you're identified by the color of your skin or race before the color of your passport. What a goofy society this is. And then there was somebody saying, well, the people who are probably ignorant about this probably, and they were blaming it on the Americans in the South. They said, are mostly from the South who haven't grown up around enough types of people and enough Asians who grew up around like black people, for example. Yeah, I could see this argument because in the coastal cities, like even a lot of, like for example, Andrew, in New York, a lot of the people that a lot of people perceived to be black could be from Dominican Republic. They could be from Guyana. Could be from Cuba even, you know. The Caribbean, Africa. So a lot of things in the city, big cities like LA and New York or the Bay area, they're very, very mixed up, but it is true and I'm not blaming the South. It does seem like their understanding of race is like back in like 1952. Sometimes, like they have an old world, like there's only two heritage groups, which is, you know, heritage whites and then heritage black Americans. But you know what's funny is that I know plenty of Asians from the South that kind of talk with the Southern twang or speak in a way that you would not expect an Asian to speak. And then they're all- It takes his dumb count, man. It takes his the new South. No, no, no, no. They're from Georgia or Atlanta and they're from all over. So I just think these people just have not been exposed to a lot of people. Or here's another theory is that these people leaving the comments, they don't want Asians to sound like that. They actively don't think Asians should. Now that, from that grows a whole bunch of other questions like, oh, how should Asians sound? Right? But anyways, keep going. Somebody said, because the majority of folks that are talking like that are forcing that talk and I'm not sold yet that you aren't yet, Adonis, this was a comment, I'm assuming this is from a black person that may be a little bit skeptical saying that like, so many people in the past have used this accent and I'm not like, you know, I'll just call it out. You know, shout out to Aquafina with friends with her. She got accused of it. I'm not saying that she did or not. Iggy Azalea. You know, like other people, I guess in the past, pink, do you remember that girl, pink? Yeah. You know, I'm saying that like forcing a black scent to get more cool points. Right. So I'm saying that that's the fear is that some people are doing that versus people just being like, oh, you just grew up in that environment. So you talk like that environment. Right. Because it is considered a cool accent to have. It means that you're part of like, oh, what you know, what's cool. It's part of you listen to hip hop. You're not like, you're not a nerd. You're not a dork. You're not a square. That's the assumptions and the implication. So people, I mean, a lot of people would consider that's the American accent of flavor. Right, right, right. The seasoned accent. Yeah, the spicy accent. Somebody said it's because Asians are seen as subhuman and incapable of adapting to their own environments, which includes the way we dress, live, and speak. The Ishii media expects Asian actors to either use broken pigeon or very posh accents instead of localized ones. Everyone's so used to telling us Asians how to think or speak like we're all made in the same factory. Wow. This is actually a pretty good comment because I do feel like a lot of people out there who are accusing other people of faking that accent, it's like, well, how are Asians supposed to talk? Now, it is true. Some people fake it. So they have their regular voice and they have their, what, accent and voice. No, I've definitely heard something that I was kind of like, oh yeah, that doesn't sound that cool when you try to put on your cool voice. But then it also comes to code switching because Drake code switches. You've seen Drake in interviews and he sounds almost like he doesn't rap like that. Drake sounds like he's from like eight different socioeconomic statuses in eight different countries. Exactly. He's like an eight by eight grid, like 64 different countries. But because Drake is also half black, then I'm sure he gets the pass. But not only that, Andrew, he pulls it off. And people have criticized him too, though. Yeah, that's true, that's true. Some people said, people don't understand that Filipinos can assimilate with the locals better than other Asians. I would agree with this. I would agree that Filipinos adapt better than Chinese to the local culture of their neighborhood, but I've seen it both ways. I've seen some Chinese be super adapted. But if you made me say like percentage ratios, it seems like Filipinos are more subculturally adaptive. On average, sure. Yeah, yeah, for sure. I could roll with that. Somebody says, yeah, but for some reason, everybody wants to attribute these cool accents to the Bay Area, but not to black people like we weren't the catalyst to this originally. I don't mind it when Asians use African-American vernacular English. My only problem is y'all can't acknowledge the culture that you adopted as your own. This is not a Bay Area accent. This is AAVE. Show us your the respect. Just say that you got it from black people because not everybody in the Bay talks like that. Obviously, it's true. When you go to like Berlin game, you could be born and raised. That's technically Bay Area. I would expect you to talk very proper and white if you're from Berlin. Yeah, but when people do say the Bay, they are talking about a specific kind of experience that is distinct from other parts. Right, you're saying if you're like Tom Brady who's from the Yay Area, he's not from the Yay Area. No, no, no, Tom Brady is from the Bay Area. He's not from the Yay Area. But I do think this comment I can somewhat empathize with because I think that there is a sense that people wanna talk like black people, but they don't want to be empathetic or acknowledge where they got the accent from or the community that they got the accent from. You know what I mean? The Yay Area, or I don't even know if I'm saying that right, the Bay Area accent, that's probably heavily colored by the rap music, the Thiz music, right? Mac Dre, E40, et cetera, et cetera. Andre Nicotina. I'm sure it's more led by black people in that community. For sure, for sure. I mean, I can totally understand and empathize with this comment. Somebody said, this is a black girl. She said, I immediately knew he's from the Bay. It's not about speaking black. It's just about culture and vibe. He sounds like those cool ass uncles that used to break dance in the 1980s. I love it. Yo, all right, I have a question. And this is for the people watching. Let me know in the comments down below. I guess if you're somebody, and let's say you're an Asian-looking person who has this accent, who grew up like this, right? Should it be fair to assume that you may be a little bit more empathetic to the black experience in America because you talk like a black person? And I put this in quotes because you'll see it in another comment, right? But I'm just saying, like, is that safe to assume that if you talk like this, you probably were around that group of people and therefore you may understand their culture and their background better. For sure, for sure. I mean, if I talk like this and I'm using all this like cattle rancher slang, you think that I would be more like understanding the plight of the taxes on beef right now or the different soybeans that are getting taxed because I want to ship them to China? Well, if you talk like this, I'm gonna assume that you're not disgusted by a rodeo. Right, you do not hate country music. And you probably don't like that song because that ain't real country. I like that song. But this girl really, she left a ton of very interesting comments. Like I said, I think there's valid arguments to go all around, but I thought her responses were particularly thoughtful. She said, you know, my whole life, I've moved around to different places, been around different people. I don't live by outsiders or insiders. That's my opinion. That's just such a limiting and small way to live. You know, by me, you do you, I'll do me. And by me, I'm not being liable to me and by me, I'm not being limited by low vibrational divisive drama. I'm an open hearted kind of gal. Yeah, I think different people view this discussion, especially in the black community, viewing other people using AAVE with different levels of extremity, right? For sure. And then there's also this whole conversation about people who are saying, oh, well, he's talking black. And then someone responded and said, oh, what do you mean? Why do you always just reduce black culture down to just this accent to slaying, to rap slaying? Like, why does it have to be like that? Right, this African-American guy said, I hate that term. It gets tossed around so aggressively, ebonics, AAVE. I just prefer to call it hood vernacular. Or if you grew up in the hood, you will talk like this. Right, right, right. Yeah, other people were talking about the hood way of talking, being traced back to Southern white rednecks and the Appalachians. This was a whole book. I mean, other people were bringing it up from, was it Thomas Sowell? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So this was another thing. Somebody said, this black guy said, people say I always talk white and I should be talking black. And I'm like, bro, I'm just me. And a Mexican chimed in and said, when I worked in San Mateo, I had so many white Americans shocked that I didn't have a Mexican accent. So these, you know, it's almost like inverse where the Asians, people are shocked that they're talking black. And they're shocked, other people probably within their community and outside of the community are shocked that this black and this Mexican guy are not talking black and Mexican. But then this girl even said, I was Filipino and I got called a flip flop and a coconut for talking white. And actually, when I was growing up in South Seattle, I had a friend that was Filipino that more acted white. And we were growing up around such an urban environment, people used to call him a flip flop. Right, right. Like, not everybody, but some people did. Some people just said, 100%, the whole Bay Area vibe is just different. I've been here my whole life and I know it's a bubble and a privilege is I grew up around so many different cultures and ethnicities. It's beautiful, I love us. But other people outside of the Bay just wouldn't understand how we melt together. It's literally because we're all stoners and it's just easier to talk to each other. We just melt more here than other parts of the country. Agree or disagree, Andrew? Like, if the world, all a bunch of cheeses in a pot, the Bay Area just got that temperature a little hotter than everybody else. I think the Bay Area and I think New York to an extent are also pretty much two big melting pots of America. This comment also said, oh, people just think black culture is a free-for-all. You can just take what you want. I'm sick of this. I don't like it. People don't want to acknowledge the pain that black people went through in the history that we went through to even have these voices and have this accent. Right, you're saying that the development of what some people used to call non-standard American English has a long, like so many layers to it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I understand this. I get it. I agree too, to an extent. But I also think like, I guess like that type of culture, whatever that accent or that attitude is, has also made a lot of money and has become very, very cool that you can't blame people for leaning into what is cool. Whether that's from a young age, from when they're five years old to one year old. Whether the exposure is hyper-legitimate or it's extrapolated upon or completely fabricated, right? It's just, yeah. It's part of American culture now, in a way. Somebody said, Filipino, Indigenous, are black and African looking, so are we Asian, we're different. DJ Kuber chimed in and said, Filipinos are Pacific Island Asians with Negrito roots crossed with Latino. And then this black guy said, Filipino are black Asians, if you know, you know. This guy came in and said, real Filipinos are dark-skinned and igorot, Lapita. But we just got mixed up over the years. So some of us are more Spanish-looking or Chinese-looking now, due to recent, like, several hundred years of mixing. So yeah, I guess this was person, person was saying, like, Filipinos can talk like this because they are originally part Aita or part Negrito, so they're closer, they're part black themselves. I mean, yeah, I mean, I looked into it, it's definitely like, I could see where they're coming from, but it's just an interesting argument. Again, I think it's a lot of how you look, right? I mean, if you're part, if your bloodline is part Negrito and you have those bloodlines, you're probably gonna be tanner skin. Right, and that means that you can say it more. Manny Jacinto is from the Philippines, can he use it? I don't know, because he doesn't look like, you know what I mean? He looks more like- Can the Pinoy say it? Right. The Chinese Pinoy, can they say it? I need to know if the owner of Jollibee's talking like it. Somebody said, I love how he says Samoan correctly, which is Samoa, because you gotta say it more with the Samoan accent. Right, right, right, right, because that word is from there. This person said, I think it's more Southeast Asians because those are the ones that I know speak like this. People who are not familiar with Southeast Asians are saying it's cultural appropriation. They're so used to the stereotypical nerdy Asians on TV, which are mainly Chinese, Koreans, and Japanese. I can't be mad at someone for being ignorant. They don't know any better. So this was like kind of like talking about like, it's okay if you're Southeast Asian, it's just not okay if you're East Asian because they are more like white people and Southeast Asians are more black. Oh man, seeing then now that's a whole nother video. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but like I said, it goes back to my initial original discussion. People often use it, not everybody, they go off like a melanated scale. No, I mean, I know East Asians, some Chinese, and I even met a Korean who's pretty tan who like, they could be Filipino or Taiwanese people. I know some Taiwanese, some Cantonese people who look like Southeast Asian. That's why I think this whole Asian versus Asian Asian thing I think is really funny because I think it is about facial features and skin tone, but it's also more about if you embody the Confucian values or not. Yeah, because it's true. Listen guys, most of the East Asian immigrants, they're gonna pursue STEM careers. In STEM careers, you cannot generally lean into AAVE to rise up a STEM ladder. Right. Like that's generally true, like of any corporation Fortune 100, Fortune 500, whatever you wanna say. So I'm saying that that's like, why I believe why people have that perception that like East Asians are white and Southeast Asians are black. Like that's literally like how I hear some people say. You know what's goofy, man? Is that sometimes people who ask other Asians like, oh man, Asians, how can you talk like this? It's like, they're also Asian. Like other Asians question Asians' ability to talk like that. And again, I understand because sometimes there is some people who play it up for media reasons and have, but I guess at the end of the day, I guess who, does it threaten me as another as a fellow Asian of some other Asian talks like that? I guess. Yeah, I don't know, man. It's complicated. The comments down below, all right? So this is an ongoing discussion. I think this question is gonna pop up for the next 50 years, as long as Asians talk like this. Like literally there was a thousand other comments that I can't get to. Andrew, people are talking about what if you are from North Philly, you're from South Philly, or like what level, at what point can you adopt, what level of action? Cause let's say for example, Andrew, there's three extremities of everything, right? So let's say for example, somebody has AAVA influence speech, but like there's a low level, there's a medium level and there's a high level. At what level is okay for like what person from what fishbowl? I'm not asking. I don't know. Like if I sound just like Drake, if I were to make my voice like Drake. Are you talking about interview Drake, hanging out with his rap friends, hanging out with like that Bobby, that Bobby comedian, white comedian Drake. SNL Drake. Yeah, he's talking more white. Yeah, that's not, is that too white? That's not, that doesn't count. Like can I do that? Is that? I actually think another overlooked aspect here is that like a lot of people are saying, cause I've met people from the Oakland Bay area that quote unquote even use more like street or hood slang than Adonis eats, but their voice is more of like a alto and his voice is like a baritone. And I think that that deep bass in his voice shifts the perception as well. Sure, because like there's almost like a, a decibel situation going on more even than like tonage or like, you know what I mean? No, there's an implication that if you have a lower voice, you're like more black or something. You know what I mean? Like there's that, there's that belief, there's that feeling. And also how should Asian sound, right? I think a lot of people associate what Asian guys with flat or more neutral, I guess less what's called emotionally emotive. I think some people would just say corny voices. Yeah, corny. That's what some people would say. I didn't say, I know, I know that's, I've heard it described that way. No, no, no. Anyways, guys, let me know in the comments down below what your guys's overall takeaways are from this. I think at the end of the day, if that's how you grew up, that's how you grew up. Now, some people may doubt it and you may have to answer or you don't have to answer to it. And these are just internet comments and who cares, live your life, even if you're faking it a little bit. I don't know. But honestly, it's gonna come back down to like, you know, like there's your self perception when you look in the mirror and then there's how society perceives your, I guess phenotype and the assumptions about your history, your background, what you have or you have not seen in terms of reps throughout your life based off your phenotype. And that's the society we live in right now. I hope everybody can just live more, you know, go to bigger cities and talk to more people across the different spectrums. All right, everybody, thanks so much for watching. Until next time, we out. Peace.