Malaysia taps Interpol for help tracking US comedian Jocelyn Chia after MH370 joke
By Bryan Ke
June 15, 2023
Malaysia is reportedly seeking Interpol’s help to track comedian Jocelyn Chia’s location in retaliation for her joke about the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 (MH370).
What happened: Chia, who is Boston-born but grew up in Singapore, was performing a stand-up show at the Comedy Cellar in New York City in April when she referred to the whereabouts of MH370.
In a video shared last week, Chia pokes fun at the “friendly rivalry” between Singapore and Malaysia and later makes a joke about airplanes, saying, “[Malaysian] airplanes cannot fly. What? Malaysia Airlines going missing not funny huh? Some jokes don’t land.”
About MH370: In March 2014, a Boeing 777 took off from Kuala Lumpur and was heading for Beijing when the plane suddenly and mysteriously fell off the radar. Malaysia, China and Australia conducted a three-year hunt for the plane, its 12 crew members and its 227 passengers, eventually drawing no conclusion in 2017.
Controversy erupts: Chia’s joke drew fierce backlash in Malaysia, with Bernama, the country’s national news agency, reporting on Tuesday that local police are purportedly asking Interpol to help them locate the comedian. She is currently being investigated under Malaysian laws for incitement and offensive online content.
The youth wing of one of Malaysia’s biggest political parties, United Malays National Organization, marched to the U.S. embassy in Kuala Lumpur on Friday to protest Chia and her joke. The group’s chief, Muhamad Akmal Saleh, said that around 100 protesters and representatives gave a memorandum to the embassy.
Chia’s response: Speaking to BBC, Chia said she considers the recent reactions to be “overblown” and “ridiculous,” noting that she had performed the same stand-up show “hundreds of times and even did a shorter version of it in Singapore.”
“It always cracks the audience up. I wouldn’t have used it again if it didn’t work,” Chia claimed, adding that her joke was “taken out of context when consumed on social media.”
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