Cancel the Racist Netflix Comedy Show "Schulz Saves America"

This show will get Asian Americans killed. Hate crimes against Asian Americans are at an all time high during the pandemic because of the racist association of COVID-19 with China promoted by Trump, his administration and other white supremacists. Andrew Schulz’s new 4-part comedy special on Netflix fans the flames of anti-Asian American racism. The first episode aired this week contains racist and dangerous “jokes” blaming China and Asians for the coronavirus pandemic. In the first minute, Schulz calls coronavirus the "Asian parasite." He later refers to the virus as 'Wuhanic plague.' Among other blatantly racist remarks, Schulz says, 'I mean, let's be honest, next to squatting to smoke a cigarette, slinging viruses is their favorite thing to do'. These words are disgusting, vile, shockingly blaming and shaming, untrue, and anything but funny. They are the very thing which leads to violence against Asian Americans. In this time, as racist language and sentiment is being spewed by our own government officials, and as white supremacist violence is being incited and is increasing in the US and other countries, the airing of racist content by an entity as large as Netflix is absolutely dangerous and will fan the flames of violent acting-out.

There have been more than 2,000 incidents of COVID-related hate crimes against Asian Americans since March, 2020. A man attacked a family with young children with a knife at a store, elderly men and women have been attacked and chased down the street, a woman suffered an acid attack, men and women are being spit on, and the list goes on. Netflix should have known better than to air this show.

Racist content of any kind on television is dangerous. It is unacceptable and dangerous for Netflix to continue to air the show. Netflix needs to act responsibly now to minimize any further damage to Asian Americans and all of us, because the consequences are already too grave. For Netflix to allow this series to continue on its platform would be nothing less than an endorsement of open and blatant racism in its programming. Reed Hastings MUST cancel the program immediately.