It’s not often that an embassy has to issue an apology to an entire country because of a video on YouTube.
Earlier this month, that’s exactly what happened when the Embassy of Japan in India posted a notice to its Facebook page, stating, “It was regrettable that this utterly inappropriate video had offended many Indian friends.”
The video in question was for a song called “Curry Police” by the group Candy Foxx. Japanese entertainers have long used stereotypes as the punchlines for jokes — remember the blackface Eddie Murphy impression or the JAL ad? — and it’s a style of humor Candy Foxx embraces in its other offerings, though those clips also poke fun at Japan.