A comedian in New York who joked about the safety of Malaysian planes in an apparent reference to the disappearance of flight MH370 has sparked a heated backlash in Malaysia and Singapore. Controversy over the joke by lawyer-turned comedian Jocelyn Chia at Manhattan’s Comedy Cellar erupted soon after a short clip of her stand-up performance was posted online earlier this week.
Chia’s bit had centered on the uneasy past between Singapore and Malaysia, which were once part of the same country. She led off with a suggestion that since the two had separated in 1965, Singapore had risen to become a first-world country while Malaysia had allegedly remained a “developing” one.
She then went on to take aim at Malaysian airplanes by suggesting they “can’t fly,” before making what many have taken as a reference to Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, the Beijing-bound flight which went missing along with 239 passengers and crew after taking off from Kuala Lumpur on March 8, 2014.
Credit: cnn.com
