Ronny Chieng Explains Why Chinese People Love Money | Netflix Is A Joke

It's such a weird stereotype

to have associated with your ethnicity.

Right? That stereotype of Asian parents wanting their kids to be doctors.

Right? It's such a weird thing to have  on your race.

Like, what is that? Is that good? Is that bad?

I thought it was a good thing.  Apparently, it's worthy of mockery.

Right?

Asian parents wanting their kids to be doctors.

It's weird because it's true.

Right? I know because my parents were the same way.

They just wanted us to be doctors.  It was like this obsession.

They just wanted us to be doctors.

And it's insidious as well,

because when Asian parents want their kids to be doctors,

helping people is, like, on the bottom of the list of reasons.

[audience laughs applauds]

Oh, if it even makes the list... of reasons to go into medicine.

Helping people is, like,  the unfortunate by-product...

[audience laughs]

of becoming a healthcare professional.

Like, when they first see that they can't even believe it.

They're like, "What the fuck?  You gotta help people?

Well, whatever, get it out of the way.

But don't let it get in the way of what this is really about.

It's about the money  and the prestige, right?"

It's the money and the prestige.

Because if you're  a first-generation immigrant,

your children becoming doctors is the quickest way

you can turn it around in one generation.

Instant credibility,  instant respectability, instant money.

Right? You flip the clan narrative around. Boom!

Started from the bottom, now we here.  We're doctors! [laughs]

[audience laughs]

And it's also weird because Asian parents are also the last group of people

you can ever convince to see a doctor.

[audience laughs, cheers, and applauds]

Yo, these fucking people will never see a doctor.

They spend their whole lives obsessing over it.

Nothing can make my mom see a doctor. There's nothing...

My mom can have an arrow  going right through her. [pants]

And she's trying to pull it out like Rambo, right?

And you're like, "Yo, Mom, let's go see a doctor."

And my mom will be like, "No.

They just want to take people's money."

[audience laughs and applauds]

Then you're like, "Then why do you want your kids to be doctors so badly?"

[strained] "Because I want my kids to take other people's money, obviously!"

[pants] "The fact that you don't understand that

is the reason  why you never became a doctor."

-[groans] -[audience laughs]

Because Chinese people love money.

We love that shit.

Chinese people fucking love money.

Okay? You think rappers love money?

Yo, we love money...

[audience laughs]

...more than anyone.

Chinese people love everything about it.  We love making it, love spending it,

we love giving it, we love receiving it, we love throwing it up in the air.

Yo, Chinese people love money so much,

we have a god of money.

[audience laughs]

Of all the gods in Chinese Taoism,  there's one god, he's the god of money.

Caishenye, we pray to him...

for more money!

Every day, we go, "Hey, god of money..."

[audience laughs]

"...give us more money."

And he gives us more money.

Very fickle god.  Doesn't care about inflation, right?

No understanding of basic principles  of macroeconomics, just...

Just throwing out gold ingots  if you ask for it at the right time.

"Here's some money. Burn some incense.  Here's some money, man."

Even during Chinese New Year,

the biggest holiday for Chinese people,  Chinese New Year,

when we see each other during Chinese New Year,

the way we greet each other is we say, "gong xi fa cai,"

or "gong hei fat choy" in Cantonese.

I'm sure you've heard that,  at least peripherally, "Gong xi fa cai."

Gong xi fa cai means, "Hope you get rich!"

[audience laughs]

[audience cheers and applauds]

That's not "Happy New Year."

[audience laughs]

Do you understand, the go-to phrase  during Chinese New Year

isn't, "Hey, happy New Year."

It's, "Yo, hope you get rich."

[audience laughs]

"Hope you get rich. Hope you get richer than all these other motherfuckers.

Hope you get so fucking rich, man.

Hope you get rich and also hope... You better hope I get rich.

We can hope each other... Both get rich together."

[audience laughs]