Somewhere in the history of America, somebody decided that making fun of the French was not only okay, it was awesome and should be encouraged. What culture out there is more stereotyped here in the USA if not the French? It's not just baguettes and mimes, we're defintely down for calling French people rude and pretentious. It's our stereotype safe place.
So today we're watching a video that is a hallmark of France/America relations, 2000's "The Bad Touch" by Bloodhound Gang, directed by Richard Reines.
The video features all the members (and there is a surpringly large amount of people in The Bloodhound Gang) roaming the streets of Paris and capturing people to put in a cage. They are dressed in monkey costumes and they are eating mealworms.
The people they nab are your stereotypical Parisians - chefs (lured by a croissant, of course), a mime (who is a little person for some reason), gay French men in French looking clothes with tiny red scarves, and beautiful French women. They mericfully leave the old woman on the park bench alone, although they definitely do dance around her. She doesn't seem to notice.
There are a few controversies with this video, which means there are a few versions floating out there. The version posted above has the actual capture of the gay French couple removed - in the uncut version they hit them over the head with baguettes which was seen as depicting violence against homeosexuals. It's a concern taken seriously enough that the gay French couple is barely in the cut version.
The other two cut elements are an montage of animals and two members of the Bloodhound Gang humping in the beginning of the video and members of the Bloodhound Gang pooping and then splattering poop on their faces at the end of the video while the little person is getting run over with the car. Wow I can't believe typing stuff like that is part of my job.
Here's the uncut version, although this copy on YouTube is has a backwards image and pans around the image for some reason:
This is, of course, a ridiciulous video, but in the end all of the French people they captured do a dance together, so I guess you could say that it symbolically brings America (represented by a poop splattering band dressed as monkeys) and French (represented by effeminate French men, chefs, and a mime) together as one. Right?
Also, here's a video of a small group of people doing a dance to "The Bad Touch". I don't know why.
