James Corden Under Fire For 'Late Late Show' Segment Denigrating Asian Foods

Funnyman James Corden isn't generating laughs from a growing movement of viewers demanding that he drop a recurring segment on “The Late Late Show” that denigrates traditional Asian cuisines.

What Happened: Corden’s “Spill Your Guts or Fill Your Guts” feature updates the old “Truth or Dare” game by forcing his celebrity guests to either answer embarrassing personal questions or swallow food that is presented as being unappetizing or worse. However, many of the foods are unique to Asian cultures, such as Japanese cod sperm and Chinese bird saliva.

The segment has been part of the show since 2016 and was most recently played in March with Chrissy Teigen. Other celebrities that have taken part in the segment include Kendall Jenner, Justin Bieber, Halle Berry, the Jonas Brothers, Harry Styles and celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay.

What’s Happening Now: Complaints about the segment have percolated over the years on social media and blogs, but never made any impact. Earlier this week, 24-year-old California-based artist Kim Saira posted a video on TikTok expressing disappointment in Corden’s use of traditional Asian cuisines as a punishment tool that became a viral hit.

"I noticed that one of the foods that he presented to someone was balut – a fertilized duck egg that is boiled and eaten from the shell – and balut is like, very specific to Filipino culture," she said in an interview on the Today show. "It's a food that I have been eating whenever I go to the Philippines with my grandma and my cousins, so it's a very sentimental food to me, and I noticed that he was presenting it to a guest and calling it gross.

"I was just so confused and I feel like it was a moment of me just being like, 'Oh my gosh, like, this is my culture," she added. "I don't understand why he's making fun of it?'"

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What's Next: Saira posted a petition on Change.org demanding that Corden either drop or revamp the segment.

“During these segments, he’s openly called these foods ‘really disgusting,’ and ‘horrific,’” the petition stated. “In the wake of the constant Asian hate crimes that have continuously been occurring, not only is this segment incredibly culturally offensive and insensitive, but it also encourages anti-Asian racism. So many Asian Americans are consistently bullied and mocked for their native foods, and this segment amplifies and encourages it.”

The petition, which has already generated close to 13,000 signatures, requested that Corden formally apologize to his Asian viewers and make a donation to Asian American nonprofits that support Asian-owned restaurants and small businesses.

Neither Corden nor his network, the ViacomCBS VIAC subsidiary CBS, have publicly acknowledged the petition and Saira’s comments.

(Photo by Andy Thorney /Flickr Creative Commons.)