Contradictheory: It’s just how we Malaysians sound

In Malaysia, multilingualism is not a threat to dignity but evidence of the strength of integration, says the columnist. — 123rf

In February 2026, Malaysian comedian Nigel Ng, aka Uncle Roger, took a minute out of a video to talk about something serious.

Normally Ng roasts cooking influencers for their “creative” ways of making fried rice, but this time he responded to a comment by J. Kenji López-Alt. The renowned American chef and New York Times columnist had admonished commenters on his own channel for mentioning Uncle Roger, saying he is uncomfortable that the character’s “schtick seems to give a free pass to people to imitate stereotypical Asian speech patterns and pronunciation”.