--- title: Aziz Ansari Feminism: Comedian Says He's a Feminist on David Letterman description: With a metaphor about Beyoncé and Jay Z to help make his point canonical: https://time.com/3478159/aziz-ansari-feminism-jay-z-beyonce/ author: Samantha Grossman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-10-07T14:48:43.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:13:38.763Z og:title: Aziz Ansari Calls Himself a Feminist, Explains Why We Don't Need to Be Scared of That Word og:description: With a metaphor about Beyoncé and Jay Z to help make his point og:url: https://time.com/3478159/aziz-ansari-feminism-jay-z-beyonce/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc847ba7c5ddd47d2/69875f1a2dce017a029dac30/screen-shot-2014-10-07-at-9-58-37-am.png?branch=production&width=1920&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Screen Shot 2014-10-07 at 9.58.37 AM og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Aziz Ansari Calls Himself a Feminist, Explains Why We Don't Need to Be Scared of That Word twitter:description: With a metaphor about Beyoncé and Jay Z to help make his point twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc847ba7c5ddd47d2/69875f1a2dce017a029dac30/screen-shot-2014-10-07-at-9-58-37-am.png?branch=production&width=1920&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Aziz Ansari Explains Why He's a Feminist and Why We Don't Need to Be Scared of That Word by [Samantha Grossman](/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Oct 7, 2014 2:48 PM CUT  by [Samantha Grossman](/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Oct 7, 2014 2:48 PM CUT According to Aziz Ansari, most people are feminists — whether or not they actively call themselves that — because most people believe men and women should have equal rights. The comedian discussed this theory with David Letterman on _The Late Show_ last night after explaining that his chef girlfriend is a “big feminist” and has turned him into one too. Here’s the thing, though: he doesn’t give some big, dramatic speech about feminism. To Ansari, being a feminist just seems like a no-brainer. “If you look up feminist in the dictionary, it just means someone who believes men and women have equal rights,” he says, after asking fellow feminists in the audience for a round of applause. “But I think the reason people don’t clap is that the word is so weirdly used in our culture. Now, people think feminist means, like, some woman is gonna start yelling at them.” He continues to add his signature humor to the topic, which is clearly important to him. “I feel like if you do believe that men and women have equal rights, if someone asks if you’re a feminist, you have to say yes, because that is how words work,” he quips, adding a metaphor about a doctor who treats diseases of the skin but deems the word dermatologist “too aggressive.” Then he throws in another metaphor about Jay Z and Beyoncé and basically this whole speech is perfect and it makes us feel [like this](http://image-cdn.zap2it.com/images/smile-zoom-in.gif "undefined"). ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3478159/aziz-ansari-feminism-jay-z-beyonce/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3478159/aziz-ansari-feminism-jay-z-beyonce/"},"headline":"Aziz Ansari Explains Why He's a Feminist and Why We Don't Need to Be Scared of That Word","datePublished":"2014-10-07T14:48:43.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:13:38.763Z","description":"With a metaphor about Beyoncé and Jay Z to help make his point","url":"https://time.com/3478159/aziz-ansari-feminism-jay-z-beyonce/","keywords":["Living","Newsfeed","feminism","women","David Letterman","celebrity","Feminist","Comedians","aziz ansari"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc847ba7c5ddd47d2/69875f1a2dce017a029dac30/screen-shot-2014-10-07-at-9-58-37-am.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Samantha Grossman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc847ba7c5ddd47d2/69875f1a2dce017a029dac30/screen-shot-2014-10-07-at-9-58-37-am.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Screen Shot 2014-10-07 at 9.58.37 AM","caption":"","creditText":"","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-living/","name":"Living"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3478159/aziz-ansari-feminism-jay-z-beyonce/","name":"Aziz Ansari Explains Why He's a Feminist and Why We Don't Need to Be Scared of That Word"}}]}] ```