Wednesday, September 28, 2016

Are White Guys Are Too Dreamy To Be Held Accountable?

Xin Xin Liu Who?!

It's a funny old world.

In my previous post, I wrote about the twitter, attention-seeking "townhall" in which Asian progressive feminists used actor, John Cho's, concerns about the mental and emotional welfare of his child as an excuse to cast sexist and racist aspersions on Asian men in general and to demean - like any good white racist would do - the masculinity of Asian men who happen to not conform to the limits placed on them by society or wannabe Asian progressives with Napolean complexes.

An article posted to the YOMYOMF website recently by Erin Chew highlights why some Asian men find it hard to take these progressives seriously. The post recounted the story of the brutal murder over in Scotland of a Chinese woman, Xin Xin Liu, by her white Scottish husband, Rob Kerr. The victim was stabbed seventy-six times as the couple's children slept nearby. Interestingly, the article's focus was not on the crime and the issue of domestic violence faced by Asian women, but rather it focused on the poor taste of internet comment(s) made by a handful of Asian men.

As the title of the post suggests, Chew wanted to make it clear that she feels that the race of the murderer had nothing to do with the killing and that to make that association is absolutely despicable! Strangely enough, I would agree that we should not associate the race of criminals with their crimes, nor should we try to blame a person's race for any behaviours whether criminal in  nature or not. To do so is racist by any definition.

Strange then, that this is exactly what Asian progressives and Asian progressive feminists did in their recent hatchet job on John Cho and the subsequent two-minutes hate-type screeds in their twitter "townhall." But even before that most recent embarrassing display of stupidity, Asian progressive feminists have been routinely associating the behaviour of some Asian men who have committed crimes, or whom they simply do not like, with their race.

Most notably, Eliot Roger, Daniel Holztclaw, and Eddie Huang have all been held up as examples of some kind of toxic "Asian" masculinity, even though no one ever has the presence of mind to define what they mean by "Asian." Of course, readers will remember that Roger was a mass murderer, and Holztclaw was a serial rapist. Huang is a celebrity chef and successful (very successful!) author and television personality. How these two extremes of men could ever be seen as having a common unhealthy masculinity is beyond me. How their "Asian-ness" plays into the equation is also never explained by progressives.

As I've written in several previous posts, Asian progressive activism seems to function primarily as a defender of white supremacy. In almost every case of police killings of unarmed black men, or other instances of anti-black racism perpetrated by white institutions or people, Asian progressives will step up without fail to divert the conversation away from white racism and "reframe" the issues by attacking other Asians with vague accusations of rampant racism, privilege and "complicity" in anti-blackness.

White America seems to have taken notice of this strategy and actually seems to be utilizing this same method of deflection to defend white racism. "Asian privilege" is used to diminish accusations of anti-black racism in white America, and ideas of alleged Asian complicity and rampant anti-blackness have been used to shift responsibility for America's racial problems onto Asians. With this in mind, the stark contrast between the twitter townhall's racialization of toxic masculinity and Erin Chew's heartfelt defense of the whiteness of a brutal murderer are quite stunning.

When Eliot Roger committed his crimes, some Asian feminists tried to force his actions into a convenient narrative of it being an example of a mentality of "Asian" masculinity gone awry, despite the fact that Roger reserved his most vicious attacks for his Asian male victims. As for Holztclaw, I've seen no evidence or even the slightest indication that his race, or his feelings about his race had any bearing on his actions. Yet, Asian feminism wants to hold him up as the poster boy for the threat that Asian masculinity presents to American society. This thinking comes straight out of the Yellow Peril xenophobia playbook and has its roots deep in America's anxiety about mass immigration of Asian men into the country and the threat of miscegenation that accompanied it.

By comparison, Erin Chew's piece on YOMYOMF seems to go out if its way to avoid the kind of racist thinking commonly utilized by Asian progressives when speaking about Asian men. Her piece could be a great example of how not to racialize issues of domestic, or male on female, violence if it did not contrast so sharply with the general racist attitudes exhibited by the rest of the movement. Sadly, her piece reads like an apology for white violence against Asians, a defence of domestic violence, and a double standard in how violence against Asian women is viewed.

First of all, what is most noticeable is that the Scottish guy's mental health is used to defend his actions. Eliot Roger was possibly even more mentally ill than this Scottish guy - at least his mental illness was almost certainly more long-term - yet his mental state was largely played down by Asian progressive feminists who chose to focus on only the Asian part of his identity just so that they could use his actions to push their narrative of Asian misogyny as if genetics plays a part in cultural concepts of masculine behaviour.

Anyone who values the lives of women would be appalled by how the victim described in Chew's piece is rendered invisible by her focus on defending the whiteness of the Scottish dude. In fact, her worst condemnation is reserved for the Asian men who made insensitive comments on the web.
These Asian men sadly, are brainwashed, angry and have their own insecurities to deal with. Instead of acknowledging that this was a horrific case of domestic violence ending in death and sympathising for the deceased and the children, they have gone to victim blaming and calling Xin Xin “self hating” to marry a white guy. I wish that these type of Asian men look at the actual issue at hand that this is a fatal murder of a wife in a frenzied attack by her husband instead of blaming Xin Xin just because she married a white guy. 
If Chew had done a little more research, she would have found that in recent years, a series of incidences, including violent murders of Asian men and women in Scotland has been met with an often apathetic response by police investigators, and that the framing of the murder by the British media as a case of a "good (white) man acting in opposition of his normally good character" is a classic means to refocus attention away from the victim - particularly in cases where the victim is a minority. The judge in the Vincent Chin murder case made similar statements about the good character of his killers before ultimately showing leniency towards them. Furthermore, both Kerr's legal defence and the media have run with this same story of a "good" man acting out of character, whilst almost ignoring the Asian victim.

A violent murder of Simon San, a Chinese restaurant delivery driver, several years ago is a good example of how some murders of Asian people in Scotland are treated. Although the assailants screamed racial abuse at the victim as they beat him to death, police refused to investigate the murder as a hate crime. Even though the murderer was convicted, he was due to be released a mere three years into his sentence despite posting anti-Chinese comments on a Facebook page while still in prison. Police did acknowledge their failures with an apology, but that did not prevent the officer who made the decision not to charge the murderer with a hate crime from being promoted.

Other instances of racism hint at the existence of a culture of anti-Asian prejudice that informs police complicity in seeking lenient charges for murderers,and affects Asians in every strata of Scottish society. Last year, a Chinese origin politician in the Scottish National Party resigned amidst allegations of racial abuse and bullying. Even main opposition British Labour Party (which has huge support in Scotland) leader Jeremy Corbyn has been alleged to have utilized anti-Chinese sentiment. A report by Min Quan from 2009 exploring widespread anti-Chinese racism in the UK, details prolonged racial harassment and abuse of Chinese-Brits, violent attacks and verbal abuse (even on children).

Although some victims report good experiences with police responses to anti-Chinese crimes, many others report apathy, indifference, and an unwillingness of police to pursue any in-depth investigation. Even worse, there is an implication of police obstruction of justice in cases where police advice to victims resulted in cases being dropped.

This background gives the savage stabbing of Xin Xin Liu by her white Scottish husband a whole different context that makes Erin Chew's defence of his whiteness seem even more hollow, particularly when we consider how justice for his Chinese victim might be administered. Already, the media, like Chew, is upholding the integrity of the savage killer. His whiteness remains unsullied by his actions, even though counted amongst the benefits of "whiteness" in the UK is the strong possibility - as shown by the Min Quan report - of not being held fully accountable for  crimes against Chinese citizens. Even if Rob Kerr's race has nothing to do with his crime, his whiteness may certainly play a huge role  in how police, prosecutors and the law deals with his punishment and whether or not Xin Xin Liu receives appropriate justice. 

But those kinds of nuances might get in the way of the narrative. Besides, white guys are just too dreamy to allow their whiteness to be held accountable.