Ben Efsaneyim

Holding a Mirror Up to America

2012-02-22T01:29:00.000-08:00

Jeremy Lin's Celebrity Highlights Casual Anti-Asian Racism.

Hat Tip to the Asian Athletes blog for posting this great piece from the LA Times.......

Jeremy Lin has dribbled America into the previously quiet corner of its casual prejudice and lazy stereotypes of Asian Americans....

...The true beauty of his story is in awareness of the ugliness that has been found there....

....America should see itself in the murky reflection of a society that has long considered it reasonable to publicly categorize Asian Americans in ways that would never be acceptable for other, more vocal minorities.....

...America should see the writer from Foxsports.com who began the barrage of ignorance last week by tweeting a tired joke about the assumed size of Lin's manhood. The guy apologized, but his company did not, which should not be surprising considering Fox Sports is also the outfit that last fall aired a segment in which a reporter ridiculed Asian Americans at USC for not understanding football.

Can you imagine a major American media company tolerating this sort of blatant racism if it were directed toward any of Lin's African American teammates?

America should see the game video from the Knicks' MSG network in which cameras focused on a homemade sign that showed Lin's face above a fortune cookie with the words, "The Knicks Good Fortune.''

Can you imagine, five months from now, that same television director willingly airing a shot of a sign that made fun of the heritage of a Latino member of the New York Mets?

If America has the stomach, it should even watch the tape of the WNYW morning show in New York where one of the anchors, upon hearing a reporter list Lin's physical attributes, asked, "What about his eyes?"

The newsman made the slur, he sort of winked with glee, the entire news desk laughed and I'm thinking, you're kidding me, right?

I couldn't have said it any better myself.

We Are At War With Eastasia

2012-02-20T03:15:00.001-08:00

Newspeak.

I wrote about Jeremy Lin in July of 2010, my general feeling at the time was that he had already achieved so much that he could already be considered something of a positive role-model for Asian boys. It is, therefore, nice to see that he has developed even more as a basketball player and is successfully competing against some of the best players in the game. I've long believed that it is the successful Asian sportsmen (and not movie and television characters) who will ultimately be the key players in the struggle to overcome stereotypes and negative attitudes.

What has been the most fascinating aspect of Lin's sudden ascent to celebrity is the reactions of American society. Varying in range from fanatical support to spiteful racial mockery, the response of America has reflected the ambivalent (and perhaps schizophrenic) nature of mainstream attitudes towards Asian people. Even some of those who support Lin might have difficulty speaking about him without some kind of derogatory reference. This Saturday Night Live skit presents a humerous example of this in action - despite being fans of Lin, the commentators make casual use of racial stereotypes and caricature.

I think that one root cause of this ambivalence towards Asians in 21st century is an almost semantic issue. In his fantastic novel, "Nineteen Eighty-Four", George Orwell describes a dystopian future in which every aspect of human society is watched and controlled by totalitarian government. One way that these governments control the minds and thoughts of their subjects is through a method called "Newspeak". In short, Newspeak is a process by which language is simplified by reducing vocabulary and grammar. By this process, key concepts in human thought that have the potential to cause people to have dissenting opinions are simply removed from the vocabulary of the language so that it becomes impossible to even conceptualize notions of freedom and human dignity that differ from the politically accepted ones.

This is somewhat chilling if you really think about it. In the context of mainstream reactions to Jeremy Lin's celebrity, what we seem to be observing is this very process in action. The vocabulary that is generally used to depict or describe Asian men is limited to that which is derogatory or demeaning. Asian men are typically jeered at or summarily dismissed and it is almost impossible to find much reference to Asian men in terms of strength or bravery. In fact, it is almost impossible to find much association of Asian men with humanity, with dehumanizing caricature being the favoured mode of description. Effectively, the concepts of Asians that condition the minds of mainstream America and form the filter through which attitudes towards Asian men are conceived and expressed are limited by the language and images put forward about them.

There is no language put forward in American culture that enables (or permits) Asian men to be conceptualized as masculine or even human by the mainstream. It should come as no surprise that some people are using the only language and concepts of Asian men that they know to describe Lin. That in no way should be taken as putting forward an excuse for blatantly racist attitudes expressed by some, neither is it an excuse for any caricaturing of Asian people. It is simply stating what I perceive to be fact - American society and culture is so geared towards conceiving of Asians in derogatory ways that the language itself is limited to achieving this end. Even in cases where there is so much support and backing for an individual - as is the case with Lin who is, after all, at the center of a dramatic turnaround in the Knicks' fortunes - the language often used in connection with him is inflected with caricature.

This is one of the reasons that I think the use of language to put forward eloquent and compelling argument is an essential tool in the fight against anti-Asian racism. Asian men - intellectuals, artists, players, sportsmen, or even delivery men - have to create the vocabulary that they want to be used to define themselves. I think that is one of the things that Jeremy Lin is doing - he is defining himself in a way tha is free of racial caricature. That to me is a very encouraging thing, and is an endeavour that all Asia-American boys should strive to emulate.

On a final note, one aspect of the Jeremy Lin phenomenon that I find extremely encouraging, is the ongoing punning of Lin's name. To me, this is effectively a way of creating a vocabulary to describe an Asian man and his exploits that is almost entirely free of racial caricature. That gives me some hope.

Nakamura Hits Free Kick Into A Moving Bus

2012-01-29T08:04:00.000-08:00

A Hole In One.

Former star of Scottish Premier League side, Celtic, Shinsuke Nakamura showing some amazing skill......

Just Acting?

2012-01-24T13:00:00.000-08:00

Or Moral Dilemma?

For Asian-Americans the single most highly debated subject - after the inter-racial dating disparity(!) - is possibly the issue of media representation. From outright derogatory and demeaning representation to invisibility and white-washing of Asian characters, the issue is definitely a hot-topic in any discourse on the Asian-American experience.

One aspect of this issue is the phenomenon of Asian-American actors who come under heavy criticism from within the community for accepting demeaning roles. This often leads to questions of the obligations (if any) of individual actors faced with the dilemma of working in an industry that only permits them stereotyped roles, and the part these roles might play in perpetuating negative attitudes towards Asian people in society in general. Most recently the broadcasting of the comedy show earlier in this year- 2 Broke Girls - has generated renewed discussion on this issue of negative stereoypes and how Asian actors willing to fill these roles might be contributing to their promotion in society in general.

On one side of the argument some Asian actors feel that accepting a demeaning role is part of a larger process that incorporates Asian characters (albeit negatively at first) into the mainstream consciousness that they believe and hope will at some point tilt the balance of influence such that they, or future, actors will have more input in how Asian characters are depicted. The general belief is that demeaning roles must lead inexorably to more nuanced and less stereotypical depictions. Some Asian actors suggest that such roles are not actually as damaging as we would believe and offer nuanced arguments defending roles that severely limit the qualities of the Asian character being portrayed, or might argue that the role will be filled regardless. Others, suggest that the entertainment industry is driven by artistic creativity and thus one-dimensional roles that uphold demeaning stereotypes should somehow be exempt from politically or socially based criticism.

Of course, it could be suggested (and has been suggested) that media characterizations do not, or cannot, influence, or shape public attitudes or behaviours. Yet, casual observation of America's news and media suggests quite strongly that the media itself is heavily invested in the notion that the things they broadcast can heavily affect how people vote, shop, believe, and behave. A look at history should also give some clues that promoting bias through the broadcast media can alter the moral compass of individuals within a population and enable attitudes to shift to such a degree that horrific atrocities can seem like good ideas - the Nazis and Stalin's Russia are a testament to this.

There is, therefore, very little reason to believe that ubiquitous negative and demeaning media (or political) depictions of Asian people can have anything other than a negative impact on the behaviours and attitudes of mainstream Americans towards Asians - this is particularly acute because there are very few positive representations of Asians that provide a balanced perspective. What all of this adds up to is that American culture has a dialogue going about Asian people that is almost ideological in character, which is derived from xenophobic hostility and is a discourse from which the perspectives of Asian people themselves are excluded. Stereotyping in the mass media is the way that this hostile dialogue is popularly propagated throughout American culture, and a casual observation of the degree of anti-Asian behaviours amongst mainstream America's children provides us with strong evidence of the success and pervasiveness of this dialogue.

This should (but surprisingly, often does not) present us with a dilemma of conscience such that the decision of an Asian actor to accept a demeaning role becomes almost a moral question. This is because pervasive negative depictions can and do shift the moral compass of mainstream America and thus normalize demeaning attitudes and behaviours towards Asian people that would be deemed unacceptable if enacted towards individuals within their own group. Given that American culture has been through over half-a-century of an ideological shift that promotes the ethic of respect and acceptance of people regardless of colour or creed, and is, therefore, not ignorant of issues regarding social and cultural integration, the fact that anti-Asian attitudes continue to be normalized underlines the unethical nature of the practice and underscores the moral nature of the issue.

The apparent failure of the Asian minority of America to recognize the ethical nature of this issue is fundamental to understanding why the issue of media representation continues to be such a problem for us. Most of the time we tend to concieve of stereotyping as a way to offend or antagonize, when in fact, their purpose is to promote a worldview of exclusion and insurmountable differentness of Asian people. Yet, the result of promoting such hostile attitudes towards Asian people may even, perhaps, have far more potentially devastating effects such as negatively influencing America's foreign policy choices in Asia.

Since there are no serious moral sensibilities - under normal circumstances - that view actions that promote harm to others as being morally acceptable courses of action, it would seem obvious that there should be an obligation on the part of aspiring Asian-American actors (or anyone with a moral conscience) to cease participation in roles that do that very thing. No actor would accept a role in a film that promoted or normalized the idea that child-abuse is a good and normal thing (well, Clint Eastwood and some Asians might). No actor would accept a role in a movie that promoted the idea that slavery was morally acceptable. The reason is that these things might go beyond the simple creative process and propagate beliefs that normalize child-abuse or the brutality of slavery and thus have the potential to cause harm and suffering to others. It is a question of ethics and morality.

And this is one of the most overlooked aspects of the drive to empower Asian-Americans. We ourselves diminish the seriousness of hostile depictions by failing to place the practice into an appropriate moral frame work. What we fail to realize is that the central principle that underlies any practice of dehumanization is the denial of moral agency of individuals in the target group. Thus, if Asians lack moral agency, then they are incapable of making ethical choices that are congruent with that of Americans. This in turn justifies xenophobia and prejudicial thinking because it is only the depraved or the lower animals who lack moral agency. Additionally, because of this lack of moral agency, it follows that one need not apply the same moral considerations towards Asians as one would towards one's own group. Thus, the very act of accepting demeaning roles could itself be seen as an example of deficient moral agency and, thus, reinforces dehumanization.

Asian actors - or any public figures, perhaps - happen to choose professions that place them in the front line of America's cultural denigration of Asian people. Thus, it would seem obvious that it is they who must, more than anybody, challenge this process of dehumanization. I would suggest that actors have a moral obligation to boycott demeaning roles - where writers and producers are unwilling to compromise - because a major aspect of combatting dehumanizing images is simply to exercise moral agency. The outcome of such an action would only be positive. It's not enough to accept a role hoping in blind faith that it must necessarily contribute to overall progress at some unspecified time in the future.

Film makers might resort to using "yellow-face" to depict Asian characters in which case at least the racism would be undeniable, or they might write the Asian character out of the script altogether, in which case what has been lost except for a few bucks? These types of demeaning roles for Asians are the entertainment industry's equivalent of the dead-end Macdonalds job that purveys a vile junk food that clogs the arteries of Asian creativity and fosters an obese irrelevance. So why do so many people scramble to do it?

I Went To The Crossroads...

2012-01-21T13:59:00.000-08:00

I Looked East And West

Check out this Asian dude........

Damn, he did a great job with that slide guitar, and a great version of the song!

Enjoy!!!!

Soccer Trivia

2012-01-17T02:23:00.000-08:00

Elastico - The Japanese Connection!

Most soccer fans will agree that one of the most skillful and entertaining teams ever to grace the football pitch was the now legendary Brazilian team that won the 1970 World Cup. One of the most exciting talents to emerge from that team of greats was winger, Roberto Rivelino. Quick, incredibly skillful, and with a brilliant football brain, Rivelino could be said to be have been one of the players who drove the evolution of the modern game.

Amongst his repertoire of skills were the ability to curl a football around a wall of defenders at an immensely high velocity (very hard to do), and amazing dribbling skills. One of his most enduring contributions to the skill of dribbling was the so-called "elastico". Never seen before it was performed by Rivelino, the technique threw opponents off balance and allowed him to glide past several defenders at once.

The technique is so useful that almost every player of skill in the modern era has incorporated it into their game. Modern greats such as Eto'o, Ronaldo, and Ronaldinho, have used the technique to devastating effect. It wouldn't be much of an exaggeration to say that the technique has made a major contribution to how the game is played, and if performed successfully can open up defences and lead to goals.

It was, therefore, interesting to discover that the guy who actually developed the technique was not actually Rivelino, but an old team-mate of his from his Brazilian club side, Corinthians. Even more interesting is that the player who, according to Rivelino himself (see the above video from 6:16), actually developed the technique was a Brazilian Japanese Nissei named Sergio Echigo.

There isn't much information out there in English about Echigo, but according to his Wiki page, he spent around 5 years playing with the Corinthians and then moved to a team in the Japanese league. For those who speak Portuguese - or don't mind trying to make sense of the crappy Google translator - here are a couple of links, with pictures, of the man himself. According to one of the articles, Echigo made some important contributions to the development of the game in Japan.

In soccer, a piece of skill can win or lose games, and individual players who are able to utilize techniques like the elastico can cause such problems for opposing teams, that strategies and tactics are often created to deal with them. In the modern game, which is characterized by fitness, strength, and an emphasis on preventing the opposing team from playing by closing down space on the filed, the elastico is one of the ways that individual players can take out two or three opponents with one flick of the foot and thus overcome an opposing teams tactics. So, I think it's safe to say that although Echigo will not be remembered as one of the greats, his great contribution to the modern game is undeniable.

Not Like Us

2012-01-12T08:19:00.000-08:00

Dying To Be An American; The Asian-American Paradox.

It goes without saying that the Asian-American experience of racism has been, and continues to be, a complex affair. Even at the height of institutionalized anti-Asian prejudice during the late 19th and first half of the 20th centuries, when strict and uncompromising immigration legislation, along with laws forbidding miscegenation and limits on legal and citizenship rights, some Asian immigrants into this country still managed to lay down roots and build some degree of prosperity. Altough beset by roving mobs of angry white men who were jealous and fearful of the Asian man's capacity to endure through the most hateful of atrocities, and in constant danger of the lynch mob, Asian men still managed to work their way to a (admittedly) precarious economic empowerment that formed the basis and blueprint for success emulated by subsequent generations of Asian immigrants.

Even today, our experience is paradoxical and the way that various members of the community conceive of this experience with its remarkable diversity of opinion and perception is a clear reflection of this paradox. On one end of the spectrum we have Captains of Culture, Political Pacesetters, and Jocularity Jockeys, for whom racism may not have been an obstacle, non-existent (in certain cases), or is something so far out of their experience that it doesn't even get a mention in their discourse. On the other end of the spectrum we have the Japanese tsunami victims - whose suffering elicited an outpouring of racist gloating from America's mainstream online communities thus highlighting pervasive anti-Asian attitudes. There's also Private Danny Chen, the Chinese-American army volunteer who died recently of racism.

Bizarrely, Asian-Americans are admired, but also feared and disliked for the very things that we are admired for. We are respected but are largely demeaned by American culture. Most importantly we are protected by legislation that makes it illegal to discriminate against us because of our race, yet, we live in a society whose culture actively promotes personal hostility, dislike, distrust, as well as negative demeaning attitudes and behaviours towards us. As I pointed out here, even though it is illegal for institutions to exhibit racist practices and attitudes, American culture itself promotes these very things in its depictions of, and attitudes towards, Asian people. Thus, although no longer permitted by law, it is now propagated by private institutions and individuals - most notably in the mass-media and entertainment industries - the result of which is a normalization and mainstream acceptance of anti-Asian behaviours and attitudes.

This means that institutional prejudice may have diminished, but personal dislike as fostered by American culture, continues unabated. Thus the paradox; legislation to combat institutional racism is off-set by a private sector propagation of anti-Asian hostility as a matter of personal taste. Often the result is the same - the promotion that never comes through, the pay-raise that never materializes, the unsuccessful job interviews of a highly qualified applicant, violent beating, or even a failed college application, all of which depend on the personal tastes of an individual from the mainstream who has been conditioned by his culture to dislike Asians. This normalization of anti-Asian attitudes manifests in other ways too; blasé declarations of distaste, casual harassment, and racially inflected mockery have become accepted ways of interacting with Asian people as modeled by glamourous celebrities, or on-the-make politicians, via the platform of popular culture.

The case of Private Danny Chen is a clear of example of this process in action. The army as an institution opens its doors to all people. In fact, although under-represented in proportion to the Asian population of America (not surprising when you consider that most Asian-Americans are foreign born and many are unable to speak English), there has been a healthy representation of Asian-Americans in the military, many of whom served with distincton both in the past and present. It is almost impossible to say, therefore, that the army practices institutional racism towards Asians since it seems that they are accepted into the ranks without much hoopla.

Yet, what is clear from the Chen case, is that racist attitudes and behaviours towards Asian people can be casually practiced and accepted as normative within the structure of a non-discriminatory institution because such actions derives from culturally conditioned personal distaste - just like in mainstream American culture. As this article suggests, Chen's success or failure became something of a crap-shoot; if he was lucky, then he might have been put into a unit that might have allowed him the opportunity to prove his value as a soldier. If not, then he faced attitudes from peers conditioned by their culture to believe that racism is the normal mode of interaction with Asians. Sadly, most of the soldiers understood this dynamic except for Chen, who seemed confounded and confused by the harassment (Asian-American culture bears some degree of blame for that).

And this is the crux of the Asian paradox. Because promoting personal distaste for, and negative attitudes towards Asians is an almost intrinsic aspect of the conditioning that occurs in American culture, Asians can simultaneously reach the heights of success whilst experiencing casual racist attitudes. It is why some Asians are fortunate enough to experience very little racism, whilst for others it defines their worldview, with neither side really able to understand the other's point of view. Common to both is that what they both experience is considered normal - being harassed by someone who may smash your head in with a baseball bat if you talk back becomes as normalized a potential experience as someone saying good morning.

What happened to Danny Chen is the natural outcome of America's cultural antagonism towards Asian people in general and Asian men in particular. Because personal distaste (via dehumanizing depictions and attitudes) is propagated as the normal and accepted way of conceiving of Asians, the moral compass of mainstream America is skewed in its behaviour towards us. Since dehumanization implicitly diminishes the moral agency of the target group, it by necessity diminishes the obligation of the mainstream to apply the same moral consideration to Asian people as they would to their own group or groups. Whether it is school administrators turning a blind-eye to violence against Asian children, big-name directors promoting the idea of racial abuse of children as a means to integration, or torturing a fellow soldier because he's Asian, the necessary outcome of America's skewed moral attitudes towards Asians is apparent.

Silence Isn't Golden

2012-01-02T02:24:00.000-08:00

But Speaking Up Is.

I came across this post via the Angry Asian Man that was written by an Asian-American man describing his experience of being on the receiving end of some verbal racial abuse on San Francisco's public transport system. You can read the full post here. In short, the post describes how, whilst riding the BART train, the blog writer was subjected to several minutes of racial abuse and harassment by another passenger, yet chose not to engage in an altercation with his harasser. What I found interesting are the reasons the writer gives for his decision to not confront the other passenger as well as his general reading of the situation.

The Asian-American experience of the 21st Century can be characterized as being similar to the experience of a society under the threat of terrorist attack. As I've alluded to here and here, the routine dehumanization of Asian people in American culture, coupled with political rhetoric that blames Asia for all the economic woes of America, combine to create an environment in which the bomb of racial violence or abuse can go off at any time. Much in the same way that extremist madrassas produce individuals who are conditioned to believe that blowing themselves up is a path to Paradise, American culture and society conditions Americans to normalize feelings of hostility towards Asian people - as well as normalizing the notion that their hatred and hostility is justified.

As the writer of the blog post relates.....

I don't know if I did the right thing, but I didn't exercise my freedom of speech to speak back directly. I remained silent. I kept quiet because I remembered that when Vincent Chin retaliated when he was called a chink, two white men chased him down, clubbed him to death with a baseball bat, and then got off scot-free by the legal system.

This to me is a clear indication of terrorism having a succesful outcome. Just like after the terrorist attacks of 9/11 when so many people were terrified by the thought of getting on a plane, or even working in a high-rise building in a downtown area, for some Asian-Americans, the threat of random violence or racial abuse stemming from the unaplologetic culture of anti-Asianism that pervades American society is a very real concern.

As you can see from many of the remarks in the comments section in the article, the general attitude seems to be that the writer should have utilized some kind of physical retribution against his abuser. I don't really agree with this for a several reasons.

I generally tend to see those who resort to physical violence to win arguments as being intellectually limited. Don't get me wrong, being able to defend oneself against physical attack is natural, and devleoping this ability is an necessary aspect of developing confidence. As I suggested here, physical empowerment is essential. But most of the time, it should be the last resort. This is because all conflicts are won or lost on the strength of ideas and beliefs, and the person or group who has the last word is always the winner. That's why battles can be lost, and peoples subjugated, but the ideas of the subjugated can change the conquerer more profoundly than the violence of the conquerer is able to change the subjugated.

Because negative and hostile mainstream social and cultural attitudes that promote this type of (sometimes violent) behaviour is designed not to offend but to keep Asians in their disempowered place, keeping silent is tantamount to an acceptance of this lower social value that is placed on Asian men. This, in turn, means that for the Asian guy on the train, a verbal retort instead of a physical one, would most likely still have resulted in his being attacked. This is why being able to defend oneself gives one the freedom and confidence to not stay silent for fear of attack - the emphasis here is on developing the physical prowess that would give one the confidence to use the mind to win battles.

That is why I believe that eloquence in speech and language, and the ability to utilize these qualities to articulate compelling argument, are some of the most important qualities for any group or individual faced with prejudice. It is the voice that cannot and should not ever be made to go silent, physical resistance is often easily vanquished, but the voice can go on resisting. True empowerment means having the courage to not be shouted down, and I think that one of the biggest problems facing our community is an apparent aversion to the culture of argumentation. It is one of the reasons that people like Frank Chin become pariahs - argumentation seems to be discouraged. The problem is, without the culture of argumentation, you can't develop the qualities that I believe are necessary to empower the individual.

The ability and confidence to argue compellingly, means that the mind is on a path to emancipation, which in turn means that whatever psychological barriers instilled in Asian men by the conditioning of mainstream culture no longer have power over us. That is a terrifying thought for mainstream America - more terrifying, even, than the idea of physically empowered Asia men. Thus, having the capacity to talk enemies down is more empowering than beating them down.

I think that for some Asian people there is a tendency to rest on the belief that a strong community voice empowers individuals - this seems logical. Positive media representation, an influential political voice, or a charismatic leader, are some of the things that we believe will empower Asians. Regardless of whether this is an accurate projection, the fact remains that unless individuals accept the responsibility of personal empowerment - success in these areas become meaningless. Just as many Americans are starting to understand that democracy is more than simply picking a candidate, and is an ongoing task of participation in political and social life, Asians have to realize that empowerment is also about participation and involves asserting one's self respect in every day interactions with the mainstream.

I'm Sexy....

2011-12-31T06:12:00.000-08:00

....And I Know It!!

Awesome! LOL!!

Happy New Year!

One Of Europe's Most Powerful Men....

2011-12-28T12:55:00.000-08:00

....Is Vietnamese.

Meet Phillip Rösler, born in Vietnam, adopted by a German family, achieved the rank equivalent to Captain in the German army's medical corp, husband, and father, presently serving as the Vice-Chancellor of Germany, and as such is the second highest ranking official in the government of Europe's strongest economic power.

Sounds like an interesting character. I don't know how this guy overcame the barriers (if any) imposed by his ethnicity and gender but it's nice to think that Rösler may have been the outsider who rose above his expected limitations.

Remember the above picture because it represents an image of Asian men that American culture fears above almost everything - an empowered and powerful Asian man not limited by demeaning stereotypes, nor emasculated by xenophobia. Sometimes becoming powerful or empowered involves little more than a realization that the state of being powerful is simply your natural state - the dilemma being that we live in a society that actively seeks to disconnect Asian men from the belief that this state is natural to them.

Princes being made to plough the fields, if you will.

Stupid Ass.

2011-12-26T01:22:00.000-08:00

Hollywood Is Race-Blind!

This just in; Hollywood is race blind. The bigWOWO recently posted this revelation, compliments of one Dan Lin - a Harvard Business School graduate turned film producer. According to Lin, quoted in this article.....

“I guess for me I don’t see a lack of Asian American actors. I think more and more Asian American actors are getting out there,” Lin said, adding that Hollywood is race-blind. “It’s all about who tells the best story. They don’t care what ethnicity you are, they just want … the most talented.”

Nice one.

The most surprising thing about this news is that no-one else in America seems to have noticed this remarkable fact. Given that can we know for sure that racism is prevalent in most, if not all, aspects of American society, it is truly amazing that not one activist, social scientist, Liberal, or academic, seems to be aware of the forward-thinking, race-blind Utopian industry that happened to manifest spontaneously in Hollywood.

It would be nice to hear how Hollywood has succeeded in achieving the feat of ending the racially biased thinking that afflicts the rest of American society. No other institution in America can boast that it has eradicated the kind of petty racially inflected thinking that discriminates against minorities in every level of American society. Whether it be in housing, college applications, incarceration rates, poverty rates, minority representation in management positions in industry, the fact is that minorities undergo biased attitudes in almost all aspects of their lives. So, it would be nice if Hollywood would show the rest of American society how to go about the same transformation.

According to Lin, the one exception to this prevalent social ill is Hollywood - which is race blind - yet no-one has noticed this except for Dan Lin.

In other news, reports suggest that the military is also race-blind. Sources close to Hollywood report that the story of Danny Chen's race-blind experience in the army is to be made into a movie. The role of Danny Chen will be played by either Shia Labeouf, or another white actor. Lin may be producing. Stay tuned.

Now I Hit Back.

2011-12-22T23:54:00.000-08:00

Facing The Demons.

I came across this awesome blogpost and thought it was worth sharing....

I was the pudgy Chinese kid. In 4^th grade, I was the equivalent to the lame gazelle limping at the back of the herd. Easy pickins for every bully who roamed the halls looking for a distraction......As a result, I just accepted the daily taunting, occasional beating and even a very painful “Jim, go back to Shanghai,” which, by the way, was uttered in front of the entire class by my 6^th grade homeroom teacher..... By the time I was a senior, an entirely new life lay ahead of me. There was just one thing I couldn’t shake: the nagging regret for my passivity in the face of aggression. It was time to face my demons........If I were to face my demons, I needed the threat of real pain. Between 1995 and 2007, I pounded the passivity out of my psyche, training in kickboxing and MMA (“anything goes” UFC type stuff). Along the way, I made some of the best friends I will ever have. There’s nothing like spending a few hours a week choking, punching, kneeing and kicking each other to forge lifelong bonds of friendship........When I watch this [video], it reminds me that despite all the years of blood, sweat and dedication, I still get my butt whupped. But whereas I lived to train another day, my demons went down for the count.......Because now I hit back.

http://www.busydadblog.com/entries/leap-of-faith-2-knocking-out-my-demons.html

Great attitude, great story!

Someone Get's It!

2011-12-18T14:11:00.000-08:00

Stephen Chan Telling It Like It Is.

I came across this fascinating debate on the subject of the China's investments in Africa. As you might notice the side opposed to Chinese investment employs mainly shrill, generalizations that are little more than xenophobic fear-mongering. In this video, some Chinese dude named Stephen Chan exposes, in the most eloquent way, the blatant racist attitudes towards both Africans and Chinese that underlies opposition to Chinese investment.

You should also check out Chan's website - he appears to be something of a Renaissance Man; writer, skilled martial artist, world traveler, philanthropist, intellectual, husband, government advisor, and the list goes on. Here's his website......http://www.stephen-chan.com/index.html. Sounds like a good role-model!

Also, check out what this lady has to say about the realities of Chinese investment in Africa.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHEpsXmmD48&feature=BFa&list=SPE7865CD7C141D230&lf=list_related

A Punch Can Speak A Thousand Words.

2011-11-16T05:23:00.000-08:00

The Manny Pacquiao Effect.

There's an interesting article published in Salon Magazine that examines how the success of Filipino boxer, Many Pacquiao, has given Asian-Americans a long-overdue popular hero and provided a sense of commonality amongst the various Asian groups within the US.

For Asians and Filipinos who were born and live in the West, Pacquiao offers a space where a diasporic people can feel closer to somewhere hardly ever seen. For a few hours they are united with all the other Asians in the world hunkered down in Pacquiao caps, socks and hoodies, trying not to gnaw off the rim of their beer glasses. Pacquiao closes a distance of thousands of miles so that they are at home........ I had never seen such a comforting, familiar and unabashed presentation of Asianness on American TV.

These few sentences actually speak volumes. The idea of a common and unified Asian-America is a notion that is given much lip service, but which in reality lacks any meaningful definition or conceptual identity. The underlying reason for this is probably due to the fact that the term "Asia" only gives us information about a general geographical area, but beyond this is fundamentally meaningless as a term which might define cultures or civilizations. Asians generally don't think of themselves as "Asians" any more than a Frenchman thinks of himself as a South-American. Although attempts have been made by various thinkers to define a Pan-Asian ontology, the concept remains largely unrealized.

It's more true to say that Asia can be thought of as a somewhat fractured collection of independently conceived societies with little pan-national cohesion and, in many cases, a degree of hostility amongst its ethnicities. If we examine Asian-America, we might notice that our thinking and self-conception follows this model to varying degrees. Many Asian-American individuals in various communities see themselves as having little in common with other Asian immigrant communities and this even expresses itself in what could only be described as prejudicial thinking towards other Asian groups.

If we couple this with the "softly, softly" approach to acceptance or integration, that has been favoured by most of Asia's immigrants into the US, what we have left is a concept of a Pan-Asian Asian-America that is unjustifiably asserted, but generally under-explored let alone striven for. It is, therefore, very telling that the one phenomenon that can cause Asia's various groups (both in the US and Asia) to have a sense of unity comes in the form of a hyper-aggressive and finely muscled athlete whose job it is to smash people's faces in. Interestingly, the only other Asian personality to have this effect on the Asian mind was also an unashmedly aggressive and finely muscled Asian man named Bruce Lee.

Who would have guessed that out of the entire body of the Asian-American experience, not a single thinker or intellectual has had the capacity to unite almost the entire community in pride such that ethnic and gender divisions all but disappear, yet two Asian men with exceptional fighting prowess have been able to do exactly that? Clearly, what Asian-America - and perhaps Asia itself - is hungry for is this sense of physicality. All too often the Asian-American dialogue seems to be characterized by an almost mystical cerebralization that hyper-subjectivizes the issues to the point that they actually become almost meaningless. (This is most usually achieved by re-writing history, but more on this in a later post!)

No feminist, Angry-Asian-Boogie-Man, or public intellectual has even come close to delivering to the hungry masses of the Asian minority the kind of satisfying sense of pride offered by the fact of strong, proud, Asian men. Ironically, despite the best efforts of some of Asian-America's culture clowns - whose ontology seems to be based upon the denial of Asian masculinity - it is strong and empowered Asian men that give us the most pride, perhaps even to those who wouldn't date us! How could Asian-American culture have missed the boat so utterly?

Clearly, what is most craved by Asian-Americans (male and female alike, and most probably second generation onward) is an empowered masculinity that is unapologetic about its own strength and power. Yet, almost by paradox, it is some sections of Asian-American culture itself that seems to feed the machinations of American culture that seek to demean this very masculine empowerment that is being craved. Given that the only observable phenomenon that has actually succeeded in providing a sense of unity and pride is powerful Asian men, it seems obvious to say that an empowered and confident Asian-American community can come into being only through the realization of Asian male empowerment.

As I've already suggested, the biggest obstacle to this is the aspect of Asian-American culture that upholds demeaning images and the invisibility of Asian men. Most usually done in the name of commercial success, and mainstream recognition, this aspect of our culture is the antithesis to our attempts to accepted as fully American, and perhaps even fully human.

Asian Americans most bullied in US schools: study

2011-11-01T01:39:00.000-07:00

No Shit!!!

Via Angry Asian Man......

According to new survey data release over the weekend for the Bullying Prevention Summit, 54 percent of Asian American teenagers said they were bullied in the classroom -- a figure waaaaay above the percentages of other groups.

I would be surprised if anyone is surprised by this. As I've stated in several posts, racially inflected harassment of Asian-American children is an integral aspect of the mainstream American growth experience - it is inherent in the American identity.

The reason is that American culture promotes the harassment and denigration of Asian people as a normative and casual aspect of their self-image. Many, if not most, of America's cultural representations of Asian people are likely to involve glamourous, beautiful, and powerful, white or (ever more frequently these days) black characters acting out the American dream of belittling or, even more popularly, crushing, the Asian. But it's not only dramatic re-enactments of anti-Asian genocidal fantasies where negative attitudes towards Asians are propagated. Many influential and popular celebs and politicians help in the normalization of anti-Asian harassment through their mockery of Asian racial characteristics or cultures.

This should give us an idea of the extent of the problem of anti-Asian racism in schools. American culture models anti-Asian attitudes that can only lead to destructive behaviour towards Asian people. This is because it is commonplace for the role-models of mainstream America to exhibit destructive anti-Asian attitudes, both within and outside of the context of their work. It can therefore be said that this aspect American culture itself is a form of racial harassment.

The belief that the Asian minority prospers free of racism is a proposition that is belied by the phenomenon of high prevelance anti-Asian school racism. There is little reason to believe that mainstream American children who grow up in an atmosphere of normalized anti-Asian racism, will somehow mature into unconditioned individuals, free of anti-Asian prejudice. On the contrary, it is more likely that those who are exposed to this type of attitude (which might well be most Americans) will maintain these attitudes in adulthood. No aspect of American culture teaches them otherwise.

More here.

I'll Eat Any Bitch!

2011-10-13T04:17:00.000-07:00

A Dog Dinner.

Asians eat dogs, or rather, in some Asian cultures dogs are included in the pantheon of acceptable consumable animal meats. Some Asian cultures apparently abhor eating dogs - the Japanese (I believe) find the practice rather disagreeable, as do some Islamicized Asians, whilst others are pretty unapologetic about it. Somewhat less known, is the fact that opposition to dog-eating exists within those cultures that practice it. In fact, some nations that are recriminated for their chow-munching habits - such as the Phillipines - have legislation outlawing the convention.

Western revulsion for the practice is well documented and as always it is the western perspective that receives the most consideration and thus defines the practice as both disgusting and immoral. Of course, in an objective sense, eating dogs is no more or less repulsive or immoral than eating chickens or cows. Granted there is the very real issue of cruelty, but if the practice was legislated to ensure humane treatment for the animal then I fail to see how there are any objective reasons for people - any people - to feel shame about eating dogs.

At the root of the fuss over dog-eating, is a very real clash of values stemming from differing cultural norms and attitudes ultimately deriving from colonialist notions. The "issue" over dog-eating boils down to a single factor; western (mostly white) people think it's disgusting. This, of course, is just an opinion mainly from emotion, but white privilege is able to transform this mere opinion into a worldview that seems to serve as a foundation that informs the western mind about the character of Asian people. Even without notions of cruelty, it is somehow implied that eating dogs reflects a bestial quality inherent in the character of Asiatic peoples.

As a person who thinks that dogs are adorable enough to eat, I obviously share the cultural proclivity that sees dog-munching as undesirable. But for some reason I lack the arrogance to believe that I have the right to shame or pressure other people to think likewise. After my last pet dog died several years ago, I decided that I couldn't justify keeping another, because to do so would make me a hypocrite - particularly because so many people associate keeping a dog as a pet with humane-ness.

Many people in America treat their dogs better than they treat minorities, their employees, homeless people, or even their own elderly parents. For me, keeping a dog as a pet became morally unjustifiable precisely because I couldn't see how it is humane to have a clean, well-fed, well-housed dog, whilst everyday I would pass several smelly, homeless and hungry people on the street. I started to wonder why instead of trying to create cultural shifts amongst Asian societies that would see them motivated to not eat dogs, Americans didn't try harder to convince their own people to freely use whatever money they would spend on their pet dogs to better address the homelessness problem. A well-fed dog takes food out of the mouths of the homeless and diverts resources that might be better spent. Some dogs even have better health care than many Americans.

Amongst the many ironies of this situation is that dogs evolved to roam in packs in the wild outdoors, hunting or scavenging for food, and not to be kept as ornaments for the pleasure of man. Keeping dogs separated from their own kind, and indoors where they are unable to exercise their natural instincts, could itself be argued to be somewhat cruel. As it stands, American society is more comfortable with the reality that homeless people roam the outdoors, sometimes in packs, and scavenge for whatever scraps they can find amongst the shit and bloodied tampons of the humane, whilst society's pet dogs leave their warm, dry homes and bound along defacating and urinating under the canopy of overpasses and hidden corners of the buildings where the sleeping places of the homeless might be found.

The moralistic brow-beating of Asian cultures for their dog-eating habits, is simply one of many ways that western culture gets to feel smug about its own superiority. Yet, I see nothing inherently more moral or even more desirable about a society that has an entire industry devoted to elevating the comfort of dogs (who incidentally are happy to eat cat's shit!) over that of homeless and poor people. Now, it could be argued that Asians aren't particularly nice to their homeless masses, but -if true, and I'm not saying it is - this just means we are more honest. We're not the ones with pretentions of humane superiority!

Stupid Racists?

2011-10-10T05:58:00.000-07:00

The Elephant In the Room....

The 8Asians blog recently published a post in which Eugene Lui, the founder of a political group called the Asian Conservatives, gave an interview in which he talks about how Asian-Americans might fit into the landscape of American politics via the ideology of conservatism. Also discussed was how he, as a conservative, conceives of the issue anti-Asian racism in the media, as well the reasons for the apparent dearth of Asian-American conservative bloggers. Here is what he has to say about perceived anti-Asian racism in the media......

Well, I think “racist” has been used so much in the mainstream media these days that the word has lost its meaning........The Civil Rights Movement — that was about racism. Somebody calling me names and making fun of my slanted eyes — that’s just an immature moron stating the obvious..............................Okay, I’m going to say it: Dear libs, stop being so sensitive to every. little. thing. If a popular sitcom doesn’t have an Asian actor, that doesn’t mean the viewers don’t know that Asians exist. If an Asian actor portrays a nerdy student in a Hollywood movie, that doesn’t mean everybody thinks we’re nerds (do you think blacks — ahem, African Americans — are nerds after falling in love with the Steve Urkel character?). It’d be an issue if Asian American citizens were denied voting rights. It’d be an issue if Asian Americans were being persecuted as a follower of Taoism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Falun Gong, or some other religion. It’d be an issue an Asian Americans were being taxed differently than other ethnic groups. It’d be an issue if Asian American parents were prohibited from making babies. .......Remember: Life, Liberty, pursuit of Happiness.

I was quite surprised by this response for a number of reasons. The idea that media portrayals can challenge traditional family values is a prominent notion in conservative thinking. It is a conservative view that media depictions of glamourized casual sex, casual drug use, and homosexuality, can and do have negative affects on the thinking, moral decision making, as well as the behaviour, of America's youth in particular and society in general. Even foul language and explicit language in songs might be viewed as a potential threat to the morality of the traditional family.

The gist of such thinking is that culture influences (or even directs) public opinion and behaviour, and normalizes activities that run counter to traditional values of moral thinking. Thus, such unwholesome cultural endeavour is seen to play a major role in how individuals within a society views themselves, what they consider appropriate morally and behaviourally, and ultimately shifts the compass away from traditional concepts of moral and upstanding behaviour. Additionally, culture is also a reflection of what is actually socially acceptable - popular cultural depictions merely mirror the realities of social interactions. So whilst popular culture can direct opinion and behaviour, it also reflects the reality of how people within the society may actually be behaving and thinking, as well as identifies the ways in which individuals view themselves in relation to others within the society.

If the conservatives are correct that permissiveness in the discourse of popular culture has the capacity to alter individuals' social behaviour, then it must logically follow that negative depictions of Asian people have the capacity to promote and normalize negative behaviour towards Asians. Many people seem to believe that pornography and some depictions of casual sex in film and television can lead people to have sexist attitudes towards women which might ultimately contribute to an environment conducive to harassment, rape, or even violence. It should follow that any media representation of any given group that promotes a demeaning one-sided view can lead to negative social attitudes and behaviours. In order to deny that demeaning and negative stereotyping of Asians contributes to negative behaviours towards that group one must necessarily question or deny that media pornography or casual sex, violence, foul-language, and casual depictions of drug use, can negatively impact moral decision making, or normalize such activities. This runs counter to the claims of conservative moralism.

It is impossible to deny that most representations of Asian people in the American media are one-sided and tend to be derogatory, xenophobically histrionic, and generally dissmissive of any value in Asian people or contemptuous of any contribution of their cultures to the richness of the human experience. Whether it be movie characters, politicians looking for cheap votes, or celebrities trying to be controversial (paradoxically, without stepping on any important toes!), the general tone is the same - Asians are demeaned or dehumanized, ridiculed or mocked, villified or dismissed. Given this general conservative belief that the media and influential personalities can impact people's ability to make responsible moral decisions, and thus affect behaviour, it seems naive (or maybe dishonest in some cases) to offhandedly dismiss derogatory images of Asians.

Of course, one could read this post and think to oneself; "So what?!" Aren't Asian-Americans outperforming everyone in universities, the workplace, income levels and so on and so forth? Isn't it trite to complain about the media when Asians are so successful in America? Surely, our success is an indication that the negative attitudes and racism propagated by American culture do not affect our ability to prosper? Whilst I cannot disagree that some segments of the Asian-American community do succeed, such an attitude reflects a lack of nuanced thinking common amongst Asian-Americans that, I believe, is almost as big a detriment to our prosperity as are racist attitudes.

History shows that when a society promotes negative attitudes and stereotypes about an unpopular group, then the result is usually unpleasant - even in situations where the target group has acheived a degree of integration. The Jews of Nazi germany provide the best example of this. In the years before the Nazis came to power, Germans of Jewish descent were amongst the most prosperous and highly educated people within German society. Yet, the Nazis were able to exploit negative attitudes, behaviours, and stereotypes that had persisted about the Jews to bring about the holocaust. Smilarly, the South Indians of Uganda were a prosperous minority, but persistent hostility towards them led to their eventual expulsion.

Then there are the Americans of Japanese descent who, prior to Pearl Harbour, had become a somewhat integral part of west coast life. Their slow but definite progress towards prosperity was rudely interrupted by an internment process caused by paranoid fear, and enabled by the persistence of racial hostility and resentments. The point should be clear. Any minority against whom negative attitudes and resentments are harboured, are likely to fall victim to some kind of backlash. Unfortunately for us Asian-Americans, we live in a society whose culture actively, cynically, and deliberately, promotes harassment of Asian people.

In short, it's difficult to see how one can hold to the belief that the media and it's personalities can influence the moral compass and behaviour of American society, whilst downplaying the idea that media mockery, and misrepresentation of Asians can lead to negative outcomes for Asian people. For this reason, conservatives of all people should understand this better than anyone else - Asian conservatives even more so. It is simply avoidance to characterize as "stupid' or "immature", the casual and routine racism enabled by the cultural normalization of anti-Asian harassment. In fact, the culture of harassment of Asians is so integral to the American psyche, that it is even normal for America's children to routinely express hostile attitudes towards Asians. It may be true that many Asian-Americans have achieved prosperity, but given the fact that attitudes of resentment and distrust are spitefully promoted in American culture, any prosperity seems built on a weak foundation.

And Now For Something Completely Different......

2011-09-29T12:25:00.000-07:00

...A Perfect Woman!

Just taking a short interlude to appreciate some of the finer things in life! A great riff, ominous music, and an awesome drummer. Enjoy!

I especially like her cymbal hitting.

"Don't Trust Whitey!"

2011-09-23T00:36:00.000-07:00

Playing The Pretend Game.

It's funny how the more things change, the more they stay the same. I came across this interesting article in the Telegraph that reports some recent research which casts some doubt on the long-held belief that famous explorer, Marco Polo, actually went to China. This claim is not really new - a 1995 book made similar claims - but after several centuries, Polo's discovery of the wonders of the mystical East have become somewhat exagerrated to the point that his (doubtful) exploits are seemingly given more historical significance than any actual Chinese history. Yet, much of what Polo wrote was seemingly inaccurate or second-hand information that he didn't witness himself - which I suppose makes him a bullshitter.

Not so strangely, this comes as no surprise to me. As I have written about elsewhere on this blog, anyone can make claims about Asia and its people and it is unlikely that the claims will be challenged or in any way questioned for accuracy, honesty, or truth. Generalizing and shaping the image of Asia has become the Gold Rush of the 21st century for many present-day prospective Polos who see opportunity in reinforcing the fear of, and prejudices towards Asians. Seemingly just about anyone can have a go - indifference, ignorance, or just plain old xenophobic fear makes it a sure sell. These revelations about Marco Polo simply show that this process of getting rich or famous through making stuff up (or exagerrating half-truths) about Asia has a longer history than previously thought. In fact, so successful is the endeavour, that there are even some Asians who have imitated this path to success. As one might guess, it is the Asian man who bears the brunt of this misrepresentation.

I think that it is important for Asian men in America to remember that in the modern world, the driving force behind this misrepresentation seems to be resentment and envy at any apparent succcess of Asian people. From inner city shopkeepers to higher profile sportsmen, from academic over-achievers in the Ivy League to the economic powerhouses of East Asia, the onslaught of apparently prosperous people with Asiatic faces has left the western world's certainty of its own superiority in tatters. We can know this by how mainstream America reacts to successful Asian men. So successfully have western peoples been brainwashed to believe in their inherent superiority over the Asian that many seem unable to compute the notion of a successful Asian man. Many Asian men might find that despite playing by all the rules and achieving their success fairly, their success itself is often held against them as evidence of their malevolent and inferior character - even if you are successful you must have done something sneaky or even immoral to achieve it.

For instance, let's take sports. A popular and well-loved stereotype maintains that Asian sportsmen are simply too weak to compete against their far superior western counterparts. This is why when Asian sportsmen do succeed the response can often be characterized as shrill, irrational, and panicky. The clearest example of this occurred during the 2002 soccer World Cup held in South Korea. That year the South Korean team had the best run of any Asian team before or since. Reaching the last four, they overcame such soccer powers as Spain, Portugal, and Italy, incurring the wrath of these soccer superpowers who screamed conspiracy and falsely (and in some ways ironically) accused the Koreans of cheating. The Italians even went so far as to vent their petty rage on the Korean player who scored the winning goal against them by threatening to drop him from the Italian team for whom he had been playing. More recently in boxing, Manny Pacquiao's achievements have been besmirched by insinuations of cheating through the use of performance-enhancing drugs.

Some of the most anxious outbursts of irrational xenophobia occur in connection to the economic rise of various Asian countries. Those who witnessed the rise of Japan's economic power during the 1970's and 1980's might remember the panicked hysteria it elicited amongst some western observers. According to some experts Japan's success was due to the robotic nature of the Japanese people. The Japanese were dismissed as unthinking, and unquestioning, machine-like automatons devoid of personality and individual character whose potential was therefore easily exploitable and suitable for repetitive labour. In this way, the west was able to re-assure itself that although the Japanese were prosperous, it was somehow less worthy, or legitimate than western prosperity and hence the west was still best.

The recent rise of China as a power has elicited an even more histrionic reaction. It seems that the tone of much of the China commentary is that the Chinese are sneaky, lying, thieving, cheating, monsters whose bestial racial characteristics compels them to seek to overwhelm western civilization. Underlying all of this is an apparent raging incredulity that these upstart Chinese dare to demand a prosperity for their people equal to that of Americans. Of course, the relative success of China's economy is usually put down to some kind of cheating or sneakiness on the part of the Chinese horde.

But this type of hostile resentment towards prosperous Asians isn't limited to foreign economic competitors. Here in the U.S a degree of prosperity of some sections of the Asian minority brings with it mainstream justifications for prejudice and hostility against them. Running counter to the notion of the American dream, Asian-American prosperity has been the cue that has legitimized anti-Asian vilification and mockery. Out of all immigrant and minority groups, our prosperity alone is met with hostility and even attempts to curtail it.

The common thread in all of these examples of histrionic misrepresentation is the idea that prosperity of Asian people has been achieved through some degree of dishonesty or under-handedness, and if this is not the case, such prosperity should be feared anyway because Asians are bad people. The upshot of all this is that there is no reason to trust or believe anything that is written about Asian people by self-described western experts. Given that we can be fairly certain that hysteria, fear, and an ingrained sense of hostility, clouds mainstream attitudes towards us, it seems that the only response to Asia experts is skepticism.

What all of this suggests to me is that the 19th Century western colonial ideas of the Asian man who needs to be put in his place and whose only value is as a servant, remains the filter through which western minds conceive of Asian people. Whether you are Asian born and raised in the Mississippi or the Mekong Delta makes little difference - if you are a successful Asian (and male) your prosperity is an affront not only to the stereotypes that western minds create about you to make themselves feel safe, but also shatters some very core beliefs that insist on the superiority of the Caucasian.

Was Bruce Lee Was A Stereotype?

2011-09-20T04:51:00.000-07:00

Not Knowing A Good Thing...

As always, James over at The Alpha Asian blog has found another informative documentary video pertaining to Asian men. The video is titled "The Slanted Screen", and explores through interviews with Asian-American actors the past and present prejudices faced by Asian men in the movie industry and society in general.

Of all the guys that participated, Frank Chin really stands out for his directness and insight. I think that when it comes to directness, Asian-Americans might need some development in this area, and Chin, although ascerbic, is at least on the right track! From the video, Chin's observation that Bruce Lee was a stereotype initiated an interesting series of comments, and I wish Chin would have been given more time to expand on this idea. My only caveat is that Chin tends to all too often favour the cluster bomb when a targeted smart bomb might have gotten his message across more succintly.

For example, while I disagree one-hundred that Bruce Lee is a stereotype, I believe, and we all know, that he was both made to play roles that were far below what his capabilities should have demanded if he had been white, and these roles were one-dimensional and often somewhat deprecatory. Lee himself could not possibly have been a stereotype because he differed greatly from what had been seen anywhere anytime before, or even since.

The power of Lee's example is that he rejected the limitations imposed upon him by American racism, and became the superstar that they said it was impossible for him to be. Subsequently, Lee has become such a profound influence on the racist culture that rejected him, that he can be said to have become not a stereotype, but an archetype that shapes the self-images of young men not just in the U.S, but all over the planet. In the past thirty years, just about every American action hero can be said to have drawn some degree of inspiration from Lee. Everything from fighting style and attitude to men's physiques it can be argued have derived much from Lee's example.

The downside to this has been a kind of backlash effect in which the image of a strong and fearless Asian warrior is negated by stereotypical versions that mock and disparage. But this is not a failing on Lee's part, but an example of how irrational maintream fear of Asian men drives the racism against them. Comedian, Bobby Lee (also speaking in the second video) seems to blame Bruce Lee for creating an unattainable stereotype that all Asian men are brilliant martial artists. This is ridiculous. Blame mainstream ignorance and racism for this - Bruce Lee never said that he was typical of anyone or anything, and he wasn't typical of any man, regardless of their race. Bruce Lee is an example of how much potential Asian men possess to impact their environment, and not someone whom we should criticize for "setting the bar too high".

And here as clear as day we are able to see the effect that growing up with racism has on the psyche of Asian men. Growing up with racism causes some (maybe many) Asian men to second guess everything about their masculinity. Even something as inspiring as Bruce Lee's life becomes twisted and something about which to feel shame and embarassment. The irony is that mainstream culture appropriates Lee's warrior qualities and emulates them whilst some Asians apparently rue his success. This also speaks volumes about mainstream America's inability (or unwillingness) to conceive of Asians as individuals and interact with them without pre-conceptions.

Rebel Without A Clue?

2011-09-04T13:31:00.000-07:00

...Chris Jeon.

I happened upon this online article that covers the exploits of Asian-American student, Chris Jeon, a mathematics major from UCLA who has decided to spend his summer vacation helping the Libyan revolution. As you might notice, the article has undertaken to scold the 21-year-old student for his apparently blasé attitude toward such a serious situation. The article proceeds with an indignant tone....

'However, what's worse about Jeon is his reason for going to Libya to fight in this dangerous war. Why did Jeon remove himself from the U.S., go on a ridiculous journey to Libya and put himself in harm's way with a bunch of strangers who he's never met and can't even really communicate with?....."It is the end of my summer vacation, so I thought it would be cool to join the rebels," Jeon said to The National. .......Let's make something perfectly clear Mr. Jeon, war is not cool. Fighting as a rebel against the forces of a dictator for something you believe in isn't cool. It's a way of life for many of these people. They aren't doing this because it's cool. They are doing it because they feel it's the only way to be free from tyranny.'

I couldn't disagree more. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that war is "cool" but I think that the article misses the point - being in the midst of history in the making is actually a very cool thing and at least Jeon has chosen the (so far) right side to fight for. I don't really see what the basis is for the article's tone - Jeon seems willing to walk his talk and put himself in the line of fire - although I don't rule out the possibility that Jeon is simply an attention whore! What is most interesting about Jeon is that he is enacting something that many men crave but may never experience - adventure in exotic places and participation in the shaping of history as it is being written.

For Asian men, this is especially acute - it might be the case that some of us feel disconnected (or excluded) from the great deeds of history in the making and the truth is that even if Asian-American men were to emerge as pivotal players in history, American culture would most likely white-wash them out of societal consciousness. My cynical side believes that if Jeon were a white student this deed would be framed to highlight how adventurous and daring white guys can be and he would be held in awe by an adoring public appreciative of the positive reinforcement. When Asian guys act in ways that are at odds with the ingrained perceptions of them society will do back-flips to correct the anomaly because it's scary.

I hope Jeon finds what he is looking for.

Doing Whatever It Takes

2011-08-29T14:48:00.000-07:00

Keeping The Myth Alive.

I don't think I've ever seen anything like this in athletics. The video below shows the 110 metre World Athletics final that was run earlier today. The two main contenders are Dayron Robles of Cuba, and China's Liu Xiang. As you can see in the video, Robles gets himself disqualified for impeding Xiang and basically preventing him from winning the gold medal. At first it all seems accidental, yet the more you look at the video the more it appears that Robles was deliberately holding Xiang back. Look especially at 2:30 and 2:48-2:52. Robles seems to not just brush Xiang's arm, he seems to hold onto it for a split second.

If this is indeed a deliberate attempt to impede the Chinese athlete (and to me it does seem that way) then this image eloquently symbolizes the dynamic of the experience of Asian men living in western societies. The Asian guy must not win under any circumstances. Sad day for Liu.

Asian Dudes Take Care Of Their Women

2011-08-09T07:59:00.000-07:00

Interracial Marriage Trends (2001-2010).

James over at Alpha Asian posted this interesting YouTube video about the most recent trends in interracial dating. According to the guy in the video, although Asian women/white men pairings are still the most common interracial relationships in American society, the rate at which Asian men are out-marrying is approaching parity with Asian females.........

Of particular interest is the apparent lower divorce rates of Asian male/white female, and Asian male/Asian female pairings compared to that of Asian female/white male pairings and the general national divorce rate. This is interesting for a number of reasons.

If these statistics are true, it suggests that as a general rule, Asian men take care of their women and have the goods to maintain successful long-term relationships. It might also suggest that those white and Asian women that marry Asian men may well be taking care of their Asian man better than those married to white dudes.

That's how awesome Asian dudes must be. Keep up the good work everybody!

;)

Child's Play

2011-08-07T03:33:00.000-07:00

Learning The Ropes.

Any person who has spent time viewing Asian-American blogs, websites, or forums, might notice that the subjects that garner the most activity revolve around interracial dating and media representation. These subjects - particularly interracial relationships - are discussed and examined to such a degree that many people might be able to tell you the precise percentage of Asians who date outside their race, as well as the rate that this percentage has increased since the 1980's. Similarly, many of us have detailed familiarity with the dynamics of media representation and would willingly take time out of our day to protest a stereotype. Yet, as this piece of news from Angry Asian Man suggests, there is another aspect of the Asian experience that is neglected in the discourse of "mainstream" Asian-American commentary - the issue of racial bullying and harassment of Asian children.

The subject of racial harassment and bullying of Asian-American children in American schools is a theme that I have revisited throughout my blog. Several of my posts have covered the problems of racism facing Asian children in South Philly High, as well the phenomenon of racist attitudes and behaviours exhibited by non-Asian children toward Asian people in general, and Asian kids in particular. For the Asian minority, the experience of childhood racism is so universal that the subject's absence from the discourse is nothing short of bizarre. Yet, information on this subject is not only largely absent from the popular discourse, academic studies assessing the degree, long-term effects, and severity, of racism on Asian children are sparse to say the least. So, not only is the product of Asian-American culture silent about this experience, there seems also to be a lack of academic curiosity. This I believe to be a huge detriment to any notion of raising the consciousness level of an autonomous Asian-American identity and culture, but is also a major stumbling block in the struggle to overcome hostile anti-Asian attitudes.

The culture of casual harassment and racial bullying of Asian kids that exists amongst their non-Asian peers is the primary step in the marginalization of the Asian-American individual. It is hardly surprising that identity issues, a sense of exclusion, and a profound cultural shame, are so widely reported by young Asians raised within an American cultural context. All too often we are quick to point the finger at the media as the principal culprit that brings about these states, but I believe that it would be more accurate to look to the experience of school racism as the probable root of these issues - how could it be anything else? Racial bullying of Asian children varies in degree from the use of epithets to outright violence, or mockery of names and racial characteristics to physical intimidation. At the impressionable school-age, many Asian kids experience casually persistent harassment so normalized that even school employees are often unmotivated to intervene.

Despite this, the negative effects on Asian children may not even be the worst outcome of school racism. Yes, we know and understand that school racism has profound effects on the victims, but what are the effects on American society itself of raising generations of American kids who have learned in school that anti-Asian prejudice is normal and acceptable? It's a well-established belief that children who are raised in violent homes are more likely to be violent as adults, and children who are sexually abused may exhibit sexual promiscuity as adults. Clearly, if kids are raised with a skewed perspective then this is reflected in their identity and perhaps even their moral sense.

So, what then of children who are raised with the belief that dehumanization of Asian people through epithets, mockery, intimidation, and violence is normal and natural? I believe that for many Americans dehumanization of Asians is part of their growth process, and hence thinking about Asians in demeaning ways becomes an integral part of their identity. This raises the question of how this affects the moral compass of Americans and American society in their consideration of Asian people.

For the most part, American attitudes towards Asians are irrational. This is evident from the ease by which mainstream America seems to be so easily goaded by politicians and culture warriors into resentment and fear of Asia. As I've written elsewhere, it seems possible that someone (anyone!) can put forward just about any notion about Asia and its people, and it will be taken as truthful without so much as a critically opposing thought. Furthermore, American culture has created an industry out of denigrating Asians that seems to be driven by a mainstream market unhindered by the moral considerations that promote racial sensitivity and non-racist attitudes as virtues. This shouldn't surprise us; the dehumanization of Asians is a practice that begins in first grade for many American children, and that is the only way that Asians are conceived of.

The result is that when an Asian child is harassed in school, or attacked by a rampaging mob, or the Asian elderly are targeted for violence, or an opportunistic poltician calls for a boycott of Asian shops, few in American society see any reason for action because implict in the American identity is the idea that Asians do not warrant the same moral considerations. There is nothing morally wrong with abusing children if they are Asian. American culture itself promotes the idea that violence towards Asians carries with it an implicit justification - well, they are taking our jobs, or they have unfair trading practices (like invading a sovereign nation to secure oil is fair!), or they are a threat to the American way of life, or they're just not cool.

For me, not much about the Asian-American experience makes sense without understanding the scope and potential repercussions of anti-Asian attitudes that are propagated through America's children and youth. I believe it is impossible to construct an accurate narrative on an Asian-American identity without acknowledging this aspect of the experience.

Hell Hath No Fury........

2011-07-01T16:28:00.000-07:00

...Like An Entitled White Man.

One of the unavoidable hazards in the world of the thespian is the disappointment of being rejected for a coveted role in a potentially career boosting production. This is tragic at the best of times, but especially more so when the victim of this injustice is a white guy. Worst of all is the shame of losing out to an Asian actor. Angry Asian Man just posted this news (also here) about actor Thomas Jane who has apparently been fired from a new Sylvester Stallone movie and has been replaced with Asian-American actor, Sung Kang and is throwing a bitch storm about the injustice of it. LOL!!

According to this article Jane explains how the producer of the movie opted to move the film in a new direction by giving the movie a "racial makeover" and bringing in an "ethnic actor" to replace the blandly Caucasian Jane, and in so doing is following a tried and tested formula of having a white main actor with a non-white side-kick. This only made me wonder which hallucinogens Jane has been imbibing for much of his life since most of the time movies will have few ethnic actors and almost always absolutely no Asian-American male actors. Furthermore, if a movie does include an Asian male actor he is less of a "side-kick" and more of a "kicked-to-the-side" type of character. That is, of course, when an Asian actor isn't literally being kicked to the side as is the case with the Asian male actors who have been kicked to the side to make way for Mickey Rourke to play the role of Ghengis Kahn. So, if there is such a formula it exists only in the minds of white men who view minor successes of ethnic actors as a mortal threat to the certainty of their entitlement.

Some bloggers have called racism on some of Jane's comments and they may well have been intended as a snide allusion to racist stereotypes. It is actually difficult to know if Jane did have such an intent. But, I don't doubt for a minute that if Jane had been replaced by another white actor that he probably wouldn't be so threatened and ego-whipped by it. So, yes, I believe that the fact that it was an Asian actor who replaced Jane is the reason he seems so particularly devastated by it. It is also interesting to note how much media and bullshit time Jane has apparently been given to speak out about the injustice he has suffered, when few in the media raise an single eyebrow hair at the complete invisibility of Asian men in popular culture. This goes to show just how much more serious it is when a white man suffers - even though he was compensated for being dumped.

Overall, I think that I'm less offended by any possible racist intent in Jane's comments or anger, but more offended that Jane's rabid entitlement is given so many opportunities to be exhibited. Maybe I should feel sorry for him since if he had a single good friend they would surely tell him to stop embarrassing himself. But, alas, the right to humiliate yourself in public and still stand tall is just another benefit of white privilege. As the Playlist article sagely reminds us......

As for the whole race thing, we’re always up for racial diversity but unceremoniously dumping an actor in order to make that happen is pretty shitty.
......I think they're saying that it is wrong to do to white actors what the industry has been doing to minorities for years - that is unceremoniously dumping ethnic actors to avoid racial diversity in the industry. Please laugh out loud with me.

As for Sung Kang, I hope the movie works out for him. As many of us will know from experience, being stuck between a good opportunity and the rage of an entitled white dude is a precarious position to be in. So, I wish him success and luck.

America's Pastime.

2011-06-15T13:49:00.000-07:00

Putting Words To The Asian-American Experience.

The Ask A Korean blog posted this extremely eloquent and powerful essay by a guy named Jay Caspian Kang that posits the sport of baseball as one of the means by which Asians can (at least for a while) experience what it might mean to be an American.

Here are a couple of excerpts.......

"The irony of our multicultural education is that it provides us with only the vocabulary of the thoroughly entitled and the thoroughly disenfranchised. Asian immigrants stand somewhere in between, but lack the context and the words to express our place..............

..........This season, I will watch the game for the stats, the umpire-specific strike zones, the infield shifts, the pitching changes, and the numbers on the scoreboard. But, when I hear the occasional racist comment in the stands that I might reflexively place upon myself, my intellect will begin to pull apart baseball's patriotic metaphor. But thankfully, the process is cyclic, because whenever an Asian player is met with applause, or when I see a young white or Hispanic or African-American kid in a Choo or Kuroda or Matsui t-shirt, the flood of inclusive, metaphoric language will seal the gaps shut and I will once again be awash in halfway hopeful reverence."

How refreshing that an Asian-American can write about his experience without demonizing or blaming his own culture, community, or parents.

Asian-American Culture......

2011-06-05T23:53:00.000-07:00

....How White Is It?

Over the past year or so, Asian-Americans have been the recipients of some atypical mainstream attention due to a couple of articles written by members of the Asian minority that reported on the negative aspects of "Asian" family culture and how it has the potential to affect integration and acceptance of Asians into mainstream life. Of course I'm referring to the Tiger Mom and Tiger Cub articles which were both published in mainstream publications.

As readers will probably already know, both articles were met with a variety of responses - some expressed agreement, many more expressed resounding disagreement. Upon reading many of the negative reactions to these articles, it became apparent to me that many people were not only reacting to the fact that many negative things were said and implied about Asian people, but also to the fact that these things were said in mainstream publications to a mainstream (and let's be honest, we're talking about publications whose audience is likely to the majority white) that already has cultural structures in place whose apparent purpose is to propagate negative attitudes about us. Why waste what few opportunities that we have to present our point of view by simply repeating to the mainstream many of the negative things that they are already saying about us?

One needn't limit oneself to these two articles to notice that much of what Asian-Americans publish or write about themselves and their cultures in white mainstream platforms follows this pattern to some degree or another. Typically, this type of expression of Asian-American culture, carries with it much drama and hyper-criticism of self and one's culture. Unfortunately, it's never really made clear why we should believe that white mainstream actually gives a crap about Asian-American angst, yet somehow this idea of appealing to, or creating for, the (white) mainstream has apparently become a prominent goal of Asian-American cultural practice. Sadly, implicit in this pattern is the understanding that mainstream racisms and prejudices must be diluted or downplayed, leaving one to wonder whether this drive to manipulate Asian-American cultural expression into a mould that is palatable for the white majority relinquishes its autonomy and simply renders it a sub-category of mainstream white culture.

Of course, it can be said that since the mainstream offers the widest possible opportunity for acclaim that it would be natural to want to appeal to this demographic. Yet, this doesn't really provide us with a good reason for the tone and theme of much mainstream-in-mind Asian-American culture to be so self-denigrating or negative - in fact, it almost seems as though this cultural contrition is a requirement for acceptance by the mainstream.

This reverence for mainstream sensitivities seems, in and of itself, to be something of a cultural quagmire, capable of swallowing whole any semblence of cultural autonomy and just like a bog, fools us into believing that it is solid gound that can be safely walked over, only to leave us stuck. This is even more noticeable given the reality of the demographics of 21st Century America. African-Americans have a population of around 40 million, Hispanics number around 50 million, yet, how many times do we hear aspiring Asian-American culture warriors speaking about trying to reach these potential markets to disseminate their ideas? One can only guess at how much more fresh, genuine, or even edgy, the product of Asian-American culture might be if it didn't struggle so hard to protect the white mainstream from its demons but, instead, expressed common experience with other minorities.

This very idea goes against the notion that works of art or products of culture exist as meaningful entities in their own right - some of the apparent goals of Asian-American culture seems to suggest that the Asian voice only has value if it has successfully appealed to the white mainstream. It would seem more conducive to the production of potent, original, and relevant works of culture if we didn't try so hard to force ourselves into modes of expression that limits creativity in the hope that the white mainstream will like it. Most ironic of all, is that this approach seems uninterested in appealing to Asian-Americans themselves, and if that is the case, then why label such an approach as "Asian-American" at all?

"My Mom's A Fucking Bitch Too.....!"

2011-05-22T21:14:00.000-07:00

Asian-American Get Rich Quick Schemes

The Asian-American blogosphere has been abuzz in the past week over an article written by Wesley Yang in the New York Magazine entitled "Asian Like Me". My reaction to the article is mixed. On the one hand Yang has accurately described the degree to which some Asian men may feel a sense of disconnect from their own, as well as from mainstream American society and culture. At the same time, I couldn't help but feel that ultimately, Yang hasn't actually said anything substantial to shed light on this state of affairs, choosing instead to apparently allow the overly-dramatic tone of the article to become the content of the essay.

Okay, I get it, some Asian parents drive their kids hard but so what? People of all races experience disconnectedness from their societies, cultures, families, and peers, what is different about the Asian experience that warrants such heavy soul-searching and self-recrimination? Because Yang's article doesn't really shed light on any dynamic that might be specific to the experience of Asian men, I couldn't help but wonder, why on earth did he racialize his essay to such a great degree. To me, based on what Yang wrote, he could have completely left out the racial aspect and been left with a much more powerful human story that would have made more sense.

How can this be? Ultimately, all Yang seems to be saying is "be more like your peers if you want to be more like your peers". Really?! In order to say that, he could have avoided the sappy dramatics and the issue of race altogether because although the article hints at a racial component to the issue, it never really goes all-out to address it head-on. If, as Yang seems to suggest, the race issue is secondary (or perhaps even irrelevant) to the problems he raises, then why bring race into it at all? But this is a dilemma - cultural differences aren't a sufficient explanation for the degree of marginalization described by Yang, but we'll never know because he avoids meaningfully addressing racial issues at all.

In some ways, we could conceive of this approach to describing the Asian-American experience as a kind of "movement". This movement reflects a worldview and an approach to life and literature that seeks mainstream recognition and success at any cost. We could label this movement, "Kingsto-Tan-ism", in honour of the cultural figurines who modeled and popularized the literary approach of avoiding holding a mirror up to mainstream America's ugliness, and instead creating myths and fantasies based on wishful thinking and ingratiatingly downplaying of racial marginalization of the Asian minority. Ironically, Yang's article effectively perpetuates the process and reality of the feminization of the Asian-American experience by adhering to this philosophy.

Unfortunately, this is what sells, i.e., this is what it is widely believed white people want to read and believe about Asians - that their cultures are so dysfunctional that any racism directed at Asians by mainstream America is actually better for them than what they do to themselves and one another. I would love to be able to say that this is a state of affairs that is inflicted upon us by white hegemony, and that may well be part of the truth. The reality seems to be that Asians themselves play a role in maintaining the delusion because it's a way to sell books, get published, or become the toast of a mainstream that doesn't take too kindly to being called out on its prejudices - especially not by the likes of us.

Google Blogger Problems

2011-05-13T23:32:00.000-07:00

Just a note to say that Google Blogger went down for around 24 hours during which time I was unable to access my comments or even sign in. Blogger is now back up and running, but several comments have been lost. So, if you posted over the last few days your comment may have disappeared as a result of the maintenance that Google was performing. Sorry for any inconvenience and thank you for reading.

EDIT: May 23rd 2011. Missing comments have mysteriously re-appeared!

A Good Weekend For Asian Sportsmen

2011-05-10T02:00:00.000-07:00

Park Ji-Sung And Manny Pacquiao.

As a fan of both soccer and boxing, I was extremely pleased to see what a good weekend Asian men had in both sports.

The English Premier League has become one of the most watched and wealthy soccer leagues in the world. This is an especially exciting time of the year for fans of English soccer as the season is drawing to a close and the fight to become champions gets more intense. This weekend, the two teams at the top of the league - Chelsea and Manchester United - met in a game that turned out to be one of the best of the season. Many believed that whoever wins this game will go on to become champions. As it turned out, the game was won by Manchester United who, barring a major catastrophe, are likely to be this year's champions.

The game aside, what was of most interest to me, was the peformance of Manchester's South Korean midfielder, Park Ji-Sung. As I alluded to here, Park is something of an unsung hero for Manchester United. Despite being embraced by the Manchester faithful, as well as being well-respected by coaches and teammates, Park seems to be unpopular with the media and soccer commentators, who have generally overlooked or dismissed his contribution to the team's success, and even questioned whether he deserves to be in the team.

With this in mind, it was nice to see the press finally take notice of Park's contribution - especially in a game of such significance. Following the match, the papers were full of kudos for Park's performance. The Guardian, talks about Park being the driving force behind the teams success, and the BBC also reports on Park's "peerless" performance. Both the Chelsea FC and Man U websites made note of Park's performance. Bear in mind that Manchester United are one of the most successful teams in the world, and have had (do have) some of the best footballers playing for them. For Park to stand out in a team of stars really does underline his value as a player. I my opinion, Park is a good enough player to make the squad, and maybe the first eleven, of most European national teams - the press just didn't seem to notice.

The other highlight for Asian sportsmen over the weekend was the latest victory of boxer, Manny Pacquiao. Although by no means his best performance, he defeated Shane Mosely - a fighter considered by many to be one of the finest of his generation. In post-fight comments, Mosley highlighted the exceptional speed and power of Pacquiao, who in addition to being arguably one of the best boxers of all time, is a true role model for Asian men.

As I've stated elsewhere, Asian and Asian-American sportsmen are unsung as pioneers in the struggle of Asian men to overcome stereotypes, and limiting ways of thinking. Park is a true pioneer - good enough, strong enough, and determined enough to make it as a regular in one of the world's top soccer teams, and even occasionally standing out in a team of stars. Pacquiao is the "impossible" Asian man - aggressive, fearless, and hyper-masculine, his achievements and conduct in and outside of the ring bear no resemblance to the accepted demeaning stereotypes of Asian men's characters.

Angry Asiance Men and Dumb Asiance Women.

2011-05-09T12:26:00.000-07:00

A Marriage Made In Heaven.

Along with nasty viruses that mangle your computer, encountering unabashed expressions of stupidity ranks, in my opinion, as two of the major hazards of internet surfing. The freedom to disseminate and receive information that is afforded us by internet access, carries with it the inevitable hazard of disseminating stupidity on a stupendously grand scale. In fact, as this Asiance article illustrates, the internet has almost become a showcase for respectably veneered stupidity.

As you can see, the article addresses the subject of Asian men's supposed angry reactions to Asian women who date outside of their race. Now, I've been around the internet enough to know that the Asian-American Interracial Dating Disparity illicits some of the most passionate and angry reactions from both men and women. Yet, away from the internet, there doesn't seem to be as much conflict or debate about the subject, which leads me to wonder if the supposed anger of Asian men is somewhat exaggerrated - after all, as I've already suggested, the internet does tend to bring out the stupid and the crazy in people.

If there is any truth to the rumour I'll admit that I don't really care for it. For some reason, I find it hard to muster anything beyond indifference when I see or read about Asian women with white men. This has been a positive thing.

I've come to realize that for many Asian-American women who date outside their race (i.e, white men) the belief in the existence of an Angry Asian Boogey Man who opposes their choice is as essential to their identity as is the dating choice itself. What this means is that true or not, real or fantasy, the stereotype of an Angry Asian Boogey Man must be perpetuated in order to somehow give the dating choice more profound meaning than it might have if the stereotype didn't exist. After all, the idea of overcoming obstacles for love is very enticing, even though the Asian female/white male pairing is and has been the easiest racial barrier to cross for over half a century - maybe even longer - and required little or no activism or struggle to achieve.

I've experienced this in my own life. I have encountered Asian women who have tried to pin the Angry Asian Boogey Man label on me, even though my only reaction to their dating choice has been indifference - sorry, but I just couldn't care less. Even after giving every indication and message that, no, I just don't care about you or who you're dating, some Asian women seemed to need to maintain the belief that I am, or have been, pre-occupied with their dating choices. The Angry Asian Boogey Man stereotype seems to be largely a myth that is required in order to give what is ultimately the mundane act of dating a white man, a more important purpose than it actually might possess - almost like emulating Martin Luther King by dating white dudes. So, just for the record, I - just like tens of thousands of Asian-American men - can't muster the interest to be angry at the dating lives of strangers - especially if they're as seemingly dumb as the lady who wrote the Asiance article.

It's time for Asian women to let go of the tired myth that insists that Asian men are are obsessed with their dating lives - we're not. There are other ways to give their relationships meaning than to believe the myth that anonymous Asian men are out to destroy their dating activism.

And Angry Asian Boogey Men, let it go...........that is, if you really exist.

Dialogue WIth Simon Tam

2011-05-07T01:19:00.000-07:00

My Response

Thank you for your comment and the clarification of your point of view. Welcome to my blog - and thank you for not starting a war! My response to you in the comments section bacame overly long so I hope you don't mind that I've posted it as an actual blog post.

Let me also start by clarifying. You wrote that I said this......'[I] don't offer any good reasons why I think I should have the right to protect our name and define ourselves by calling ourselves "The Slants."'

Your paraphrase is inaccurate. I wrote nothing like that. In fact, what I actually wrote was this... I couldn't help but notice the irony in the above quote. It might well be true that a government agency shouldn't have the right to determine how a group defines itself, but at the same time Tam doesn't really offer any good reason why he thinks he does. Which was a response to this statement made by you……This is what angers me the most: the US Trademark Office decided that anonymous wiki sources mattered more than the voice of Asian Americans. Why does a government agency that has no connection with APA’s have the right to dictate what is appropriate for our community? Why don’t we have the right to decide for ourselves?

Words are not entities with relative meanings, by necessity they must adhere to some kind of standard in order for language to make any sense. Unless the words that you wrote above have a different meaning to you than they would have for most other people then it is fair to conclude that, clearly, you have decided that a historically derogatory term is an appropriate way to define or label our community. What you have written goes way beyond merely wanting to use an epithet to label yourselves because you are trying to convince a government agency that it is okay to for a society think of dehumanizing terms as positive. That affects the whole community, past, present, and future. I also find it strange that you think that this (or any) government agency has no connection with APAs. Isn't the point of activism and political involvement ultimately to forge connections between individuals, the communities that they constitute, and their governmental agencies? The fact is that all government agencies must and do have connections with APAs whether we like it or not, and whether it is good for us or not. It seems to me that this particular agency is showing great sensitivity toward APAs.

Fair enough, plenty of Asian groups utilize the term "slant" to label themselves, but unlike yourself, they don't seem to have appealed to the general community to support them in trying to convince a government agency in making a term acceptable that was and still has the potential to be used to dehumanize Asian people. Surely the bigger issue is that we do indeed live in a society that shows a proclivity, and desire even, to dehumanize Asians. It seems obtuse and meaningless to argue that "words only have as much power as you give them" or that derogatory epithets lose their power if we understand them in the context of their pure or absolute meaning. This is nonsense. A dehumanizing epithet reflects a social and political reality that places some individuals in a hierarchy above an entire group. So yes, whilst it's true that words in their pure form may not be demeaning, it is ultimately a meaningless argument because it is social and political inequalities that enables such words to have power.

That is what I tried to get across in my post. Derogatory epithets do not lose power because we might "own" them or use them to describe ourselves. They lose power when the structures that enable a given group to utilize them as a means to reinforce ideas of social, racial, and political superiority over another group, are dismantled or are themselves disempowered. This means that racial epithets are not merely intended to offend (that's a mundane and naive perspective) - the goal is not and never has been to bruise the egos of minorities, but, rather, to reinforce the idea of social and political inferiority by "putting them in their place". This why the N-word can be said to be reclaimed and owned - it can no longer be used with impunity because the structures that empowered it have been and are still in the process of being dismantled. The Asian community is not there yet. This is because so much of the negative attitudes directed at us stem from issues of ongoing economic and potential military conflict that affect the very sense of survival of the American state. That's how deeply ingrained is the fear of Asian peoples.

Perhaps I have underestimated the degree of support that your case may have received from a few bloggers and activists, but that still doesn't make your case any more logical or coherent, and I'm almost never swayed by appeals to popularity. I still fail to see how making the term official contributes to dismantling the structures that empower the usage of the alternatives still being used today. Most mainstream Americans don't even know that Chinese labourers were used as slaves in the 19th century. They don't know that Chinese workers were lynched by bloodthirsty mobs of Americans, and don't realize that quaint Chinatowns began as nothing more than ghettos intended as a means of segregation and a step in ethnically cleansing America of Asians. Most Americans don't know of the brutal and inhuman treatment of Filipino migrant workers in the 1920's an 30's, or the discriminatory legislation that restricted Japanese immigrant's opportunities. They just don't know or understand the extent to which epithets have reflected and reinforced deep seated institutional and personal prejudice towards Asian people.

By contrast, you might well notice that many white Americans are visibly embarassed and uncomfortable when they hear the N-word and might even try to disassocociate themselves from its use. This is because the term is associated with slavery, rape, murder, and inhumanity. This is not the case with anti-Asian epithets which is why it is incoherent to reclaim terms that mainstream America isn't ashamed of. I don't want the term "slant" to have a positive connotation. When people hear it, I would like for them to understand that it means violence, hatred, injustice, brutality, and dehumanization and to subsequently be embarassed because anti-Asian racial slurs are not something silly and mundane like "fart-face" or "dick-wad". They are not the cause of the inequality, but a symptom of it. Many Americans believe that anti-Asian slurs are funny, and that earthquakes that kill thousands of Japs are hilarious. By changing this connotation, you are effectively contributing to the obfuscation of Asian-American history and allowing America to remain comfortable in its ignorance of its historical prejudice towards Asians - a past that still has repurcussions today.

The amazing work that you have apparently done is admirable, but I can't help but wonder if the positive reactions that you receive from Asians and non-Asians might have less to do with your name and more to do with the actual work and activism that you engage in. In fact, I might even be inclined to believe that making "slant" a positive thing undermines your real activist work.

On a final note, you have stated in that the term slant is not longer used as an epithet, yet in a post that you wrote for the AALDEF and linked to on the bigWOWO blog I read the following......"But then he noticed some other bands, non-Asians, using the name The Slants, to ridicule Asians". Have I misinterpreted this - are you saying that "slants" is still being used to demean Asians?

The Neverending Story

2011-04-28T03:33:00.000-07:00

Gran Torino And The Tiger Mom.

The Eurasian Sensation blog just posted this latest satire on the Tiger Mom Hydra....

The Daily Show - Tiger Mothering
Tags: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

For those who don't know, so-called "Tiger Mom" achieved a degree of infamy early last year due to a Wall Street Journal article that printed an excerpt from her book in which she apparently seemed to explain the merits of emotionally abusing her children. My thoughts on Tiger Mom can be read here, and here.

As you can see from the video above, mainstream America registered its horror and condemnation of Amy Chua, basically labelling her as a child abuser. Whether or not this is true, I'll leave to readers to decide for themselves. What interests me, on the other hand, is this idea of child abuse - or more specifically the abuse of Asian children.

I'm always a little skeptical when manistream America registers any kind of horror at the thought of Asian people being harmed in any way. I'm especially skeptical about the sincerity of mainstream concerns about Asian children. For instance, a few years ago, Clint Eastwood came out with the movie "Gran Torino", in which he played an old, embittered war veteran and racist, who befriends a young Hmong boy and becomes his mentor.

Now the thing about Gran Torino, is that it basically depicts an Asian child being verbally and emotionally abused by a racist, white adult, who unleashes a constant and unrelenting torrent of derogatory epithets at the boy throughout the entire movie. Now, given the apparent concern about the abuse of Asian children, surely mainstream America would have registered some protest at this depiction of child-abuse in a mainstream American movie? The answer is "no". America seemed to actually think that this depiction of child abuse was worthy of several awards, and nominations for awards - in fact, no-one seemed to notice the actual abuse. To put this into perspective, imagine the movie, Karate Kid, in which the Asian mentor, in addition to teaching the white acolyte how to fight, had also called him "white trash", "hillbilly", or "nazi" in every scene. I think that there would have been some protests. Clearly, the idea of abusing Asian children is not so horrific to mainstream America as it would at first seem.

So, the question is, if abusing Asian children isn't so bad, why is mainstream America so horrified by Amy Chua? I think the reason has nothing to do with what she may or may not have done to her own children. Her mistake was to criticize the way that white people raise their kids. If she had simply written that she was hard on her kids but now somewhat regrets it (which, in her wishy-washy way, is what she seemed to be saying), then there wouldn't be an outcry about her methods. But, she actually went one step too far in suggesting that white people aren't perfect in how they raise their children - and that's what has America so pissed.

Now, I do give Gran Torino some kudos for honesty in portraying (and exposing) the realitites of mainstream attitudes towards Asians - although that may not have been the intent. As I've suggested elsewhere, Asian kids growing up in America will be exposed to varying degrees of racism from their mainstream peers - a prejudice that is both encouraged and normalized by American culture, as well as overlooked and fostered by parents and society. The silence of mainstream America on this subject is deafening.

Chinkies and Gooks and Slants Oh My!

2011-04-25T23:49:00.000-07:00

Owning Silliness.

The You Offend Me You Offend My Family blog recently posted an article written by musician Simon Tam, the bassist for the all Asian-American group The Slants. According to the article, the band is engaged in a struggle with the U.S Trademark and Patent Office over their attempt to trademark the band's name. Their application has been denied on the grounds that because the term "slants" has been used historically as a means of denigration of Asian people, it runs counter to the patent office's policy of not permitting disparaging terms to be used.

The article then goes on to explain that the band "deliberately chose this outdated, generational term to inject pride into Asian American culture", and that they have received substantial support from the Asian-American community. The article continues.....

"This is what angers me the most: the US Trademark Office decided that anonymous wiki sources mattered more than the voice of Asian Americans. Why does a government agency that has no connection with APA’s have the right to dictate what is appropriate for our community? Why don’t we have the right to decide for ourselves?............The role of government shouldn’t include deciding what a group can define themselves as. That right should belong to the community itself."

I couldn't help but notice the irony in the above quote. It might well be true that a government agency shouldn't have the right to determine how a group defines itself, but at the same time Tam doesn't really offer any good reason why he thinks he does. The fact that a few random bloggers and activists support him is irrelevant.

The worst thing about this idea of "owning" a derogatory slur as a means of empowerment or to inject pride into Asian-American culture (what does that even mean?!!), is that it seems to be a case of simple imitation. The reasoning seems to be that blacks have done it with the N-word so we should too! Pride and all that, don't you know! Of course, the reality would appear to be far more complex than this.

Black people owning the N-word came about after decades of civil rights work, protesting government authorities, facing dogs, watercannon, and lynch mobs, with the effect of building a community of empowered individuals. The by-product of all this activism was that the N-word became hazardous for white people to use because there weren't any more laws preventing African-Americans from refusing to accept the term from them. In this way, the N-word has changed from a socially valid descriptor into socially unacceptable slur. Therefore, for black people to use the term it is both a reminder to white society of its past brutality (and the struggle to overcome it), and it truly is owning the word because non-blacks use the word at their own peril.

The situation of the Asian minority in 21st century America is different. Words like "chink" and "gook" can be, and are, used casually in American society, and racial mockery of Asian people is the norm. In fact, it is considered so normal to concieve of Asians in mocking and derogatory ways, that American popular culture (and the celebrities it manufactures) routinely and confidently propagates these negative attitudes. American children grow up in school environments where racial baiting and harassment of Asians is casual and acceptable. There are absolutely no negative social or political repurcussions that result from using anti-Asian epithets or expressing anti-Asian attitudes. There is no social stigma attached to expressing racism towards Asian people and adopting such slurs does nothing to change that.

With this in mind it would seem obvious that striving to apply a derogatory epithet as an appropriate self-definition in an environment where few positive alternatives are used, does, in fact, reinforce and provide impetus to the practice of dehumanizing Asian people through derogatory epithets. If everybody can use them without restriction, then how are these epithets being "owned"? Furthermore, how does applying a demeaning epithet to oneself convince a society - that is quite comfortable using them - that it is actually wrong to use them?

In short, there is no logical basis to presume that Asians applying derogatory epithets to themselves, in any way promotes cultural pride or social empowerment. All it does is legitimize their use as a means to dehumanize us. Tam's article calls for the Asian-American community to show support for what he terms their "plight" - I urge readers to not support this silly campaign.

Asian Penis Pickup - Get Her Number!

2011-03-25T03:56:00.000-07:00

Hahahahaha!!!!

It's hard to be sure whether these guys are serious or just making funny videos, or both, but it was nice to see Asian guys acting with confidence around women!

Çinli Gibi!

2011-03-18T08:51:00.000-07:00

Tsunamis and The Children Of The Corn.

As I've alluded to elsewhere, the Asian experience of racism in America bears some comparison to a campaign of terrorism. For instance, terrorists seek to manipulate, disempower, intimidate, and coerce a population into acceding to various demands and beliefs in order to empower themselves, yet, a society that promotes and normalizes racial hostility, violence, and behaviours through demeaning stereotypes and xenophobic socio-political rhetoric creates a similar relationship between the mainstream and the target minority as the relationship between the terrorist organization and the citizens it targets.

Where I presently reside, the existence of various militant separatist, anarchist, nationalist, and religious groups makes for an interesting cocktail of potential hazards of the explosive kind. Three years ago a bomb was discovered in a Burger King just down the street from my apartment, and earlier this year a suicide bomber martyred himself in one of the City's main squares. Suffice it to say that even though these types of incidences are rare, I would be lying if I were to say that the thought of being caught in a bomb blast whilst sitting in my favourite coffee shop, or shopping at the grocery store, is not always at the back of my mind.

Obscenely, this sense of foreboding that a bomb might go off is analagous to the experience of being Asian in America. Just as in a society that lives with an internal terrorist threat in which its citizens can never foresee the next martyr, but who know that one will come along sooner or later, Asians in America never really know when their race is going to be a problem for someone, somewhere. It could be in a favourite cafe, or whilst shopping at the grocery store, but sooner or later, someone will remind us that being Asian means casually routine harassment and racial baiting, and perhaps even violence.

It is precisely because American culture normalizes racist attitudes and behaviours towards its Asian minority that an environment has been created in which interactions with the mainstream often carries with it the likelihood for racial denigration or even violence. Yet, because depictions of racial violence and harassment forms the core of representations of Asian people in American culture, this is not considered an abnormal state of affairs. Hence, just like someone who is trying to live a normal life knowing that a terrorist's bomb could go off any time or anywhere, many in the Asian minority exists in a state of expectation knowing that an inevitable explosion of casual (or even casually violent) racism will impinge upon their lives. Society is set up to ensure this.

American culture (and hence American society) is abnormal in its xenophobic hostility to the epicanthic fold and the single eyelid. If you refer to the title of this post - "Çinli Gibi" - it is Turkish for "(He looks) like a Chinese", and I heard a group of small Kurdish kids saying it about me whilst I was walking through my neighbourhood recently. I looked over at them and smiled, to which they responded in accented English, "Hello!" and then giggled. I waved and continued on whilst the kids went back to playing. Just a case of innocent curiosity - how normal! If this had occurred in America, the kids would be likely to have a selection of choice epithets to hurl at me, and the tone of the exchange would likely have been alot uglier.

This offers a great insight into how sick and aberrative American culture is when it comes to its attitudes to its Asian minority because, by contrast, mainstream American kids seem to be armed with a ready supply of racist attitudes and epithets that they are seemingly not discouraged from using in their interactions with Asian people. It is Asian-American children who experience this most intensely - yet what can it mean for American society and the place of the Asian minority within it when America's children go through the most impressionable years of their lives with the belief that it is normal to use racial epithets towards Asian people?

To me the recent outpouring of anti-Japanese feeling in the wake of the earthquake and tsunami is simply confirmation that the practice of rearing American children to think of Asians in dehumanizing ways has been a great success, and that we should not be surprised that this apparent inability to have a human connection with Asian people is so prevalent - it is how many of these people have been taught to think since childhood.

Goodbye Cruel World...For A While!

2011-03-07T00:34:00.001-08:00

Oh the drama! Google Blgger has been blocked by the authorities here. I wish that I could say that dramatic, historically significant events were the reason for this (well, actually, maybe not), but the truth is that there is an epic struggle going on over the broadcasting rights for soccer games.

Apparently, some bloggers with Google have been posting videos of games on their sites - which is taking money out of the pockets of the multi-billion dollar media companies - a big no-no.

On the positive side, it's possible to occasionally get around the block and get to my dashboard to publish comments, but for some reason I can't post comments of my own - so no replies for now! Sorry. I'm not even sure if this post will make it through.

Stay posted - I'm hoping that the issue will be resolved quickly.

Outsiders

2011-03-03T12:52:00.000-08:00

Being A Harbinger Of Things Unheard Of.

I recently came across this quote that struck a chord with me.......

Literature is not conformism, but dissent. Those authors who merely repeat what everybody approves and wants to hear are of no importance. What counts alone is the innovator, the dissenter, the harbinger of things unheard of, the man who rejects the traditional standards and aims at substituting new values and ideas for old ones. He is by necessity anti-authoritarian and anti-governmental, irreconcilably opposed to the immense majority of his contemporaries. He is precisely the author whose books the greater part of the public does not buy......

Ludwig von Mises....The Anti-Capitalistic Mentality.

Although I am by no means an expert on the subject, it doesn't require an expert eye to notice that when it comes to Asian-American literature, very rarely can it be characterized by the criterion set forth by Von Mises. There can be very little doubt that dissenting anti-authoritarianism plays little part in the themes of possibly the majority of Asian-American literature. Rarely, it would seem, do we concern ourselves with the notion of substituting new ideas for old, or the rejection of traditional standards. Rather, it would appear that there is a tendency for some to repeat what everybody approves and wants to hear - some of Asian-America's most widely read authors have been accused of using this strategy.

Yet, for Asian American men, about whom much is written that is misrepresentative, our very existence is dissent - what else could it be? Because Asian men are represented in such a negative way, to conform is to accept that we are less than human, therefore our only option is non-conformity. Given this, the question is; why is so much that is written by Asians about themselves devoid of this element of opposition? Given the degree to which Asians are villified and dehumanized by American culture, the largely conciliatory tone of the literary response seems bizarre to say the least. It's not that conciliation is a bad thing in and of itself, but without an equally established, vibrant, and assertive culture of non-conformity and dissent, its value would seem to be diminished.

Whether this description of the Asian-American literary world is accurate I leave the reader to decide for themselves, but, for me, any endeavour that requires creativity and originality must almost by definition challenge any, most, or all of the attitudes that we hold (or are held about us) regarding a given subject. In this sense, I lean towards the belief that much literature that is produced within Asian-America has not yet risen to this challenge. For a misrepresented minority the importance of original thinking, and a dissenting attitude are essential, if not a natural outcome of our circumstances.

To understand the power of non-conformist dissent, one need only look at the suppression of the intelligentsia in Stalin's Soviet Union. According to the book "Stalin And His Hangmen" it was through a series of "purges" that Stalin and his henchmen systematically murdered opponents, both real and percieved, first in the political sphere, but also in a process which ultimately saw tens of thousands of social activists, musicians, writers, artists, military personnel, peasants, foreigners, and minorities, being murdered or sent to the GULAG. The reason for this is simple; an intelligentsia is by definition an oppositional entity. Comprised of artists, philosophers, writers, journalists and social misfits, an intelligentsia pushes the boundaries of a society's beliefs and tastes and in so doing has the potential to set in motion dramatic shifts in social dynamics. There is power in asking uncomfortable questions and highlighting uncomfortable truths.

I would argue that it is this power that many in the Asian minority seem ambivalent about embracing - for whatever reason. There may be cultural reasons for this, or not, yet it seems to me that the most genuine expression of the Asian-American experience has to be based in opposition, and non-conformity. There are some who suggest that the future of Asian-American writing must endeavour to reach as wide an audience as is possible - this can only mean white people. I don't necessarily agree with this, simply because in order to do this one must dilute the experience in order to allow the mainstream to feel comfortable with itself. I would submit, instead, that Asian-American literature must strive to make the mainstream feel uncomfortable with itself, its pretensions, and its prejudices. After all, if we give the mainstream what it wants to hear, and is used to hearing, then what have we contributed that is new and innovative?

Unsung Heroes

2011-02-11T01:28:00.000-08:00

Asian Footballers.

As a long-time soccer fan - and an Asian! - I have observed with some degree of enthusiasm the steady but definite improvement in the overall quality of East Asian players and teams in the last twenty-five years. As two of the most economically prosperous countries in the East, it seems natural that Japan and South Korea would be the leaders in developing domestic soccer leagues and youth development programs which have produced some talented players and exciting teams. In the recent World Cup in South Africa, both teams performed reasonably well and produced some exciting football to illustrate that the gap in quality between the traditional football powers (Europe and South America) and Asia is slowly decreasing.

Japan and South Korea's heavy investment in soccer has paid dividends, with several players from both countries earning the opportunity to play with some of Europe's teams in the world's toughest leagues. The now retired Hidetoshi Nakata became something of a flamboyant sex symbol/superstar whilst playing in the Italian League, and was nominated for the Footballer of The Year Award several times. South Korean, Park-Ji-Sung, has become a regular for Manchester United - one of the world's most renowned teams. Park has become something of an unsung hero of Manchester and a cult hero amongst its fans. Keisuke Honda has impressed in the Russian league and seems poised to become a true soccer hero. Most recently, Japanese player Yuto Nagamoto has joined Italian football giants, Inter Milan. Quick and tricky, he torments opponents with pentetrating runs and dangerous crosses. In addition to these four, there are, and have, been several others playing in European leagues who have become an integral part of their teams and have been embraced by their team's fans.

Apart from enjoying the skill and passion that Asian footballers like these bring to the game, the development and inclusion of Asian men as sportsmen in a mainstream pastime represents a potential avenue toward changing negative stereotypes. I tend to feel that the role that Asian sportsmen can play in countering demeaning stereotypes is often overlooked or ignored. The general consensus seems to be that it is through media characters that project a positive image of Asian men that the image of our demographic will improve. I don't necessarily agree with this entirely.

It could be argued that, historically, it has been through the process of excelling at sports where the most dramatic shifts in attitudes and beliefs about racial groups has been the most apparent. For instance, the great Jack Johnson almost single-handedly destroyed the myth of white physical superiority by defeating the best white boxers of his era. Granted, there was a severe reaction to his success, but after Johnson it could only be a matter of time before black boxers would be given opportunities in the ring. In soccer itself, players like Pele and Eusebio became football gods at a time when racial discrimination was the norm. Now, in the present era, black players make up a huge percentage of soccer players and along with it has come the commitment of reducing discrimination and racism in football.

This is why Asian sportsmen should be viewed as being at the forefront of the fight against demeaning stereotypes and beliefs about Asian men. No doubt, positive media representations can only be a good thing, but ultimately a movie hero depictions are escapism that we all know isn't real. A successful sportsman, on the other hand, competes and hopefully excels in real events where, as Asian men, they are not expected to do well. Just like modern day Jack Johnsons, Asian sportsmen are contradicting the notion that Asian men are inherently weaker than non-Asians, and are thus, slowly breaking down barriers in perception and in society in general.

Groupon - Tibet - 2011 Super Bowl Commercial Ad

2011-02-08T04:39:00.000-08:00

LOL!!!

Apparently many people (Asian and non-Asian alike) are indignant about this ad, so I know I'm not supposed to find it funny, but I did. Why? Because it was possibly some of the most honest advertising I've seen, particularly with regards to Asians.

As we all might agree, Asian representation in the media is largely derogatory or mocking of Asian people and their cultures. If there is one thing that I would say with certainty, it is that the dignity and humanity of East and Southeast Asian peoples are routinely mocked and demeaned by American culture. Racial harassment of Asians through television, film, and radio is commonplace and propagates a culture that sees harassment of Asians as a normal and acceptable activity.

This is why I've always been skeptical about this claim that people in the west are concerned about upholding the humanity, dignity, and rights of any Asian people. American culture promotes harassment and racist behaviour towards its Asian minority, and does so without concern for the dignity and well-being of those people. So, it's extremely dfficult for me to believe that there is some magical process by which a people who are culturally inculcated with dehumanizing images of Asians can have genuine attitudes of compassion for those people.

One of the main criticisms of this advert was that it trivializes the suffering of the Tibetans. Yet, that is actually no different than demanding human rights for the Chinese or Burmese who suffer under totalitarianism, whilst at the same time embracing a culture that demeans and dehumanizes those very people. How can the west claim to be concerned about the suffering of various peoples in Asia, when their cultures trivializes this suffering by demeaning Asian peoples' humanity with mockery?

Why does Tibet garner such indignation when its peoples' suffering is trivialized? Part of the answer might be that some high-profile "Free Tibet" spokespeople happen to be well-known celebrities who are apparently seeking enlightenment by supporting this cause. The irony, of course, is that these celebs are influential in an industry that routinely discriminates against Asians (particularly Asian men) and propagates the culture of dehumanization of Asian people, and they haven't once spoken out against it.

Karma is a bitch.

Understanding The Rise Of China

2011-01-28T23:42:00.000-08:00

The Sophist's Choice.

This interesting TED talk was posted up at the Alpha Asian and bigWOWO blogs, and offers some insights into some of the western world's attitudes regarding Asia. I will admit, though, that I felt somewhat none-the-wiser by the end of the talk.....

As you can see, the gist of the talk seems to be that China is so different that it can never be expected to "become like the West" and that in order to understand China's rise to prominence one must take into account specific qualities that make it atypical. Jacques presents three main points that he calls "building blocks" to help us understand the rise of China.

To be honest I was really underwhelmed by Jacques' talk and found his ideas to be overly simplistic. Much of what he concluded didn't follow from his arguments and at certain points his arguments were actually evidence against the conclusions that he drew - all founded upon some sweeping generalizations and an inept grasp of historical nuance. Jacques simply seems to be making mountains out of molehills, and perceiving differences where they don't actually exist.

His first point attempts to point out how China doesn't think, act or have the characteristics of a nation state and is therefore distinct from the west. Yet, all of the characteristics that he presents that are supposed to show that China is not a nation state (common ethnicity, common cultural values) are actually the very qualities that define a nation state. Here is a good definition of what a nation state is....

'country in which a nation of principally the same type of people exists, organized by either race or cultural background. In the nation-state, generally, everyone would speak the same language, probably practice the same or similar types of religion, and share a set of cultural, “national,” values'.

....somehow because China has different cultural characteristics it is disqualified from the calling itself a nation state. He goes on to insist that China's use of more than one system within its sovereign territory is further evidence that it is not a nation state. Yet, this is simply false. There is no reason why a nation state can't have multiple systems and conditions existing within its borders. Ironically, the UK is an example of this. As part of the terms that turned the British Isles into the "United Kingdom", the constituent kingdoms that comprised it were permitted to maintain many of their own cultural, ethnic, religious, and even legal identities, so according to Jacques definition, the UK cannot be a nation state. Of course, this is nonsense, and only highlights the fact that Jacques has re-defined terms and applied them selectively in order to create this idea of a gulf of distinction.

Jacques' second point actually has no point and is really a pejoritive dressed up as a sophisticated observation. Here, Jacques waxes poetic about the inherent racism of the Chinese and how their attitudes set them apart from the enlightened west. The most obscene aspect of this part of the video is the ease with which Jacques presumes to know the attitudes of 1 billion people, and makes casual generalizations about them. Such is the power of white privilege and the white sense of superiority. Of course, the biggest irony is that the more Jacques describes this ethnic chauvinism of the Chinese, the more they seem to sound exactly like Europeans.

In the third and final point of Jacques' talk he highlights the subservient nature of the Chinese. He begins by using a fuzzy application of terms. He says.....

...the relationship between the state and society [in China] is very different from that in the west......in the west we see the authority and legitimacy of the state as a function of democracy....the Chinese state enjoys more legitimacy and more authority amongst the Chinese than is true with any western state....

The first problem with this is that nowhere is the legitimacy and authority of the state a function of democracy - not even in the west. This is because the nation state gets its legitimacy and authority from those factors that define it as a nation state. It is a government that gets its legitimacy from the democratic process, no-one votes (except in cases of separatist referendums) on whether or not their state should exist - it is simply taken for granted that it should exist and no-one votes for their state to cease to exist. Of course, when a government's authority comes from itself then what you have is an authoritarian entity, and in the case of China, this is a totalitarian entity. But, so what? Didn't we already know this? Even worse is Jacques' suggestion that totalitarianism is somehow embraced by the Chinese psyche. The reason that the Chinese state (and I think Jacques actually means "government" here) enjoys so much legitimacy amongst the Chinese is because they have the power and will to run a two thousand volt electrical charge through your testicles if you show dissent. Yet, this hugely important fact doesn't figure into Jacques lesson on how to understand China, in fact, it's looking more and more like he actually doesn't really understand China at all.

The biggest question mark over Jacques' actual understanding of China can be found in what he omitted from his talk. Jacques and most other China pundits like to conveniently forget that the west tried to destroy China economically, politically and culturally during the colonial period. Even the though the west has forgotten this, China hasn't. Resistance to colonialism was one of the factors that drove the communist revolution, explains China's distrust of the west, and was a significant factor in much of its internal and foreign policy in the past half century.

In short, Jacques' contentions seem to be based on historical illiteracy and some questionable logical contortions. For instance, he talks about the "Holy Roman Empire splitting up 2000 years ago", which is strange because the Holy Roman Empire didn't come into existence until 1100 years ago and only dissolved in the 18th century - 300 years ago. Maybe he was talking about the division of the Roman Empire proper into East and Western portions, but that was a purely poltical endeavour which wasn't based on any civilizational or cultural divisions. If Jacques doesn't grasp the nuances of his own history, then why should I believe that he is capable of grasping the nuances of the history and culture of China? Jacques has used cultural and historical factors extremely selectively in his talk in a way that suggests a confirmation bias on his part. In fact, the more Jacques describes China, the more they appear to be motivated by many of the same factors that motivate the west.

Overall, Jacques is following a pattern of over-simplification which I alluded to in a previous post. Basically, this type of knowledge dissemination is based upon the fact that it is possible to make all kinds of over-generalized claims about Asia and its peoples and have them accepted by mainstream consumers without question as accurate- even when they are obviously a-historical and logically incoherent.

Asians Eat White Kids For Breakfast

2011-01-22T03:07:00.000-08:00

With Chopsticks, Of Course.

In the furor created by the recent "Tiger Mom" article in the Wall Street Journal, it would have been easy to miss out on the fact that few, if any, mainstream commentators displayed any kind of skepticism that Amy Chua may have been guilty of over-generalization in her assertions that her periodically vituperative parenting exuberance was somehow representative of the wider parenting philosophy of the Asian community. In the news dissemination industry where journalists are traditionally taught to dig deeper into a story in order to better determine its efficacy, it is especially surprising that this generalization fallacy was so easily overlooked, and perhaps even embraced.

It brought home for me how willingly society seems to accept the idea that Asians can be conceived of as a single unit, where the qualities exhibited by one Asian can be rapidly generalized as the truth for the entire group and applied accordingly. Even worse is the realization that you can make just about any claim about Asians and it's veracity won't be challenged in the mainstream. The reason for this, I believe, is that Asians have become so de-individuated in mainstream culture, and consequently in the general social consciousness, that it has become normative - and simply less troublesome - to dismiss Asians as a collective entity and not see them as individuals with unique qualities and perspectives. This sociological truth enables the mainstream to feel secure in its own superiority, and transforms anti-Asian discrimination into some kind of natural outcome of Asian cultural deficiencies and not mainstream bigotry.

What this all suggests is that when Easterly Asiatic peoples or their cultures are discussed by the mainstream, reason and logic seem to fly out the window, and are replaced by a gullible inability (or lack of desire) to sort through fact from farce, all with the proclivity toward low-key hysteria. In essence what this means is that the mainstream engages with the Asian minority from an irrational position, from which any and all suggestions that reinforce their pre-conceived (usually negative) notions about us are generally accepted without question, and any evidence to the contrary is dismissed as aberrative.

Naturally, this is a prodigious issue for the Asian minority. Here we are trying to engage in dialogue through literature, art, music, politics and so on, but the mainstream we are trying to reach aren't often engaging with us from a place of logic and reason. The mainstream consciousness is so inculcated with the notion of the uniform indistinguishability of Asians that they literally don't see us as individuals and it is because of this cultural pre-disposition to think of Asian people in derogatory ways, that negative beliefs about us are so easily disseminated as truths.

For the Asian minority, this manifests as a challenge to reassess our ways of perceiving the manner of our interactions with the mainstream (and with ourselves). Because our reception by the mainstream is founded upon irrational gut-reactions to de-personalized pejorative stereotypes of its own creation, any challenge to it requires a staunch re-assertion of Asians as individual entities. This approach leaves no room for the kind of backpedaling defense into cultural relativity as exhibited by Chua in her Wall Street Journal article and in her subsequent interviews. Those in the Asian minority who seek to present an honest understanding of their community simply do not have the privilege of using the over-generalizing language employed by Chua (and many others) - this simply undermines their own endeavours.

The Case For More Anti-Asian Bias In College Admissions

2011-01-10T05:04:00.000-08:00

A Blessing In Disguise?

As an Asian man I belong to a demographic that is routinely misrepresented in society by gross generalizations and stereotypes. Most of the Asian men I've known come nowhere close to being the type of pathetic individuals that society apparently needs them to be. It's because of this experience that I have adopted a rule of thumb that reminds me that when discussing groups of people, the only generalization that one can accurately make is that it is more misleading than accurate to make generalizations. Apart from the vulgar generalizations such as pointing out that all people eat and defecate (does this need pointing out?) all other generalizations regarding particular groups' motivations and attitudes offer us limited capacity to truly appreciate the humanity of others.

On the subject of over-generalization and defecation, I couldn't help but be moved by a recent Wall Street Journal article written by Amy Chua, a second-generation Chinese-American mother of two - possibly psychologically damaged - teenage girls. According to Chua an extremely tough approach to parenting involving verbal abuse, totalitarian control over her childrens' desires, as well as starvation blackmail, are what is required to produce math whizzes and musical prodigies in one's children. She labels this the "Chinese Mother" approach.

In an apparent effort to avoid the charge of propagating racial and cultural stereotypes, she goes on to insist that this approach is not exclusive to Chinese mothers since she apparently knows mothers from other ethnic and cultural groups who engage in this type of child rearing. Yet, despite the disclaimer, Chua represents her method as an approach practiced by the general Chinese parenting body. To me this is both cowardly and dishonest.

Clearly Chua believes that she is presenting an approach to parenting that might be construed by her target audience (the white mainstream) as controversial. As she readily admits, some of her practices could be considered abusive and unacceptable to the white mainstream audience that she is apparently trying to convince. One might even say that her article is deliberately provocative and has the triumphal tone of someone convinced of their own rightness. Yet despite the self-assured posturing of the article's tone, not once does Chua take personal responsibility for her actions. Having thrown the rocks of controversy, she beats a hasty retreat behind the Great Wall of Chinese Cultural Mystique. She does these things that are arguably abusive yet slyly absolves herself of personal responsibility by "disappearing" behind the veil of cultural relativity.

This to me is intellectual cowardice. If Chua wants to paint herself as some kind of maverick parent promoting a superior alternative parenting method then fine, but don't make unfounded claims that these strategies are typical to Chinese culture - they might very well be, but the article doesn't do a good job of convincing me of it. Certainly, Chua attempts to support her claims by mentioning studies that show that Chinese parents don't think that learning should be fun, and that Asian parents drill their kids more than white parents. Yet, how does this support her claims that verbal abuse, threats, and threats to deny food are a common practice amongst Chinese parents? It doesn't.

As a Professor of Law at Yale and a Harvard graduate, Chua could arguably be said to represent the very best that Asian-American academia has to offer for the intellectual advancement of Asian-American thinking. Yet, the blatantly weak inductive reasoning exhibited in the article points to some very serious issues with the reasoning capacities of even our most academically accomplished individuals. To be fair, the article is only an excerpt from Chua's new book and so may not necessarily reflect the overall gist of the book, yet most writers publish excerpts that are most representative of the themes that they are exploring in the larger publication. It doesn't look good!

If the thinking exhibited in this article reflects the very best that Asian-American minds have to offer, then Chua has destroyed the motivational foundation for her parenting style. What's the point of striving for prodigy and Ivy-League when the result seems to be intellectual mediocrity?

Where's That Innate Moral Sense When You Need It?

2010-12-28T02:18:00.000-08:00

Forcing People To Act Right.

Earlier this month a settlement was finally reached between the Justice Department and the School District of Philadelphia which amounts to an acknowledgement that the district and school administrators overlooked racially biased harassment and violence directed at Asian children at South Philly High School. As part of the agreement it is required that........

"...the district hire a consultant focused on preventing harassment and discrimination, will serve as a nationwide standard for school systems trying to prevent bullying........[and] Philadelphia schools to develop a plan for preventing bullying; conduct training to increase multicultural awareness; and maintain records of harassment..."

A combination of indifference, alleged participation in harassment by school adminstrators as well as accusations of mishandling written reports of abuse (that is, many reports were simply thrown away), all demonstrate that school admins and the District engaged in a cynical effort to hide evidence of their own abdication of responsibility as well as their evasions in addressing racially biased abuse perpetrated by elements of the student body and staff. All of this demonstrates that racist attitudes towards Asians amongst both staff and students were allowed to foment eventually manifesting as acts of physical violence - you are what you do.

Of course, this type of black/Asian conflict isn't new both in American schools and beyond. Remember Lafayette High School? The situation there bears some eerie similarities to the South Philly conflict. It is this dynamic of minority on minority prejudice that gives this situation and others like it such a complex and almost untouchable character. By tradition it is the well documented and acknowledged oppression of Africans that has defined the dialogue on race in America and so, for many people, instances where the oppressor has African features are difficult to compute. Consequently, obvious anti-Asian racism amongst elements in the black community is dismissed for a variety of reasons - sometimes even by Asian-Americans themselves.

A common refrain is that these apparent race crimes against Asians are an unwelcome but natural consequence of economic hardship and poverty. Others suggest that the experience of racism itself leads to acts of racism. Still others will dismiss black on Asian racism on the grounds that overall African-Americans experience more oppression (both past and present) than anyone ever and are therefore excused by some unspecified logical mechanism from practising tolerance. Then there are some who assert that black on Asian violence is justified because Asians are racist.

The problem is that much white racism is fuelled by a sense of disenfranchisement resulting from poverty. Many recruits to white supremacist groups come from poor working class backgrounds. Would anyone dare to justify white racism on these grounds? Maybe we can accept that poor black students at South Philly have few hopes for a bright future and are thus able to understand (somewhat) their aggression, but what of the staff and District - what's their excuse? College educated and paid a decent salary (and in the case of the District, paid handsomely), these people should know better. You would have to do some amazing logical backflips to tie economic hardship into their racism. Furthermore, how much racism and oppression is required before your own qualifies as justifiable? Of course, if Asian racism justifies black racism then surely Asian racism is justified because there is black racism? The mind boggles.

Of course, as many Asian-Americans might agree, the issue of racial harassment of Asian children in American schools goes way beyond the ghetto and is one of the phenomena that unites all of us in a common experience. The degree may vary from racial baiting to violence, yet the intent is clear. The marginalization process for many Asian-Americans begins in school and as an experience it is perhaps the most overlooked amongst the Asian minority - the result of which is an apparent dearth of pro-active advocacy. Yet as the Asian student activists at South Philly have learned, it is by standing up and fighting back, that you gain allies. By doing this, they have empowered other black students to stand with them and hopefully improve conditions for everyone. The natural by-product of pro-active advocacy is that others become empowered to not go along with your oppression.

This is an important point because I maintain that anti-Asian racism is propagated not by extremism but by apathy and indifference. As the extreme (yet, apparently not uncommon) example of South Philly demonstrates, racism against Asians is fuelled by a willingness of others to "go along" with it, either by inaction or by dismissal of the significance of racist attitudes. Asians are harassed in the culture of the mainstream and this serves as the model of behaviour towards us. How then can harassment of Asian students in South Philly be condemned without condemning mainstream culture? It is this harassment model of behaviour as put forward by American culture that allows people to go along with anti-Asian bias up to and sometimes including the point of violence. It's no coincidence that harassment precedes anti-Asian violence in American schools.

On a final note it is important to highlight this.......

"Justice Department officials signaled that the agreement with the School District of Philadelphia, which............will serve as a nationwide standard for school systems trying to prevent bullying."

The measures against bullying that the District is being required to take will serve as the nationwide standard. To me, this is our cue. As a community we have to set the standard for what we allow as acceptable behaviour towards our children in American schools. This is our opportunity.

Be Like Water

2010-12-11T05:44:00.000-08:00

Recapturing The Heart Of The Tiger.

As readers will know, this past month saw what would have been the 70th birthday of Chinese icon, Bruce Lee. Few Asians in the modern era have had such a profound influence over the consciousness of popular western culture as Bruce. To pay tribute, I present this interesting exerpt from an interview he gave in the early 1970's...........

Although he is remembered for his skill as a martial artist, and appreciated by Asian-American men for being one of the few images of masculinity for their demographic, as the video suggests, his value to the consciousness of Asian men goes beyond his onscreen personna. Clearly, even from this short clip we can see that Lee's greatness as an athlete and martial artist was grounded in a profound philosophical foundation that saw self-discovery as a means to access an existential truth and recognized the flow of self-expression as the natural product of this process.

Maybe because he experienced the frustration of being stifled by the prejudice he encountered whilst trying to break into the American film industry (in much the same way many Asian-American men today feel stifled by stereotypes and exclusion), much of what he says in this interview is very pertinent to the way we can understand our experiences as Asian men. Here İ've presented some of the quotes from this clip that İ believe have some insights for Asian-American men......

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".....styles separate man, becomes doctrines/gospel truth - cultures separate man.....

....do not have [a] style, here I am as a human being - how can I express myself totally and completely, that way you won't create a style......[it is] a process of continuing growth.....

...[be like water because] running water never grows stale [it] keep on flowing - honestly expressing yourself...

....[it is] easy to put on a show - flooded with a cocky feeling - and feel cool.....[but just like] if you learn to speak Chinese it's easy to speak the words but what lies behind the words - what brought on the feelings and expressions behind those words?..."

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It has become somewhat axiomatic for minorities to say that "going back to your roots" or rediscovering your culture can be a dramatic experience of catharsis that empowers the individual and offers an alternative world view to the white-washed perspective. Whilst I see the value of this, it has to be recognized that racism goes beyond cultural white-washing and anti-pluralism, and is fundamentally an assertion of a racial hierarchy that utilizes vaious methods to dehumanize minorities.

In fact, as I noted here, various Asian cultural practices are greedily and more readily accepted than are Asians themselves, which suggests that cultures can be and often are more easily integrated and accepted than races. What this suggests to me is that any kind of Asian-American consciousness must have as a fundamental premise the idea of reconnecting with the essence of what makes us human as opposed to cultural characteristics that defines us as particular ethnicities.

Nowhere is this concept more applicable than in the issue of reclaiming Asian masculinity. Many commentators suggest that balancing dehumanizing cultural portrayals and attitudes with more masculine versions is an essential step (perhaps the most essential step) in correcting emasculation issues. This idea suggests that masculınity is fundamentally a product of culture and that it is cultural expression that drives the qualities of masculinity. I disagree with this - masculinity is far more fundamental than the mere cultural expression of it because ultimately the qualities that we describe as "masculine" seem most likely to be a product of various biological drives. We could call this biological drive the masculine essence, in the sense that the qualities that derive from it are fundamental to the nature of being biologically male.

Whilst this doesn't downplay the importance of sympathetic media representation as a means to defuse xenophobic and racist attitudes or the value of cultural connection, it does put into question the idea that emasculation can be remedied by these means. If we take Lee's ideas to their natural conclusion we should realize that culture - whether it be inclusive or not - reflects a fundamental tension between that which is instinctual and natural on the one hand and the need to define, describe and ultimately limit those instincts. That may sound like a dubious notion, yet as Asian men in America it's impossible to deny that we live in a culture that seeks to separate us from our masculinity, that is, whatever the things that might be instinctual and natural to us as men.

The kicker is that this is one of the purposes of any culture (including our cultures of origin) - to reign in those things that are natural and instinctual in order to render them relatively harmless and to shape them into something that doesn't threaten the social order. Having media stereotypes that represent us, as well as a grounding in our cultural roots may serve some purpose, yet we have to realize that ultimately all this means is someone else that we probably don't know - or worse, someone who cannot know us - is defining the limits of our identity.

So what all of this means to me is that discovering a masculine identity must involve a process of peeling away the filters of culture that limit and shape our nature. This might involve developing a philosophical foundation driven by the principle of inquiry and the desire for truth. In this video Lee illustrates the weakness of looking to media stereotypes to inform our characters, and the way that cultures (all cultures) can limit inquiry and stifle self-expression. So in some ways it is the striving to release the flow of self-expression that forms the basis for masculinity. Viewed in this way, the notion of masculinity transcends cultural boundaries and moves beyond the principle that identity and masculinity can, or should, be fundamentally culture specific.

All of this suggests that the assertion of an Asian masculine identity is primarily a counter-cultural endeavour. The seeds and roots of this masculine archetype must be firmly planted in the soil of oppositional thinking to all of the assumptions and expectations that are made and required of us by mainstream America and by our own cultures. Bruce Lee, the philosopher, seems to suggest that it is by moving outside of cultural paradigms that a more profound and fundamental truth about who we are can be attained.

Screw All Of You Guys....I'm Going Home

2010-12-08T03:34:00.000-08:00

The Cartman Principle.

Life can be funny sometimes.

For various reasons many Asian-Americans will cringe when being called a "model minority". Chief amongst those reasons is the notion that supposed Asian-American academic achievement and economic success are often held up by some white commentators as the model for other minorities of colour to imitate in order to pull themselves out of poverty. Many minorities (Asians and non-Asians alike) view this as a strategy for excusing white discriminatory practices and placing responsibility firmly on the shoulders of minorities themselves for whatever backward social conditions they might face. The general principle is that if Asians can succeed, then why can't other minorities do the same? Many minority commentators point to this idea as being divisive and has set minorities groups against one another, increasing suspicion and mutual hostility.

Yet, as this article proves, white people should be careful what they wish for. Here's an excerpt............

In Silicon Valley, two high schools with outstanding academic reputations are losing white students as Asian students move in. Why?.........Whites aren't quitting the schools because the schools are failing academically. Quite the contrary: Many white parents say they're leaving because the schools are too academically driven and too narrowly invested in subjects such as math and science at the expense of liberal arts and extracurriculars like sports and other personal interests.....The white exodus clearly involves race-based presumptions, not all of which are positive. One example: Asian parents are too competitive. "My sense is that at Monta Vista you're competing against the child beside you," [parent, Ms. Doherty] says...........At Cupertino's top schools, administrators, parents and students say white students end up in the stereotyped role often applied to other minority groups: the underachievers.

As you may have read, many white people are refusing to play their own game and are leaving - taking their marbles home with them.

No doubt, the model minority stereotype will lose its appeal for white commentators and will quietly disappear from the dialogue.

Foot-Binding Ain't So Bad

2010-11-30T07:54:00.000-08:00

The Case For a More Nuanced Dialogue.

Few would argue that the now abolished Chinese cultural practice of the foot-binding of Chinese women has been the subject of much debate amongst the men and women (but mainly the women) of the Asian minority of America. Although a phenomenon existing exclusively within Chinese culture, some Asian-American women find value in representing the practice as the essence of female oppression in Asia (and by extension within the Asian-Amerian community). Subsequently, the burden of correcting the historical wrongdoings of the culture of foot-binding falls on "Asian men" in general. Apparently Indian, Uzbek, Siberian, Pakistani, Nepalese, Filipino, as well as Chinese and all other Asian men - all must equally share the responsibility for the phenomenon of foot-binding - even though ultimately it took the willpower of strong Asian men to end the practice.

Foot-binding was a practice in which Chinese girls as young as 3 or 4 underwent an extremely painful process to modify the shape and size of the foot. In order to achieve this, the bones of young girls' feet were broken and bandaged in whatever was the desired shape. Foot-bound women lived in constant pain, and infections were a frequent complication. Definitely an ugly practice. Yet, what were the circumstances that brought about this practice? Most accounts maintain that the phenomenon started as a fashion statement amongst the rich and well-to-do of the Tang Dynasty and slowly evolved into a tradition that involved every echelon of Chinese society.

Women who had their feet bound were highly prized in feudal China - their value as wives were increased and for many it was a means to escape poverty. Asthetically, bound feet were considered sexually attractive, and those who had undergone the procedure were widely considered to be chaste. Although it is maintained that foot-binding was a means to keep women disempowered, on the flip side, mutilating the feet of Chinese women effectively increased their value and thus was a practice that was propagated by the men and women of feudal China.

Ironically, the American practice of modifying the body through cosmetic surgery, bears some remarkable similarities to the Chinese tradition. As was the case with women's feet in feudal China, women in modern America aspire to a standard body shape and type that is extremely difficult or impossible to maintain by natural means, and which is a standard determlned by a patriarchy and not the women themselves. In order to do this some women are pro-active and seek out invasive surgery to meet the required standard. Other women in America simply become sick - that is, they develope eating disorders from attempts at body sculpting through extreme dieting and vomiting. Those women who achieve the desired body shape through mutilation (a.k.a cosmetic surgery), become highly valued and desirable.

Clearly the underlying principles that drove the Chinese tradition of foot-binding and continue to drive the modern American culture of cosmetic mutilation are almost exactly the same. Strangely, yet not unsurprisingly, some Asian-American feminism seems to somehow not notice this fact, and continue with the "Asian men are foot-binding mysogynists" battle cry, seeming to be intellectually stuck in feudal China. Apparently, for some Asian-American feminists a traditiıon not practised by the majority of Asian cultures and one that has been abolished for decades, is more of a threat to their empowerment than an American patriarchy that is powerful enough to pressure millions of women to undergo cosmetic surgery. Somehow, Asian women seem fortunate enough to be unaffected by this American culture of control over women's body image, yet remarkably enslaved to an abolished culture of foot-binding that, incidentally, was never practised by the communities that they grew up in within the United States. This reminds very much of the type of disconnect that I noted here. I look on bemused.

The more I notice this similarity between foot-binding and cosmetic surgery, the more difficult it becomes to view the former as an inherently wicked practice without viewing the latter in the same light. Strange as it sounds, the fundamental difference between the two traditions is the availability of aneasthesia, anti-biotics, and painkillers. Unfortunately, what this means for those too lazy to make nuanced and balanced arguments against the practice, is that foot-binding would be no different and no less brutal that routine cosmetic surgery if practised in the present. Wheelchairs, Segways and escalators make the immobility issue a non-issue, painkillers and aneasthesia make the procedure painless. Modern surgical techniques might even make the practice easier and painless.

With this in mind, it is clear that if I am to be held responsible for a practice that has been abolished for decades, and which was never practised within my own Asian culture, then Asian feminists have to come up with better arguments for their case against me. Otherwise, it becomes extremely difficult to take this type of feminism seriously.

Sadly, as with much of the intellectual discourse that occurs within Asian America, the issue is often overly generalized to the point of becoming simplistic. Often this process goes hand-in-hand with a selective ommission of historical and social realities and an uncritical lack of nuance in the argumentation. Since foot-binding wasn't practised outside of China and never occurred amongst any Asian minority group in America (including the Chinese), it strikes me as strange in the extreme that this phenomenon could cause so much resentment toward the general Asian-American male population and serve as something of the rallying cry for the empowerment of Asian-American women. So how is it that some of the voices of Asian feminism rail vehemently against a practice that was not a Pan-Asian phenomenon and has been abolished for decades, yet few rail against the modern day manipulation of women into undergoing cosmetic surgery?

Hat Tip...

The Asian-American Gender Gap

2010-11-05T15:39:00.000-07:00

The Separation of Asian Men and Women.

As readers might agree, the so-called "gender-gap" phenomenon of the Asian minority is one of the most talked about, read, and discussed subjects anywhere there is a gathering of two or more Asians. A complex matter, the gender-gap is something of an umbrella term used to describe several different states of affairs and phenomena that when taken as a whole, could be seen as indicative of a fundamental difference in the way that Asian-American men and women conceive of, and experience, the Asian-American experience.

Hyper-sexualization of Asian women and emasculation of Asian men, interracial dating disparities, the Asian Patriarchy and its misogyny, perceived sympathetic media depictions of Asian women compared to derogatory stereotypes of Asian men, plus various literary and artistic works by Asian women that are perceived by many to paint Asian men and culture in an unfair manner might be considered some of the more important or contentious issues that generally come up for discussion. All of this together is what constitutes the "gender-gap". Although not complete, I believe that the above list covers the most contentious topics of debate on this subject.

It is generally accepted that this concept of an Asian-American gender divide has its roots in the literary world of 1970's in the controversies surrounding the work of Maxine Hong Kingston and, later with the work of Amy Tan. Although the conflict of literary sensibilities between Kingston and Frank Chin in the 1970's formed the basis for the modern debate, I believe that it is Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club that has set the tone for the debate in the last twenty years and served as the catalyst that shifted the debate beyond the literary to the wider community.

That being said, I would argue that the gender-gap, far from being a late 20th century phenomenon that reflects a misogynistic reaction to Asian feminist empowerment stems, in fact, from oppressive laws that targeted the Asian minority, making the gender division one of the factors that defines the Asian-American experience as unique and different from that of America's other minorities. What this means is that the gender division - or the separating of Asian men from women - must be seen as one of the most potent mechanisms of dis-empowerment for the Asian minority and has been in place almost since the beginning of Asian immigration to America. .

History shows that almost from the beginning, Asian minority communities in America were prevented from flourishing in several ways; immigration controls, anti-miscegenation legislation, denial of property and citizenship rights, limitations on employment and employment discrimination, discrimination in housing, as well as the pervasive threat of personal violence. For the predominantly male Asian minorities of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, strict immigration laws meant that any hope of having an Asian spouse was next to impossible - even men who already had wives in Asia were denied the right to be joined by them. Furthermore, immigration laws that although not explicit in the intent, served to restrict the immigration of Asian women specifically into America. Effectively, this is the beginning of the separation of Asian men and women, the goal of which was explicitly to contain and limit the Asian minority and prevent its population from growing.

The second major event that shaped the gender-divide was the phenomenon of the Asian War Brides of the Second World War. In a dramatic reversal of restrictive immigration policies that targeted Asian women, the War Brides Act permitted tens of thousands of Asian women (some estimate that there were up to 100,000) to be admitted to the country as the spouses of American G.I's. Even though a number of these Asian brides were espoused to black or Asian-American G.I's, the vast majority were admitted as the wives of white Americans. Strangely, what this meant is that (for a brief period) it became easier for an Asian woman to enter the U.S if she was married to a white man, than it would have been if she was married to an Asian immigrant to America. In other words this meant that it was legally easier for a female Asian immigrant to be married to a white American than to an Asian man - Asian women became acceptable mainly if they were partnered with white men.

Clearly, the so-called gender-divide precedes by decades the issues raised by the literary conflicts of the 1970's and 80's and was initiated as a means of social engineering. Those in power controlled the number of marriages between Asian men and women plus the availability of Asian women to Asian men through strict immigration legislation, and ultimately the roles that Asian women would take once they were permitted to enter the country.

In a historical sense, the Asian War Brides phenomenon marks the point where the history and experiences of the Asian minority that existed prior to it, starts to be whitewashed out of history and starts to be replaced by myths of Asian women needing and wanting to be rescued by western men. Put another way, the Asian-American experience becomes feminized in the sense that the apparent benefits conferred on Asian women by virtue of their marriages to white men comes to define and dominate the historical and literary dialogue of the Asian minority and the mainstream alike. The struggles and hardships experienced by the Asian men and women that went before takes a back seat and are largely forgotten, at least in the popular view, simply because it is too uncomfortable to address. Thus, since the 1950's, the Asian-American story has been reworked as the "Asian woman/white man story" or some variation or derivative thereof with Asian men largely excluded from their own history.

So, far from being a natural cultural evolution within the Asian minority, the gender gap must really be viewed as a reflection of a fundamental difference in historical perspectives stemming from laws that deliberately and unnaturally kept Asian men and women apart. These differences are so profound that it would be most accurate to say that the outlook of the Asian minority consists of two vastly different and perhaps irreconcilable historical points of view - that of the pre-war predominantly male Asian minority whose stories of struggle against oppression are largely absent from mainstream consciousness, and that of the post-war Asian War Brides whose experiences are ostensibly disconnected from the experiences of those that came before, yet whose story evolved into the acceptable version of Asian-American history.

This Is a Consular Advisory!

2010-11-03T04:58:00.000-07:00

Suicide Bombers and Business As Usual.

Anyone that has had the opportunity to live in a foreign country might agree that often the experiences one has can change one's outlook on life and alter their perceptions of ideas and notions that they might have previously taken for granted. I count myself fortunate to have had the chance to live in several places outside of America where the things that might have seemed so important to me whilst there were somehow given a new perspective when viewed through the filter of a different culture.

The country where I currently reside is especially remarkable in this regard. A country that considers itself to have drawn culturally from both east and west it is a nation of contradiction. Boasting a strong secular tradition, the country also has an equally strong religious vein that is apparent everywhere one looks. Hundreds of minarets rise up everywhere along the horizon, calling the faithful to their religious duties five times a day. Most amazing and interesting are the people themselves. Walk along any thoroughfare of the city where I live and you will be struck by the almost surreal juxtaposition of cultures that coexist and interact with very little effort.

It is common to see families out for their Sunday stroll with their twenty-something daughter dressed in a short skirt and tight blouse walking along arm-in-arm with her mother who will be wearing the khimar. Further along the street you might encounter a dreadlocked or punked-out musician type offering to help an old lady climb some stairs. Walk through any neighbourhood and one might hear traditional music coming from one building whilst across the street the sounds of angry rock blare out in response. Extremely passionate, the people here take their politics and social issues seriously. Public demonstrations are common and heartfelt. On any given weekend walking through the central squares of the city, demonstrators calling for more anarchy, socialism, religion, political autonomy or gay rights will be out making their voices heard.

Whilst in normal circumstances this city is nowhere near as dangerous as most large American cities, there are some security issues here that most American ex-pats here are aware of. This was brought home to me this past weekend when a suicide bomber detonated his explosives in one of the city's central squares, which typically has a prominent police presence, in an attempt to kill as many of them as he could. Fortunately, no-one was killed although dozens were seriously wounded. In the four or so years that I've been here, there have been several bombings around the city, but most of the time these attacks occur well away from the central part of the city where I live and none of them have involved suicide bombers, so this incident is somewhat unique and close to home - my apartment is a five-minute walk from the place where it happened.

It is at times like this that the American consulate here will send out e-mails to any ex-pats on its e-mail list warning them to be on high alert and advising on the types of places to avoid. These advisories are generally issued any time that their are heightened political tensions in the region that might lead to personal danger to Americans living overseas and are not always sent as a response to an actual attack. For instance, occasionally there might be a surge in hostile sentiment during which entire neighbourhoods will put up angry posters in their windows and drape damning banners over the street. Of course this can sometimes be accompanied by political and media rhetoric that fuels the resentment. Naturally, this can be a time of great anxiety, although in true local fashion, there is usually no display of personal animosity, with people even going out of their way to let you know that there is nothing personal about the sentiments! Still it helps to be a little wary!

Oddly, this sense of anxiety and foreboding are familiar to myself and perhaps even to many others living in America who are of Asian descent. American communities expressing and acting on resentment and hostility towards Asians that is fuelled by media and political rhetoric accurately describes the experience of the Asian minority. If occurring in the country where I currently reside, America labels this type of social intimidation as nationalism or radicalism, with it being clearly recognized that such attitudes can foster acts of violence against the targeted group. This is similar to America where the media routinely presents dehumanizing stereotypes of Asians, politicians foster xenophobia to win votes (as illustrated very recently in political ads for the mid-terms), and violence towards Asians is trivialized, there is a social acceptance and even encouragement of racist behaviour toward Asians. As I outlined here such attitudes are promoted as a method of social engineering that promotes a racial hierarchy seeking to place limitations on the Asian minority.

Clearly, there is very little difference between radical or nationalist promoted hostility in the foreign country where I reside, and media and politically motivated anti-Asianism in my very own country, America. The effects on the target community are the same in both places; the mainstream are empowered to express their hostility with demeaning behaviour or violence, the target community experiences anxiety and a sense of danger from their neighbours. In extreme cases, it is this type of environmnent that fosters terrorism, the definition and purpose of which is to limit and intimidate a target population. Negative stereotyping and xenophobic rhetoric normalizes and promotes denigrating behaviour toward the Asian minority and models an attitude of exclusion from the mainstream. Of course, anti-Asian media rhetoric in America might not encourage a suicide bomber attack on Chinatown, but it certainly might lead to harrassment of, and violence toward Asian small business owners or schoolchildren for example, not to mention random acts of violence carried out as Asian-Americans try to go about their daily lives.

So, it is with a touch of sadness that I recognize that my dignity and safety as an American are given more credence when I live outside of the country, than when I reside within it. Living as an American ex-pat overseas, my country will do what it can to ensure my safety, as an American-Asian living in my own country, my dignity and safety are flouted. So, kudos to the Consulate for respecting my dignity and safety, now if only the rest of America would follow suit.

"My Mom Is A Fucking Bitch."

2010-10-30T00:48:00.000-07:00

Discovering The Elephant in the Room With Amy Tan.

As readers may know, The Joy Luck Club is possibly the most popular and widely read novel written by an Asian-American author. Although loved by the mainstream, the book is either adored or reviled by Asian-Americans and since its publication a degree of contention has surrounded the novel. Some critics (such as Frank Chin) lambast the book for perpetuating stereotypes and many Asian men complain that the novel depicts Asian men unfairly. Like it or hate it, The Joy Luck Club is the work that many point to as representative of the vast difference between the experiences of Asian-American men and women. Although first published over twenty years ago, the subsequent "controversy" over the book's content seems to have set the tone for much of the inter-gender dialogue within the Asian minority in the two decades since.

There is very little doubt that out of all the ways that the Asian minority seems dis-united, the divide between Asian-American men and women is the most widely discussed and contentious. For some (perhaps many) The Joy Luck Club is the book that made it fashionable for Asian women to be outspoken about their disdain for Asian men and perhaps even made this rejection a necessity in the process of Asian-American feminist empowerment. For me then, there is no question that The Joy Luck Club could be considered to be something of a watershed in the Asian minority experience and particularly in the manner in which the genders interact.

Despite the apparent gravity of the anger and frustration that the book has elicited, I do, nevertheless, find that it can offer us some intriguing insights into the experiences of the Asian minority. Moving beyond these ideas of inter-gender conflict, the novel is fascinating to me for the sole reason that it simply ignores any kind of Asian-American (or even simply American) historical context.

The American part of the story takes place mainly between the 1950's and 70's, which as readers might know was an extremely turbulent period in American history. It was during this period that America, amongst other things, went from practising apartheid to promoting civil rights, engaged in a highly divisive war in SE Asia, put several men into space, developed the H-bomb, created youth culture, experienced several inner-city race riots, empowered women and gays, and saw the rise of an open drug culture. This is not to mention the social effects of the Cold War and the threat of nuclear holocaust that hung over almost every aspect of western creative expression of the period. Apparently, the young Americanized Asian women that the novel describes were somehow unaware of any of these dramatic and world-view building shifts in the culture to which they belonged.

The effect is surreal since despite growing up in a period that could be described as volatile and dynamic, the Americanized characters in the book seemed to have missed the entire experience. Imagine if we had the story of Dr. Zhivago but with characters that are unaffected by the turbulent Russian Revolution. What we would be left with is a sappy love story with one-dimensional and self-absorbed characters. From a purely Asian-American perspective the disconnect from historical context is even more remarkable. At this time anti-misegenation laws forbidding Asian men from marrying white women still existed in several states. Anti-Asian racism was still deeply entrenched in the laws and social context of the time. Racially biased immigration policies limiting Asian immigration were still in force, plus citizenship and property rights were only recently given to the Asian minority. Strangely, none of these factors that had defined the experiences of the Asian minority at the time make it into the consciousness of the characters in the book.

Of course it can be argued that the story describes a universal human condition in a way that goes beyond race and racist restrictions, yet this seems inadequate since the human condition is very much informed by its social environment. In fact, the story might possibly have been more powerful and universal if the complexities of the Asian-American experience of the time had been referenced in some way. A good example of this in action is the movie "Precious" - set against the backdrop of African-American poverty, the movie describes personal human tragedy that interweaves effortlessly with the historical and social context. Compared to this, the Joy Luck Club seems soap opera-ish.

It is for these reasons that I've always found the Americanized daughters described by Tan to be extremely annoying. Their apparent self-absorption is so profound that they don't seem to realize that the success they achieve in America was built upon the struggle against oppression of those who came before. They seem oblivious to the fact that their ability to effortlessly make dating and marriage choices across the racial divide was a right paid for with the blood of thousands, and that even at the time that the events were being described was a right denied to ethnic minority men and women in many states. Effectively, the Americanized characters described by Tan seem so disconnected from the social and historical realities of their time that they can only be described as borderline sociopathic.

This for me is the ultimate legacy of The Joy Luck Club. If we move beyond the bickering of the interracial dating disparity and view the novel objectively, it should become apparent that the book sets a mode of consciousness for ensuing generations of Asian-Americans that is mundane, socially disconnected and heavily biased toward emotionalism. By definition these qualities are dependent, irrelevent and ultimately favour the irrational adherence to disadvantage that drives the emotional appeal. Fundamentally, this type of approach is impotent for both Asian men and women and directs the dialogue of the Asian experience away from rational discourse that is based upon logical assements. If we ignore the very circumstances that create our world-view, then all we have left is emotive irrelevence.

I would argue that much of the creative, political and sociological commentary of the Asian minority follows this example of the appeal to emotion. The principles of rational argumentation and intellectual honesty take a back-seat to emotional necessity. I would suggest that The Joy Luck Club stands as the leading model for this mode of thinking that continues to the present. As a community that still struggles to define itself the reliance on emotionalism is ultimately detrimental to this cause. So in the end, the thinking espoused by The Joy Luck Club can only be viewed as a literary and intellectual dead-end that promotes short-term emotional expression but that has ultimately failed to inspire a rational, intellectually honest world-view.

A Herd Of Cats

2010-10-21T04:07:00.000-07:00

Overcoming Stereotypes.

Here in Asian-America much is discussed about the notion of overcoming stereotypes and for many (possibly most) people from the Asian minority the effect of being stereotyped is something that they encounter on a daily basis. Often these experiences might involve the mundane, but sometimes stereotyping can result in violence and even murder. So the issue of stereotyping is complex and covers a wide range of experiences ranging from irritating to fatal. I think it would be accurate to say that the process of stereotyping has a dehumanizing effect and by propagating the social acceptance of demeaning behaviour towards the Asian minority it upholds the structure of social marginalization and personal disempowerment.

America is known throughout much of the world for its commitment to freedom and the cause of individual attainment. Vague and often elusive, the notion of freedom can be and often is interpreted by different people to mean different things. The notion of freedom has been understood to comprise a negative and positive aspect (as examined by Isaiah Berlin). In simple terms, the negative aspect of freedom holds that there be few external restrictions from others within one's society (be it from other citizens or government and generally accepted to come in the form of society's laws) that interfere with one doing as one pleases - limited of course by laws that protect the common good. Positive freedom is more of an internal concept that involves the idea of individuals transcending personal limitations - which can often be in the form of social, cultural or even self created limitations - and achieving one's full potential as an individual.

If we look at stereotyping through the filter of negative and positive freedom we might notice that the process of stereotyping creates an environment that allows mainstream society to restrict our ability to enjoy freedom as completely as other Americans. Political propagation of mistrust of Asia plus social willingness to accept - as normal - behaviour that denigrates Asian peoples and trivializes violence against them (as popularized by the media) all serves to diminish our capacity to live our lives free from pervasive random acts of prejudice and nurtured ignorance.

So, even though we won't find any laws that explicitly deny the Asian minority its freedom, in practice social attitudes are promoted that allow and perhaps even encourage interference in our lives. This means that whilst institutional racism towards Asians is ostensibly limited, the free market promotion of negative attitudes encourages prejudice as an expression of individual choice driven by social expectation and demand, which, put another way, means that institutional racism towards Asians has become privatized. In other words, whatever negative freedoms American democracy guarantees its citizens is diminished through sometimes severe social restrictions resulting from society's eager embrace of negative stereotyping and the subsequent effects this has on the Asian minority.

For most Asians what this means is that despite some degree of economic prosperity (which many people assert is the measure of a minority's integration and "success"), society's promotion of demeaning xenophobic attitudes and behaviours results in routine experiences of baiting, harassment and bigotry that often carries with it the potential for violence. This contradicts ideas of positive liberty as outlined by Isaiah Berlin............

".....we are not acted upon by external nature or by other men as if I were a thing, or an animal, or a slave incapable of playing a human role........I feel free to the degree that I believe this to be true, and enslaved to the degree that I am made to realize that it is not".

Two Concepts Of Liberty

In this sense stereotyping can be viewed as a process of social engineering carried out by cultural institutions and apparently driven by market demand. The goal is to reinforce ideas of a social hierarchy that excludes Asians (especially Asian men), and diminishes our humanity whilst simultaneously mainstreaming hostile behaviours towards us and effectively creating social barriers that promote personal limitations.

What all of this means is that the struggle to overcome stereotyping is first and foremost a personal and private endeavour that seeks liberty from imposition of limitations through the emancipation of the mind. It is individuals that have to emerge as role models and positive archetypes (but not necessarily via the media) for others within their own community. The individual has the choice to decide the power that attempts at social limitation and stereotypes will exert in their lives. This means no centralized notions of what constitutes a "good" or "bad" stereotype where the individual is informed from above on what best represents them. Rather, the process becomes one of individual inquiry that discovers its own limitations and thresholds and by so doing informs the community and society at large about who or what it is.

This is not to say that the work of protesting media stereotyping is without value, but to suggest that we shift our focus away from the sometimes superficial idea that stereotypes are an insult and turn our attention to the real tragedy which is that stereotypes place social limitations on individuals from our community. For instance, I don't like stereotypes such as Long Duk Dong but not because it has the potential to make me look bad. If non-Asians are stupid enough to put that on me, then it's my job to make sure they understand who I really am. What should truly make us angry about the existence of such depictions is that Asian men, individuals perhaps much like myself, have had and to a large extent still have social limitations placed upon them that restrict their opportunities to realize their full potential in whatever their chosen field might be.

"No-One Loves Me!"

2010-10-14T12:53:00.000-07:00

Self-Fulfilling Prophecies.

I once attended a seminar that claimed to have the key to prosperity. The promise was simple - cultivate the habit of positive self-talk, and "manifest" prosperity by focused visualizations of one's goals and dreams. Simply, think good thoughts and the world will be your oyster! Eventually, the prosperity I visualized didn't match the prosperity I actually achieved, but I wouldn't say that I'm too disappointed. What I learned and what I came to believe is that what a person believes about theirself and the self-talk that comes from it can have profound consequences in their life. For Asian men, this idea is all-important.

As readers may agree, Asian men are somewhat invisible in this society - and that's at the best of times. When we aren't invisible, restrictions on positive Asian male images means that we're generally negatively represented by mainstream culture. Understandably, this is a cause of concern within the Asian community and for Asian men in particular the weight of this negativity is a heavy burden that, for some, seems to affect many aspects of their lives. It is media mis-representations that are charged with causing a sense of emasculation and disempowerment amongst Asian men. In addition to this, there are others who point to the media's defamation of Asian men as a major contributing factor in the supposed relegation of Asian men in the dating pool. In fact, it has become almost an acceptable standard to point at the media as causing the value of Asian men to decrease in the love market to such an extent that partnering an Asian man is tantamount to scraping the bottom of the barrel.There's little doubt that Asian men have their detractors (who doesn't?), and it's not really uncommon to hear or read various women opining on their negative attraction for Asian men. But is this representative of a general truth? Are Asian men at a disadvantage when it comes to love? I don't think so.

Despite personal testimonials that support the notion that Asian men may encounter negative responses based upon racial characteristics, this in no way proves that Asian men are generally at a disadvantage when it comes to finding partners. Yet, many seem to accept this as a common truth and there is no shortage of cultural reinforcement of this "truth" through online and offline media sources alike. Worst of all is the fact that some Asian men themselves seem to buy into this idea that they are at the bottom of the romance ladder. My own personal experiences, those of my friends, as well as casual observation of Asian men around me leads me to believe that reports of Asian men's undesirability are greatly exaggerated.

Suffice it to say that I never felt intimidated to approach an attractive girl and have also been pursued by attractive girls. I've seen this happen to other Asian guys too. So why doesn't my experience and the experiences of many of those I see around me not fit the stereotype of romantic losers? Is it that I'm simply "good-looking for an Asian guy"? Much as I would like this to be true, I don't think it offers a good explanation!

In reality, as individuals Asian men are neither more nor less desirable than other men. The fact that so many Asian men seem to believe that this is not the case is a result of the ongoing cultural terrorist campaign being waged against us by society. The undesirable Asian male archetype is as much a caricature as is Long Duk Dong - it isn't real. It is a stereotype just like all the other negative stereotypes of Asian men, the goal of which is to uphold the fragile sexual ego of frightened white men. We don't accept the truth of these other stereotypes, yet we seem to accept the idea that we aren't desirable and internalize it, and therein lies the problem. If Asian men believe that they are going to fail in the world of romance, then that's pretty much guaranteed to happen.

In short, I simply don't believe that Asian men are doomed to failure when it comes to dating, and I especially don't believe that Asian are at a romantic disadvantage. Asian men need to give themselves a fighting chance of romantic success by first changing their mindset and everything else will follow from that.

Invasion of Privacy

2010-10-02T01:38:00.000-07:00

The Sexual Harassment of Asian Men.

Shaming of others through mockery, taunting or any other method will always be ugly and will often carry with it painful consequences. The suicide last week of Rutgers University student Tyler Clementi is a tragic reminder of this. As readers may know, his decision to commit suicide is alleged to be the result of a "prank" by his roommate and an accomplice that exposed Clementi's apparently hidden homosexuality in a live online broadcast of the boy engaging in a sexual encounter with another male student. No doubt, defendants Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei may have thought that shaming a young man about his sexuality would be a great laugh! Both students now face charges of invasion of privacy with some gay rights activists calling the incident a hate crime which, if proven, would carry with it a harsher sentence.

Sadly, Clementi was the target of the mean-spirited spite with which Asian men may be familiar. Sexual shaming of Asian men is now such a common phenomenon in American culture that sexual inadequacy has become the normal mode of reference for Asian men. Sexual myths about Asian men are broadcast so routinely by many major institutions of popular culture that they have become commonly accepted truths. From big-budget movie productions to home-made YouTube videos the personal and private particulars of Asian men's sexuality are the subject of much public discourse - often carried out with the apparent intent to humiliate.

This is why the incident and subsequent reactions to it are so fascinating. When public sexual humiliation is directed at Asian men society sees no problem with it. If society were consistent then it should find reason to be outraged at the pervasive sexual denigration of Asian men. Yet, as we all appreciate, this is not the case. Perhaps it could be argued that Asian men don't commit suicide as a result of cultural shaming. This may be true (or not - who knows?) but that line of argument also legitimizes social sexual shaming of homosexuality as long as it remains directed at the entire community and not at individuals. This would make homophobia acceptable as long as it isn't directed at any particular individual. As most would agree, this is incoherent and of course unacceptable.

As I've outlined before, Asian male sexuality is feared. The sexual denigration of Asian men serves to uphold the myth of white male sexual prowess. This is why society is so heavily invested in this phenomenon - Asian male sexual empowerment is the final straw that will break the back of western patriarchal self-confidence hence the vehement propaganda war to prevent this occurring.

Edit: Minor Word Edits For Clarity.

A Whiter Shade of Yellow

2010-09-29T11:11:00.000-07:00

Single White Female Syndrome.

It is always such a surreal experience when I find myself noticing the degree to which Asian cultures are adored in the West. If I turn on my television and watch an action movie I'm likely to see a white hero kicking the crap out of someone by utilizing Asian martial arts techniques. Some American action films have been influenced by the styles of Asian martial arts movie makers. Many restaurants in our hippest cities will be serving nouveau cuisine with a distinctly Asian influence. Plus there are minor yet pervasive Asian cultural traits and practices that have become integrated into western culture; karaoke, use of chopsticks, Asian fashions, Japanese innovations in comfortable and user friendly car interiors, and interior home designs are but a few.

Quite possibly the most important Asian influences in modern western cultures are Eastern religious practices and their accompanying terminologies which have become increasingly integrated into American spiritual practice. It has become commonplace to hear people talk about karma where they used to talk about punishment of sin, and reincarnation where they used to talk about being saved. Eastern style meditation and spiritual growth through self-realization are concepts that are profoundly integrated into the popular mentality. In fact, such is the appeal of Eastern spirituality that the Dalai Lama is one of the few Asian men (perhaps the only Asian man) in America that white people will watch and listen to without striving to replace him with a whitewashed version - although I hear that there may be plans afoot to make a movie about him with Zac Efron in the lead role.

Of course, the irony is that despite this adoration of "Asiatica" the actual Asians themselves remain somewhat in the cultural margins. This appropriation of Asian culture goes hand-in-hand with the restrictions placed upon postive images of Asian men, many of whom notice this bizarre state of affairs and liken it to not getting an invitation to their own party.

It's cool to be Asian - except when you actually are Asian.

"...the Chinese are extremely bright...and wonderful....!"

2010-09-06T06:38:00.000-07:00

When Propaganda Succeeds.

Few subjects inflame the Asian-American community more than the issue of stereotypes in film and literature. In the view of Asian-Americans, stereotypes promote violence against Asians, serves to desensitize the mainstream to dehumanization of Asians, and trivializes our struggles with bigotry. One of the most well-known and, for some Asian-Americans, the most hated stereotype is the Charlie Chan character. The bigWOWO blog recently presented a podcast of Yunte Huang debating Frank Chin on the very subject of the Charlie Chan character and the stereotypes that went into the creation of this character. Here's the link to the podcast, and here's the link to the bigWOWO blog post, check it out - it's interesting.

The podcast was especially interesting because of the comments and attitudes of the (apparently) non-Asian callers to the show. Remarkably, despite the fact that many Asian-Americans perceive the Charlie Chan character to be negative, most (if not all) of the non-Asians that called in to the show felt that the character was a positive depiction of the Chinese people and their character. This raises some questions about what constitutes a "good" or "bad" depiction and even calls into question the notion that "positive" stereotypes can create a shift in social conditions of a given group.

The paradox of Charlie Chan is that despite being apparently adored by non-Asians and the reported sense of goodwill the character generated amongst mainstream fans, there was very little shift in attitudes towards Asians within American society. Anti-Asian prejudice and discrimination continued unabated for decades. So, if we accept that in the minds of Chan's non-Asian fans his depiction was positive for their perception of the Chinese, then the question arises; why didn't these warm fuzzy feelings amongst these fans lead to a discernible social improvement for Chinese-Americans?

The answer lies in the nature of the character itself. An accented Chinese immigrant, the character of Chan is set in a time in American history when it was almost illegal to be Asian. Chinese immigrants in this period experienced immense institutional and personal racism. Restrictions on citizenship, employment, inter-marriage with white women, and land ownership meant that Asian immigrants were forced to live and work in ghettos (aka "Chinatowns") where they couldn't contaminate the local white populace. Xenophobic hostility to Asians led to regular random acts of violence and harassment to such an extent that simply walking along the street became an act of immense courage that could end in violent death. This was the common experience of pre-war Asian immigrants.

What does this have to do with Charlie Chan? Well, absolutely nothing! And that's the point. As wise and clever as he is portrayed, the life of Charlie Chan would have been unrecognizable to the Chinese immigrants of the time. Denied rights and considered barely human, Chinese immigrants could have been killed for attempting to enter many white owned establishments which makes the notion of one of them being given jurisdiction over white criminals competely preposterous. Certainly there are situations where Charlie Chan encounters racism but he is always able to brush it aside with a Confucian quip.

That's why Chan is so beloved - he allows America to brush aside its history of brutality toward its Asian immigrants in a way that makes racism seem almost harmless. Chan is a proto model-minority - he doesn't need any help because he has all this wisdom and culture to draw upon and because he doesn't need help, there's no need to examine anti-Asian racism. Fortunately, this also means that the mainstream gets to deny that prejudice towards Asians can and has been so brutal, and it allows them to hide behind the propaganda that things aren't so bad for Asians because "they do so well" and they're "really smart!"

The biggest irony is that Charlie Chan's existence gives the mainstream an alternate view of themselves and not of the Chinese. This "positive" depiction did not contribute to social progressiveness because what he depicted wasn't real. That's why he was so popular - he allowed manistream America to believe that they hadn't acted like savages toward their Asian minorities.

The King Has No Clothes?

2010-08-30T13:44:00.000-07:00

The Oppressed becomes the Oppressor.

No mention of the black Civil Rights struggles of the nineteen-fifties and sixties is complete without a reference to the bravery and determination of the Little Rock Nine. For those unfamiliar with the story, the Little Rock Nine were the first African-American students to attempt enrollment in the segregated Little Rock High School in 1957. The images of the mass of white students shouting racial abuse at them as they enter the school have become almost iconic and are a portent of the abuse they would experience throughout the ensuing school year.

In the year following their enrollment the nine faced continual and repeated harrassment as well as physical abuse and intimidation. One of the nine, Minnie Jean Brown Trickey , after enduring repeated harrassment and abuse was suspended and subsequently expelled for calling one of her tormentors "white trash". Carlotta Walls Lanier was spat on and regularly harrassed by white students. The studious and quiet Jefferson A. Thomas was heavily targeted by bullies. Gloria Cecilia Ray Karlmark was especially targeted by bullies and was jostled, pushed and physically intimidated by white students. Melba Patillo Beals had acid thrown into her face. All of the nine faced daily harrowing abuse, bullying, physical intimidation and violence. All the while the Administrative and teaching staff permitted the violence to continue unabated.

Because of their endurance and bravery, the story of the Little Rock Nine has empowered subsequent generations of the dispossessed and disempowered. All of the nine went on to be successfull in their fields and themselves became community activists. How painful, then, must be the realization that one of the main lessons learned by some of the heirs to the struggle for equality is how to be oppressors.

It's something of a clichè to write that history repeats itself, yet, the ongoing violence and harrassment of Asian students at the hands of the descendants of the Civil Rights movement in South Philly High school proves that this age-old wisdom is sometimes true. As readers may know, the Asian student body at South Philly High School has been involved in an ongoing judicial struggle to have their grievances appropriately addressed by school authorities, who have so far apparently pursued a policy of denial and dishonesty in order to avoid upholding the civil (and human) rights of their Asian students. At the school, students of Asian descent have reported repeated racial baiting, harrassment, intimidation and physical violence all under the watchful indifference of school staff.

It's therefore the greatest irony that Federal investigators have found merit in the complaints of the Asian student body on the anniversary of Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech. The similarities in the experiences of the Little Rock Nine and the Asian students are remarkable. Just like the Little Rock Nine, the Asian students at South Philly want to better themselves through education and hard work. Unfortunately, also like the Little Rock Nine, the Asian student body is being abused by an ignorant group of students whose violence and intimidation has been (allegedly) repeatedly ignored by school authorities. Sadly, on the anniversary of King's speech that inspired oppressed people throughout the world, the heirs to his legacy have been called to address their own oppression of a weaker minority.

Does the King still have clothes?

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H/T Masir Jones at Destroy & Rebuild

Magic Mushroom Clouds

2010-08-15T01:14:00.000-07:00

Being White means never having to say you're sorry.

The annual commemoration of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is typically accompanied by a debate on whether the bombings were justified or simply an act of mass-murder motivated by revenge. Often, this debate then evolves into a discussion on whether the Japanese have done or said enough to redress the actions of their militarist regime of the period. Although Japan has issued several apologies to their Asian neighbours, many still feel that Japan has failed to genuinely, and fully, acknowledge atrocities committed by the Imperial Armies against its former enemies. So, even though it's been sixty-five years since the bombs were dropped, the political and social fallout from their use is still being felt.

Whatever position one takes on these issues, I think most people would agree that imperialism deserves condemnation and that any crimes of brutality resulting from any colonization process should be brought to some kind of justice. By examining the attitudes and ideologies that led imperialist nations to believe that they had the right to brutalize, exploit and enslave others, we are better able to understand the basis for much of the biases and prejudices that exist today, both in the way that international relations are conducted and in the racial dynamics within those societies themselves.

Again, although Japan's apologies are considered by some to be insufficient, of all the nations that attempted colonization of Asia - often brutally savage - Japan is the only one that has actually ever apologized for its actions. Somehow, yet for me unsurprisingly, not one Western country that waged wars of aggression on the peoples of Asia, has ever apologized for any atrocities committed during this process of conquest - even though some of these very nations have been vocal in insisting that Japan apologize for its atrocities.

Part of the reasoning behind the West's insistence that Japan fully acknowledge its atrocities is based upon the fear that without full acceptance of responsibility and the subsequent historical re-interpretation that this would entail, Japan might once again become militaristic. This is sound reasoning, yet the West seems unwilling to apply this reasoning to their own imperialism - "sorry" doesn't seem to be a part of their vocabulary. The biggest irony is that after Japan's defeat, the French, Dutch and the British all returned to their former colonies to wage war against the very Asian countries that they had supposedly fought so hard to free - killing millions in the process.

For a diverse country like America, accepting responsibility for colonial brutality is a necessary step in integrating its minorities. For example, the U.S has by and large accepted responsibility for slavery and by doing so has legitimized programs and policies leading to cultural acceptance and inclusion of the black minority. African-Americans are afforded a degree of respect, deference and empathy not given to other ethnic minorities (at least ideologically). This can be partially explained by the fact that America and other western countries have acknowledged their atrocities and in so doing have placed the presence of its black minorities in a context that supports their specific rights and needs, as well as their very right to be there.

If we compare this to social and cultural attitudes toward East Asian minorities in the U.S, you'll notice a vast difference. There is a fundamental distrust of Asia and its people and Asian-Americans struggle to be recognized as true, loyal Americans. Xenophobia and economic resentments combine to keep Asian-Americans on the periphery of society and therefore vulnerable to violence. Lacking the mechanisms to define and present our own identity, empathy for Asian-Americans is minimized by negative images controlled by a hostile media and propagated by racist institutions.

In short, America exists as the result of colonialism. Its diverse population reflects its past colonial aspirations. Asians are in America as the natural and necessary outcome of America and the West's aggression and interference in our countries. Naturally, this fact isn't covered in the history books. This is why Asians continue to be thought of as outsiders that don't really belong in this society.

I Think, Therefore I Think I'm Asian.

2010-08-06T06:24:00.000-07:00

Pulling Leaders Out Of Our Arses

Of the many factors that contribute to making a good leader, one of the most important has to be a solid philosophical underpinning; a basis of thought that guides actions and determines the nature and method of approach to achieving an objective. A good example is Martin Luther King. A strong and charismatic leader, King campaigned for Civil Rights guided by a philosophy of the intrinsic value of man - a philosophy which he exhibited by pursuing his objectives through non-violent resistance. The strength of King's leadership was determined by the strength and coherence of the philosophies he adhered to.

Clearly, King’s greatest asset was the philosophical wealth that he inherited from both African-American philosophers (W.E.B DuBois, William Fontaine, Alain Locke) and various religious philosophies (Jainist non-violence, Christian compassion). There was a circulation of philosophical ideas and ideals throughout the African-American community that tackled issues of racism, morality, colonialism, identity, and cultural expression. From this dynamic richness of philosophical thought African-American leaders seemed to emerge almost as a necessary consequence of it.

By contrast, we in Asian-America are often left to wonder about the dearth of charismatic Asian leaders. If it is indeed true that philosophical richness can provide fertile ground for leaders to emerge and that there is a dearth of Asian-American leaders, it’s unsurprising to find that there seems to be a dearth of Asian-American philosophers also. What exactly is the philosophy of Asian-America? Are we shapers of American destiny or the implementers? Are we in the vanguard of a new America that looks to the East with affection equal to its affection for the West? Is our future full assimilation? Do we need a semi-autonomous United States of Asian-America? What is our vision and who are our visionaries?

In short, I would submit that as a community our need to reassure the xenophobic mainstream that we are “people, just like them”, may perhaps have stifled the development of an Asian-American vision and stunted the emergence of a hotbed of philosophical ideas competing against one another to be the best guide for our future. This may be because of fears that Asian-Americans with new social or political ideas would contribute to xenophobic fear and reprisals against the community. Yet it seems to me that the first step in the emergence of a consciousness has to be through the examination and evaluation of ideas, even those that are scary or uncomfortable.

Clearly, our lack of leadership may be partially but directly attributed to a lack of philosophical richness. A necessary part of that philosophical richness has to include the exploration of concepts and ideas that are uncomfortable, ugly or even frightening. Yet, in the spirit of free inquiry we must be willing to do this regardless of the consequences – if we can’t be free with our ideas, then we’re not really free. We need to move beyond supporting existing paradigms and become the creators of new paradigms.

We Don't Need Another Hero.

2010-07-27T12:41:00.000-07:00

Roll away the Models......

A perusal of commentaries by many Asian-American men in the media, be it blogs, news articles or even some academic literature, will reveal a remarkable fact; many of us believe that the media doesn't provide us with any respectable role models! This is remarkable for two reasons; firstly, I think it's arguable that the media can provide role models, and secondly it's not their job to provide role models. Here's why.....

1) The Media is a poor medium for providing role models.

When most people speak of media role models, they usually mean the movies or television, i.e. movie representations that shows a white hero being heroic and getting lots of play in the process. According to some, this type of representation is supposed to lead to a sense of confidence and warm fuzzy feelings of masculinity in the (male) viewer. Conversely, Asian men are never portrayed as heroes or lovers and so the prevailing wisdom is that this lack of "role models" contributes to feelings of diffidence and emasculation.

The problem is that most media representations aren't real; they're made-up stories that present simplistic depictions of motivations, circumstances and emotions. As such, these types of media characterizations are simply sophisticated caricatures, a form of visual sloganeering if you will. By its very nature, sloganeering is a vulgar, in-bred second cousin to the arts, and as history teaches us, societies that buy into the myths promoted by media sloganeering will produce – at worst - easily-led, unthinking masses that can be manipulated into believing that things like genocide can be justified.

With this in mind, it seems strange that Asian men would even want the media to be the vehicle that provides Asian role models. Certainly, to argue for positive representations is justified, but to desire that the media create Asian role models is both bizarre and dangerous. It’s bizarre because it would seem far more commonsensical to promote a healthy skeptical agnosticism toward what we see in the media, whether those images be positive or negative. It’s dangerous because it creates the false belief that we actually need the provision of media role models.

In short, it’s illogical to argue that the media is motivated to misrepresent Asian men, and at the same time give responsibility to this same institution to provide us with role models.

2) It isn’t the job of the media to provide role models.

Why? Well, because it’s our job, as Asian men, to assume the personal responsibility to be role models for Asian boys. It’s our job to nurture their burgeoning minds to avoid negativity and defeatism, and to exhibit the qualities of masculinity that they might want to emulate. It’s our job to nurture the sense of confidence and self-belief that they will need in order to thrive in a society that demeans them.

When I hear or read Asian guys saying that they never had media role models to look up to, what they really seem to be saying is that they had no role models at all - which seems like a far more serious problem. If they did have a figure in their formative years that they could look up to and emulate, then the lack of a media role model would be a non-issue. So, a more profound problem seems to be that some Asian men feel as though there are no Asian role models who are directly involved in the shaping of their lives and attitudes.Whether or not this is true is up to the reader to decide.

To summarize, it seems evident that the perceived need or desire for media provided role models is less urgent than the need for Asian men to assume the responsibility of becoming role models. Looking to the institution of the media to give us role models is tantamount to accepting the authority of the media over our own lives.

Program on Violence Against Asian American Students: The Philadelphia Story

2010-07-23T03:43:00.000-07:00

From the API Movement Blog......

API Movement Building Boston and other groups will be hosting an event with students and community members active in fighting for Asian American student safety after attacks on them at South Philadelphia Highs School……………

……let’s hope for a good turnout.

Especially interesting for me is this;

What happened? How did the students and community build an effective coalition, what is the legal case and situation, did anti-immigrant sentiment played any role, and are Asian American students facing similar issues locally?

As I outlined, here, my sense is that much of the identity (and some other) issues experienced by many in the Asian community may be partially resolved when this problem is addressed. The marginalization of the Asian community begins in the first grade. It’s time to end the cycle. The first step to empowerment of the community has to be the empowerment of our children.

Most if not all East Asian children experience race related harassment and/or bullying in American schools. Of all the things we experience as a community, this is one of the things that is most universal and one which any East Asian who went through the school system of any western country will be familiar. Strangely, the often administration/teacher enabled harassment of Asian kids is an issue that, for whatever reason, the general Asian community seems reluctant to address with any passion. The situation at South Philly is by no means an isolated phenomenon, the only difference may be one of degree and blatancy.

My, what big balls you have!

2010-07-20T06:11:00.000-07:00

An Asian-American hero.

Where?!! Where?!! Here, via the Angry Asian Man....Jeremy Lin.

Lin is a fine example of what it will take for Asian men to become empowered. So why do I think that Lin is such a hero even though he still might never play first team basketball? Simply put, the odds are so stacked against him, that to get even as far as he has is a heroic achievement.

As we all know, the idea of Asian male athletes competing successfully with non-white athletes is a paradigm far outside the realm of possibility for many people - including some Asians. The mainstream likes to (no, needs to) believe that Asian men are inherently weaker or slower than they, and for some Asian cultures a career in sport is somewhat shameful and so they don’t encourage their sons to partake, let alone excel. Of course, even more ominously, some Asian boys are told by their families that they are too small, or too weak to compete with westerners, and so mentally they are set up to fail.

Furthermore, many Asian boys feel the weight of media stereotyping to be an almost insurmountable hurdle to their success. This is why Lin’s example is powerful; he has apparently been single-minded in working for what he wants. Stereotypes, negativity, and racism have not stopped him from striving. Most interestingly, Lin never seems to cite a lack of media role models as a hurdle to his determination to succeed, or his belief that he can succeed. This, for me, is the most important point and one that I will probably expand upon in a later post.

In the meantime, kudos to Jeremy Lin!

The Ten Commandments.

2010-07-20T06:10:00.000-07:00

These are the guidelines for restricting images of Asian men in the media.

1. Thou shall not have sex.

2. Thou shall not be attractive or sexually potent.

3. Thou shall not be the partner of an Asian female character.

4. Thou shall not be a leader.

5. Thou shall not have a girlfriend.

6. Thou shall not play Genghis Khan.

7. Thou shall not kiss.

8. Thou shall not be confident.

9. Thou shall not be moral.

10. Thou shall be a misogynist.

It’s very rare that we will see a depiction of Asian men that isn’t guided by some or most of these commandments. The mainstream is heavily invested in restricting the depiction of Asian men to these limited qualities.

What are they so afraid of?

I want to be Black!

2010-07-07T02:39:00.000-07:00

How the appropriation of black stereotypes rescued the sexual potency of white men.

I’ve always been fascinated with the way that stereotypes of Asian men have changed over the decades. Prior to the 1970’s, stereotypes of Asian men included a sexual dimension not present in today’s depictions. Throughout the mid-to-late 19th century and through to the first half of the 20th, Asian men were depicted as rapacious sexual deviants - Chinese men were stereotyped as craving white women and were considered a threat to their sexual purity. Filipino men were stereotyped as sexual powerhouses, irresistible to white women and preying on their innocence.

Over the past thirty years, these ideas of Asian men’s sexual potency have diminished whilst the stereotypes of Asian men as nerds, losers and sexual inferiors has increased. The shift has been dramatic and the apparent need to simultaneoulsy elevate the image of sexual primacy of white men has seemed almost pathological in its urgency. What then could be the cause of this shift and the almost hysterical manner that characterizes its social and cultural expression?

The first clue is the timing of this shift. The seventies saw the culmination of two decades of social upheaval in America and in particular three shifts in social paradigms that challenged the sexual confidence of the white males who dominated society. Women (white women specifically) became more empowered to demand their rights and asserted their control over their own sexuality. Civil Rights outlawed discrimination and along with it anti-miscegenation laws that forbade interracial relationships were repealed. Most importantly, the seventies saw the previously taboo notion of the hyper-sexualized black male come to the fore.

The combination of these three factors meant that the sexual primacy of white men was no longer guaranteed by racist laws and disempowered white women. Furthermore, the preference of many white women for black partners diminished confidence even further. It’s no wonder that we see such a dramatic reaction to this loss of sexual assuredness. Not content with the sloppy seconds of African-American men, the fight to reclaim sexual pride was on. For this to be achieved a new class of sexual "omega" was created that would divert attention away from the increasingly apparent flaccid potency of the white mainstream.

Almost in the blink of an eye, Asian men became asexual in the imagery of American culture and the process of appropriating the hyper-sexualized image of black men and applying it to white men had begun. The loss of power over the choices of white women and the sense of inadequacy this created was cushioned by the newly created myths of white male sexual hyper-potency. Simultaneously, stereotypes of Asian male sexual inadequacy increased. The rest is history.

Since the 1970’s popular cultural images of Asian men in America have become increasingly demeaning. The turn-around is so complete (and a necessary safeguard of the fragile white dick) that images of an empowered and sexually confident Asian man are anathema to this culture. The fear of Asian male sexual potency is so profound, that Asian men are even forbidden from taking roles in historical movies where the main character was an extremely powerful and sexually potent Asian (see here). In fact, non-demeaning images of Asian men are largely restricted in American society and media for this reason.

So to summarize, it's clear that social and cultural denigration of Asian men is an attempt to salvage the sexual pride of white men. In order to achieve this, the stereotype of black hyper-potency was appropriated and Asian men were assigned the role of the sexual underclass. Restrictions on positive images of Asian men reinforces the position of Asian men in this underclass. It just has to be remembered that these negative images of Asian men are part of a larger myth building process, the goal of which is to prop up the sexual self-image of the white mainstream.

It’s not my fault!!!

2010-07-02T02:02:00.000-07:00

Or.....how the Asian Patriarchy can give you herpes.

Earlier this year a rather disturbing study was done by Asian-American sociologist Professor Hyeouk Chris Hahm that revealed a disproportionately high incidence of sexually transmitted diseases amongst young Asian American women. Read about it here. Sad but true.

Study aside, what I found to be interesting about the article, is the rather predictable conclusions that Hahm draws when suggesting causes for this problem. This is what she says about it…..

Accounting for the gender disparity, Hahm suggested that again, culture may be playing a critical role. “Condom use is hard in a culture where women are raised to be accommodating and polite.”

Obvious, right? Asian women are supposedly raised to be submissive and passive, so it’s natural that given this upbringing, young Asian women will not be assertive in many or most aspects of their lives. Case closed, right? I don’t think so.

Hopefully the problems with Hahm’s reasoning will be obvious to the unbiased reader. Clearly, Hahm is suggesting that traditional Asian cultures do a piss poor job of raising strong women. I don’t think this is necessarily true, but let’s put that aside and examine the facts against the presumed cause. Young Asian-American women are evidently engaging in risky sexual behaviour – lax attitudes to condom use and increased risk of exposure to disease resulting from different interracial dating habits. As Hahm says…..

“Asian and Pacific Islander women also have broader interracial dating patterns than Asian American men. This might explain why these women are exposed to higher rates of STDs.”

As with many cases of high risk behaviour, unprotected sex with multiple partners is also a factor. Can you see the problem with this picture?

Hahm believes that these Asian women are so deeply enculturated to be submissive that they can’t muster the assertiveness to compel their sexual partners to use a condom. This is strange indeed! As many readers will know, a traditional Asian upbringing expects Asian girls to be chaste, and sexually demure. It’s expected that a women not date casually, and that preferably they should remain virgins until they marry. It’s also traditional that an Asian woman marry someone within their own social and ethnic group. Any potential husband is usually vetted by the parents and sometimes even chosen by the parents. Sex before marriage is a huge taboo.

Given the above description of tradition, do you see the problem with Hahm’s conclusion? Clearly any young Asian woman engaging in risky sexual behaviour has rejected just about all of what is expected of her, and rebelled against her traditional upbringing. Hahm wants us to believe that despite this rejection of sexual chasteness and traditional roles, that these women somehow retain the submissiveness of their traditional upbringing. These women have the confidence to rebel against centuries of tradition yet they can’t make their boyfriends put on a condom? It’s nonsense.

Of course what is really being said is that it's all the fault of The Asian Patriarchy - the usual suspect. It has become all too easy to point the finger at "The Patriarchy"! The Asian Patriarchy is to blame when Asian women are too weak, too strong, too loud or too quiet. If she makes wrong choices in her lovelife, it's the fault of the Patriarchy, if she adheres to tradition and lives an unhappy life, it's the fault of the patriarchy. If she rejects tradition and acquires an STD, it's still the fault of the Patriarchy!

The fact is that no-one is to blame but the women themselves. Let’s be honest about it, let’s not create victims where they don’t exist. If a woman is strong and confident enough to reject centuries of tradition and expectation, then it’s unreasonable to suggest that she isn’t strong enough to insist on safe sex. Blaming tradition comes nowhere near to being an appropriate explanation for this phenomenon. Even worse, it hijacks any effort to find the truth, after all the answer is so obvious, why delve any deeper?

Hating the Airbenders!

2010-06-29T06:30:00.000-07:00

I started this blog only this month mainly to present a series of essays and commentaries on some of the issues facing Asian-Americans, particularly Asian-American men. One such issue is media “whitewashing”, i.e., the habitual use of white actors to play characters who are Asian, both fictional and historical and usually it is Asian male characters who are whitewashed out. Another aspect of this phenomenon, as it relates to Asian men, is the issue of whitewashing Asian men out of relationships with Asian women, i.e., an apparent ubiquity of onscreen partnerships involving white men and Asian women, yet very few involving Asian men and Asian women (but this is another story!).

As an Asian man, I’m fully aware of how invisible we are in the media, and I get it that invisibility increases the influence of negative stereotyping. I also get it that challenging invisibility in the media and media misrepresentations is a necessary part of the struggle to end dehumanizing images of Asians. Unfortunately, my feeling is that as much imbalance there is in the media, the response to it by Asian-Americans is equally out of balance. It seems to me that there is a movement of sorts within the Asian-American community that seeks to elevate issues with the media over that of real civil rights issues. I think of this as something of a “populist” movement – populist in the sense that there is an ability to mobilize apparently large numbers of supporters across the nation to protest and engage in demonstrations against whatever media issue is at hand. The Airbender issue is a perfect example of this populism in action.

Most people reading this will probably be familiar with the issue. Briefly, many Asian-Americans (i.e. East Asian-Americans) are peeved that a live action movie re-do of a Nickelodeon cartoon has used non-East-Asian actors/actresses to play characters who were apparently East-Asian in the original cartoon. The response has been immaculate! Letter-writing campaigns, demonstrations, accusations that the director is being racist, and calls for a boycott. I have been amazed!

Recently, I wrote a post (here) about the ongoing struggles faced by Asian-American children in South Philly High School. What seems to be happening there is that Asian children have been targeted for harassment and violence. Beatings of Asian children are routine, and racial baiting is reportedly initiated in some instances by teaching staff. School admins are and have been fully aware of the problem, yet apparently continue to permit an environment of anti-Asian bias in the school. Evidently, this seems to be a major issue that suggests the civil rights of Asian children are being abused.

What is remarkable is the seeming lack of prolonged outspoken national support for these beleaguered children. In the first few days that the story broke, somewhat nationally, several Asian bloggers carried the story, there was some degree of national support in the form of monetary donations (I believe), but since those first few days, the issue has quietly slipped from the popular Asian conscience (although some Asian bloggers continue updating the situation). By and large, the kids and civil rights advocates at South Philly are apparently on their own.

Compare now the response to the Last Airbender whitewashing issue. Since the casting for the movie was announced in 2008, the issue has been kept fresh in the hearts and minds of Asian-Americans across the U.S with repeated calls for letter writing campaigns, boycotts, protests, and so on and so forth. There’s even a website devoted entirely to the campaign. Yikes!

Here is my confusion; why aren’t we getting this worked up about our kids being basically lynched in South Philly? Where are the one day walk-outs by Asian kids across the country in support? Where are the thousands of letter-writers? Where are the weekly demonstrations around the country that keeps the pressure on the South Philly school district? Why aren’t we more angry about it?

Whilst I empathize with the frustration and pain of media whitewashing, I find it hard to understand how the Airbender issue can assume so much importance that it eclipses an overt case of institutionalized racism. People and societies form ideas about people in many ways. The Asian community is extremely concerned about its image in the media, yet, I can’t help but wonder what kind of image we are presenting with our apparent failure to get our priorities straight. I think that prioritizing media whitewashing and misrepresentation over civil rights issues is ultimately as detrimental to our very real cause as the media whitewashing itself.

Good-Looking for an Asian guy!!!

2010-06-28T00:58:00.000-07:00

If I had ten cents for every time I had seen or heard this statement I would probably be quite well off! We all have a sister, cousin, aunt or even our mothers(!) who would routinely state something along the lines of; “(he) is quite good looking……for an Asian!” or it’s several variations – “(he) has a nice nose…..for an Asian”, or “(he) is strong/fast/tough…….for an Asian” etc. You get the picture. In fact, it would probably be accurate to say that most, if not all, Asian-American men grow up hearing this so many times throughout their childhood and on into adulthood that they believe that it’s entirely unusual that anyone would consider Asian men to be attractive.

What is the standard by which these guys, who may be attractive despite being Asian, are measured? Of course, the answer is the Caucasian standard. The reality is that for many Asian women involved in raising Asian boys, the attractiveness of Asian men is dependant upon the degree to which their physical characteristics resemble those of white men. Few even recognize the underlying prejudice this statement entails. It’s not that these women are being wicked or deliberately racist, they have somehow deemed it acceptable to impart to their sons and brothers the idea that Asian characteristics aren’t as desirable as those of Caucasian men, and that when Asian men do measure up to the white standard, that this something extremely unusual and is something to be admired.

Although the examples given above are specific, this phenomenon seems to be part of a wider problem that exists amongst Asian-Americans. It seems to me that as a community we seem to permit ideas and attitudes which if we were to apply to those outside our race or community, we would consider extremely offensive and racist. One of the most prevalent yet casual expressions of this racism is of course, the attitude and its ubiquitous reinforcement that it’s unusual or unbelievable that Asian men can be attractive or desirable. These attitudes will typically suggest that Asian men are, almost by definition, less than. Asian-Americans would disown and lynch their own mothers if they were to say perhaps that Denzel Washington is good-looking for a black man. They wouldn’t tolerate it. Yet, we tolerate this attitude when speaking about our own brothers.

Much is written and discussed on the subject of the emasculation issues of Asian-American men. What seems to be the most common belief is that the media emasculates Asian men through derogatory stereotyping. Whilst I don’t deny that there is a media war being waged against Asian men, I question whether this is enough to cause the sense of emasculation and disempowerment one seems to see expressed by some Asian men. It seems obvious to me that if an Asian boy grows up in a household where it is believed and reinforced that Asian men are typically unattractive or that Asian men are unable to compete physically with his non-Asian peers, then that boy will develop a pretty profound sense of inadequacy about himself. The media simply provides the icing on the cake.

Certainly, it makes sense to challenge media stereotypes that are detrimental to the psychological well-being of Asian boys, but to pursue this course without challenging the negative reinforcement that many Asian boys receive from within their own families is like building a house on a weak foundation. Even if we were to persuade the media to change its representations of Asian men, the issue of confidence and emasculation would remain because a good deal of these problems stems from the negative messages Asian boys receive in their formative years.

This must be the first step to Asian male empowerment; to challenge and overcome commonly held beliefs within Asian families themselves that are fundamentally demeaning for Asian men, and contribute to the sense of emasculation that many of them experience.

South Philly and lessons from the Jena 6.

2010-06-20T00:10:00.000-07:00

The API Movement blog recently wrote an update on the latest obfuscations of the South Philly School District who are engaging in an apparent campaign of deceit in an attempt remedy their tarnished image and stave off criticisms of their (lack of appropriate) handling of ethnic violence in South Philly High School. Here is the API story, read it and weep.

It's rare to see institutionalized racism against Asians so blatant and transparent as we are witnessing from the goons of the South Philly administration and teaching staff. These are the people who have the responsibility to raise the next generation to be productive citizens, and the bearers of the torch of American freedom and democracy. Given their evident dishonesty, and criminal indifference in upholding the civil rights and safety of our children (both Asian and black) it seems more likley that they are working hard to raise the next generation of criminals and racists.

It is ominous in the extreme to realize that South Philly administrators and teachers apparently seem completely comfortable with ignoring any sense of morality and feel empowered to ignore apparent criminal violence amongst their student body. Worse still is the apparent willingness to obstruct the process of justice by destroying reports describing the continuing violence.

While this case (and others like it, remember Lafayette?) has met with a strong response from Asian civil rights groups and local advocacy groups, and has been reported by several Asian-American bloggers, the case has remained a largely local affair. Could it be that the staff and administration of South Philly are empowered by the fact that advocacy for our kids in the school has been allowed to be contained within a relatively small geographical area, and has similarly met with relatively little national attention even from Asian-Americans?

Compare, for instance, the case of the so-called “Jena 6” in Louisiana. Briefly, six African-American high school students had been arrested for beating a white student amidst rising racial tensions and confrontations at their school. The subsequent arrests of the six, gave rise to outrage and accusations of racial injustice by civil rights groups and black advocacy groups. The outcry against this perceived racial injustice became a national phenomenon. Most notable was a rally on the day one defendant was to be sentenced that was attended by around 20,000 people – this in a town of less than 3,000. Thousands of demonstrators had been bussed in for the rally and several local demonstrations of support took place around the country. The message was loud and clear; the Jena 6 were not alone and the nation was watching.

The lesson here is clear. The Asian-American community doesn’t seem to realize that it is being outmaneuvered and contained by a South Philly staff that is motivated to keep the status quo and uphold the institution of anti-Asian racism in the American public school system. By allowing the problem to be contained and localized we are disempowering our activists. Why aren’t there more rallies of support across the nation? Where are the letter writing campaigners? Surely if we can muster the motivation to act on a national scale over issues such as media stereotyping, and whitewashing of Asian characters, we can also find the motivation to rally in support of our kids miles away in South Philly.

There are numerous Chinatowns and Asian enclaves throughout the U.S.A - I urge Asian-Americans to take up their banners, and march peacefully through your local Chinatown and help draw attention to this injustice being committed against our children.

“Dollar a Day, Dime a Dance”

2010-06-15T06:35:00.000-07:00

Asian men; America really needs you!

Readers may recognize the title of this essay from a chapter out of the Ronald Takaki book “Strangers from a Different Shore”. The chapter outlines the experiences of the mainly male Filipino immigrants to the U.S in the 1920’s and 30’s. What is most interesting about the account is how, in many ways, the Filipino experiences were vastly different from that of Chinese or Japanese immigrants.

A primary difference seemed to be a relative lack of a cultural aversion to ethnic/cultural/social mixing with outsiders. Whereas, according to Takaki, Japanese and Chinese immigrants possessed a drive to maintain ethnic/cultural purity, the Filipinos seemed to have no such notions of cultural or ethnic purity. Consequently, Filipino immigrants of the time regularly and brazenly defied anti-miscegenation laws to consort with white women. Of course, this outraged white men and threatened their apparently fragile sexual prowess and led to terrible racial violence, harassment and victimization of Filipino men with white women. Many mixed race couples simply didn’t go out in public together, even if they had children together, because it was deemed too dangerous.

Carlos Bulosan (the great Filipino-American writer, who was also an immigrant to the U.S.A during this period and witnessed first-hand much of this anti-miscegenation hostility) in his book “America is in the Heart” records many incidences of violence and discrimination directed at Filipino male/white female couplings. Reading some the accounts is heart-wrenching. Discrimination, harassment and violent attacks characterized the lives of those Filipino men brave enough to cross the racial divide.

Both books describe the hostility of white men to the fact that white women found Filipinos to be extremely attractive, sexually preferable and that Filipino men were pursued by white women. What comes through in these accounts is the degree of fear of the Filipino male’s potent sexuality. Subsequent laws limiting any further immigration of Filipinos were enacted with this sexual fear in mind. What a remarkable contrast to the way that Asian men are perceived in America today!

At the present time, Asian men are well and truly discarded, disregarded and demeaned by many in American society. Our value as partners has been diminished – even by some within the community itself. Our masculinity itself is regularly demeaned and relegated as substandard. To me, this shows that the fear of our sexual potency that was so openly expressed in the 20’ and 30’s still exists and is now expressed as media ridicule and enabled by social marginalization. Now the fear of Asian men’s sexuality is hidden behind the bravado of sexual posturing of an insecure mainstream. This is supported by media misrepresentations, , and negative stereotyping, which are sadly endorsed as truth by some within the Asian community.

The truth is that mainstream America has this fantasy about Asian men. It really needs for us to be weaker, less attractive, less masculine and less potent. It needs us to be strange and ridiculous. It needs us to appear weak so that it doesn’t have to face the fact of our potency. Asian men; the mainstream fears you and really needs for its misrepresentations of you to be true.

They fear that you will prove that you are equal in every way.

Giving Credit Where It's Not Due!!

2010-06-11T05:27:00.000-07:00

Are media stereotypes responsible for identity crises in Asian-Americans, and do they contribute to social diffidence in Asian men and the high rate of out-dating of Asian women?

This is certainly a loaded question! It is a topic that gets debated, analyzed and thrashed out by any Asian-Americans seeking the societal and political advancement of their community in America. I think it would be fair to say that most Asian-Americans are dissatisfied with how Asians are depicted in the media and film, and many believe that these depictions contribute to anti-Asian discrimination.

There are still yet others in the Asian-American community who go further than this in suggesting that stereotyping leads to crises of identity for Asians, a supposed diffidence amongst Asian men (if indeed Asian men are generally diffident!), and causes Asian women to fawn over white men! This seems to be a somewhat popularly held belief within the general Asian-American population. I agree entirely that negative media stereotypes foster racist attitudes, and perhaps even desensitize viewers to the inhumanity of racism toward Asians; but, can media depictions be implicated as the major cause of diffidence, identity issues and sexual obsession to the degree that some in the community would suggest?

I don’t think it would be inaccurate to say that many – perhaps most – Asian-Americans see media depictions as one of the major, if not the major, stumbling block to the advancement of the community. In this essay I will explore these ideas and present a solid case for why I believe that so much focus on the idea that changing the media will be a resolution to these problems may itself hold back the community.

For me, there is no doubt that Asian-Americans experience identity and assimilation issues. A sense of not belonging, being an outsider and perhaps even isolation are somewhat common experiences for Asian-Americans. Media rejection of images of Asians as Americans may certainly exacerbate this problem. The issue of confidence levels amongst Asian-American men is often cited as evidence of media emasculation, and that stereotyping leads to disempowered Asian men. Certainly the most contentious issue is that of interracial dating and the role the media plays in the high outdating rates of Asian women. The media is often cited as being responsible for brainwashing young Asian-American girls who subsequently grow up craving white men.

All of these phenomena are real; many Asians do experience identity crises, many Asian men have a sense of disempowerment, and a substantial percentage of Asian-American women do show a preference for non-Asian men. But is it too simplistic of an assessment to blame media depictions for these realities? I believe that this thinking is inaccurate and perhaps even damaging. Individuals do not derive their identity entirely from what they observe in the media or film and the drives that motivate any human being seem to be far more complex (and often subconscious) than simple reactions to media depictions would suggest. In a strange twist of irony, suggesting that Asians can be so easily influenced in this way is itself a negative depiction, and in some ways, may contribute to the sense of disempowerment that Asians experience. If media depictions aren’t the primary culprit, then what can explain these phenomena? For me the answer is obvious; persistent racial harassment throughout childhood is more likely to result in identity and confidence issues than negative media stereotypes.

To illustrate, I’ll briefly describe some of the experiences common to Asian-Americans who are raised in the United States, and I have very little doubt that many Asian-Americans reading this will be very familiar with the experiences I describe. Most American children of Asian descent will experience racism in varying degrees from the moment they enter the school system aged five, until they graduate high school and perhaps even beyond into college. The nature of this racism will vary; name-calling, vulgar imitations of “Asian” accents, and mockery of Asian physical ethnic characteristics on one end of the scale, with violence, and physical intimidation on the other (although these days harassment seems to be slowly developing a more violent character). This type of harassment is often a regular ordeal, occurring daily for many.

Sadly, for many Asian-American children, the adults whose job it is to ensure their safety (teachers and administrators) seem unable or are simply reluctant to create an environment where harassment of Asians is marginalized or addressed in any meaningful way. In fact, the sheer routine prevalence and apparent acceptance of harassment of Asian children as normal casts an almost surreal sheen on the whole subject, since for the most part it is ignored or swept under the carpet. Thus, the trauma of such experiences are often underplayed, not believed, or simply denied.

It seems more plausible that these experiences of racism and denial play a much larger role in shaping what Asian-Americans believe about themselves, their identity, and perhaps even influences their dating choices, more than any media depiction possibly could. What could be more obvious? Through the medium of racially motivated harassment young Asian-Americans are given the clear message that they are deficient, physically unattractive, unwelcome, and generally less than. The problem is further exacerbated by the attitude that these anti-Asian attitudes are not abnormal.

It is generally accepted that individuals form much of their sense of identity, self-perception, self-esteem and ideas of their place in the world during childhood and adolescence. Given that the experiences of many Asian children are dominated throughout their school lives by demeaning harassment and even threats of violence from their non-Asian peers, it seems far more reasonable to propose these factors as more primary causes of confidence and identity issues, and which in turn may even offer some partial explanation for high out-dating rates amongst Asian women.

It’s clear then, that the experience of racism in childhood is likely to be more damaging to the psyche of Asian-Americans than media depictions ever could be, and the issues under discussion that are often associated with negative media influence may actually not be the result of media stereotyping. It is evident that this explanation is obsolete and that striving to change media depictions in the belief that this would address these issues would actually fail to accomplish this goal.

By conflating the two issues and assuming a common resolution, we are in some ways ourselves failing to acknowledge the gravity of the effects of school racism on young Asian-Americans and how this may affect them throughout their lives. This presumption may also smother any perception that there may even be a need for more thorough exploration and study of how racism affects Asian children and thus deprive them of the depth of community support and mentoring they may need in learning to overcome prejudice. Furthermore, it is impossible to address these issues effectively if the causes are misidentified.

It seems evident then, that although media stereotyping is an important issue that has negative effects on the Asian community and the way that we are perceived by the mainstream, its role in shaping the self-perceptions of young Asian-Americans is often over-rated and its power of influence is often overblown. I see no good reason to believe that media depictions have more power to influence the self-image of Asians than any negative experiences of discrimination that they may have grown up with.