12.20.07
Posted in Business at 9:56 pm by william_lee
I have a difficult time flipping through the news these days without seeing some mainstream news outlet telling me that I should boycott goods from China, or telling me about something about Asian people that is wierd, unusual, out of the ordinary, or basically some reason why I should really really really feel embarrassed about my Asian ancestry. Man, the things I have to go through to prove that I was born in the U.S.A. Anyway, we’ve mentioned in previous posts that there is a relationship between
- mass media’s encouragement of people to boycott goods from China
and
- a shiny brand new flavor of yellow peril coming out of retirement
Mainstream media outlets are really quick to play up, in big bold letters and giant sized .jpg images why everyone should think Americans of Asian ancestry are spies, but they are very quiet when it comes to telling you stories about the ways in which China bails out American businesses left, right and center.
This article from the Wall Street Journal mentions, “Like UBS and Citigroup, Morgan Stanley is getting a cash infusion from a foreign government. It announced that a Chinese investment fund will pay $5 billion for an eventual 9.9% stake.”
Don’t you find it at all ironic that America wants to invoke fear and hatred towards China, while at the same time its financial power houses are going over there begging for a $5 billion bailout due to their own bone-head trading decisions and mis-steps? You want to call out China on the innumerable human rights? Go ahead. Blow the whistle on corruption, prisoners of conscious, and other humanitarian outrages? That cool. I’m just saying that it’s a little hypocritical to do that and then turn around and say “Psssst…. hey China! Can you spot me $5 billion?”
Am I wrong?
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Posted in Activism and Empowerment, Fun Facts, Racism, China at 9:10 pm by mark_chang
Now William, you should know that tossing out a tasty morsel such as “micro-aggression” is going to get me out of bed to chomp at the bit ; )
So I offer a snippet from the “Communication” chapter of my upcoming book (written from the perspective of a Chinese person, modify nationality as appropriate) which will hopefully get the wheels turning so that others may develop more clever ‘jeu d’esprit’s …
“Where You From?”
You meet somebody for the first time and one of the first things he asks is … “So where are you from?”, probably in front of others.
10. The playful response:
“I’m from an island called Chakalakalaka. It’s in the South Pacific”
9. The surprised response:
“Where am I from? Wow, you just come out guns ‘a blazin’ don’t you?”
8. The coincidental response:
“Ha, I was just about to ask you the same thing, how ironic is that? I’m from China and you? Oh <offender’s country (if they say USA ask “so you’re a Native American?” and keep pressing for their origins>, so tell me, are you intrigued by the mysteries of the Orient?”
7. The questioning response:
“Why is that always the first question I get asked? Do you get asked that? How come my friend Bob Smith never gets asked that?”
6. The professional response:
“China, and where are you from?”
5. The metrosexual response:
“Oh I’m a local (or U.S. city or state or origin), oh do you mean what is my nationality? I’m Chinese, is that ok? And what’s your nationality?”
4. The friendly response:
“China. Hey we’ve all got our flaws right?” Follow up with a playful slap on the shoulder while laughing as if you’ve just made a hilarious joke.
3. The camraderie response:
“Born and raised in the USA baby.”
(when asked about your nationality) “American citizen by birth baby just like you.”
(when pushed to describe your genetic stock) “My ancestors came from China, oh <slight pause> maybe I’m not just like you, <slight reflective pause> aw man, now this is gonna keep me up at night.”
2. The antagonistic response:
“Fresh off the boat from China, yup I’m one of the bad guys. Working for low pay driving down your wages, corrupting your gene pool with our exotic women. Getting good grades and forcing you to spend money on affirmative action programs. Ha ha ha, oh not funny? No good? Aw c’mon lighten up.”
1. The angry response (to a smart ass):
“Your mother’s pussy, bitch.” (the watered down version would be: “why do you want to know (or what does it matter) where I’m from?”
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Posted in Crime at 8:43 pm by william_lee
According to this article, a bone-head SWAT team in Minneapolis decided to fire an alleged 22 bullets into the home of a peaceful and hard-working Hmong family of 8 before figuring out that this was not the drug-dealing cesspool that they originally thought it was. Yup. They raided the wrong house.
Now, I’d like to request that you, the reader, forget for a moment about how this was a monumental f___ up on the part of the SWAT team. Forget about the fact that this family was EXTREMELY lucky that no one in the family was hurt. Forget about all of that and answer this question honestly:
This family was American Hmong. If the family had been of a different ancestry, what would have happened in the aftermath? ‘Cuz you know that no one in America cares about an alleged 22 bullets fired at the wrong American Asian person. Provide your answers for each of these:
A) White American
B) Non-white American
My guess? White family wrongfully attacked -> Everyone jumps up to compensate them. Non-white American family wrongfully attacked -> nobody cares. Am I wrong?
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Posted in Crime at 8:25 pm by admin
According to this article,
 |
| Isaac Nathan Tillis, 29 |
BARTOW, Fla. — Police said a Bartow High School student hoping to improve her math grades through extra credit instead got a lewd request from her teacher.
Isaac Nathan Tillis, 29, was arrested after repeatedly telling student she could earn an “A” if she gave him oral sex. He lured the girl into a teacher’s lounge bathroom on Wednesday, but once inside police and the girl sprung a trap.
The 16-year-old was wearing a hidden listening device, which recorded Tillis’ proposition after he dropped his pants, police say. The teacher had also scribbled his request on a hall pass, an arrest report states.
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Posted in Culture, Media and Entertainment, Sexuality, Offbeat at 6:54 pm by telly_wong
Nuts in her mouth: I guess she’s straight after all
This past Tuesday saw the long-awaited finale of MTV’s “A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila”, the trashy “reality” dating show that featured 16 straight men and 16 lesbians vying for the elfin hand of the supposedly bisexual professional MySpace friend Tila Tequila.
After two months (which I’m guessing took a mere two weeks to actually film) of hot tub shenanigans, crocodile tears and lesbian kisses, Tila’s final two contenders were a white guy named Bobby and a white lesbian named Dani. Perhaps following in the great tradition of well-worn interracial dating paradigms, Tila chose Bobby.
Maybe I’m being naive here but since she’s “bisexual”, couldn’t she have just picked both?
I’m not gonna get started on why this show sucks because I’m sure many of you already know. It was bad enough that none of the male suitors appeared to be Asian (for the politically correct, if one of them happened to be half or a quarter or an eighth or a sixteenth Asian, they certainly didn’t look it, and, unfortunately, that’s what counts when we’re discussing media representation), but as someone with a young sister, I’m concerned about the message “Shot” sends to the young people of America: Asian women are sexually promiscuous playthings.
Unfortunately, instead of being a pimple on my ass that will soon go away, this Tila Tequila phenomenon looks like it’s developed into a full-blown anal fissure that’s gonna stick around. The show was a ratings smash, according to an MTV press release, that averaged 6 million viewers per episode and was MTV’s second highest-rated telecast of the year. More alarming, however, was the series finale was the most watched telecast across all of television among 12 to 34 year olds.
Now call me an old fart, but as a concerned adult, should early adolescent kids be exposed to theatrical bisexual antics (as opposed to a real lifestyle) at a time when many are still developing and/or exploring their sexual identity?
My other beef with the Tila Tequila show is that it continues to reinforce the American public’s narrow perception of who Asian folks are and what we’re all about in American society.
While some idiots will point to VH1’s own trashy “reality” dating show “I Love New York” as an example of mass media’s colorblindness when it comes to the stereotype-affirming exploitation of minorities, there are some major differences. For every New York, Mo’Nique and Chris Tucker, there is a Halle Berry, Oprah Winfrey and Will Smith. In other words, there is an arguable balance and the Average Joe’s perspective is ultimately left to their own common sense.
Unfortunately, for us yeller skins, the decision makers in Hollywood don’t feel the same obligation to provide a wider definition of our community. Therefore, when we’re given a mainstream platform, like Ms. Tequila, we shouldn’t squander it by acting like a jackass and pandering to the Oriental sexual fantasies of the Western male.
But then again, maybe I’m asking too much of Ms Tequila. After all, this is a woman who makes a living dry-humping cars in her underwear.
– Telly Wong
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Posted in Racism at 4:22 pm by william_lee
This article mentioned something that I was always thinking about but could never quite put my finger on– micro-aggression. From the article:
Here are some really good ones that I have often encountered myself:
- [when entering my brother’s apartment buliding with a grocery bag, the doorman said:] Which apartment are you delivering to?
-
- [when riding the elevator in my own corporate office building, carrying a plastic bag containing the lunch I just bought for myself to eat at my desk, a woman said:] The service elevator for deliveries is in the other elevator bank.
- Where are you from?
- No, I mean… where are you REALLY from?
Got any good ones?
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Posted in Activism and Empowerment, Culture, Media and Entertainment at 1:00 am by telly_wong
For the Empire State Building, the 2008 Lunar New Year will be
acknowledged by the more traditional American-sounding name,
“Thursday”
First the city bans firecrackers and now we have this.
The new management of the Empire State Building won’t be lighting up the building in red and gold in honor of the coming Lunar New Year, terminating an annual tradition that began in 2000, according to this press release from the Asian American Business Development Center (AABDC).
The AABDC, the group who initiated the lighting ceremony and has continued to oversee it, had their application rejected and they are pissed.
“It is simply outrageous for the Empire State Building to deny over one million Asian Americans in the city the recognition of this most important holiday by rejecting the request to light the building,” said John Wang, President of the AABDC.
While the management company has yet to comment on their reasons why they rejected the application, I understand why the average folk may not consider Lunar New Year such an “important holiday” for Asian Americans, ’cause quite frankly, most Asian Americans (specifically second generationers and onward) don’t. In addition to not being observed by everyone categorized under the vague “Asian American” moniker, Lunar New Year traditions are simply not practiced and/or acknowledged by the ones that supposedly do.
In my observations, I’ve found that a 2nd generation Chinese American Taoist is more likely to have an eight-foot Christmas tree up in December than take off work on Lunar New Year’s Day.
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Posted in Culture, Health, World News, China at 12:27 am by telly_wong
“I raise you for 35 years and all I get is this flippin’ hat!?!?”
In The Doors classic, “Five to One”, the great Jim Morrison proclaimed “the old get old and the young get stronger.”
In relation to modern China, he would be half-right.
China’s population is getting increasingly older and their kids are becoming more ungrateful, according to a new study by the National Committee on Aging. Unfortunately these changes are having a negative effect on the nation’s longstanding cultural traditions, society and even the mental health of its seniors.
According to the survey, as of June 1, 2006, China had 146.57 million citizens over the age of 60, which accounts for 21.4% of the total number of people in that age group worldwide — that means 1 out of 5 old people on this planet is a Chinese.
But one of the most surprising findings, in my humble opinion, were 49.7% of elderly persons in urban areas lived in “empty nest” families in 2006, while 50.3% stayed with other family members. These numbers reveal a stark deviation from the longtime Chinese cultural tradition of the “extended family” and kids providing for their parents into their old age.
Meanwhile, in rural areas, the tradition is still practiced, for the most part, with 61.7% of elderly residing with family members and 38.3% living alone. However, those numbers are also beginning to even themselves out as experts cite the increasing number of senior “empty nest” households in both urban and rural China.
So what’s causing all this? Modern China turning their back on filial traditions and adopting Western ones? The increasing bachelor population who don’t have big homes for their folks to move into? The lack of space in big city apartments? The increased cost of living? Unfortunately, the study doesn’t provide any answers.
The study does cite, however, some other major socio-economic and psychological changes that go along with the rising number of “empty nest” households, including seniors increasingly relying on on social insurance to support themselves instead of being cared for by their children and rising rates of depression and thoughts of suicide.
This is kind of sad news. After all, I think my parents are pretty cool. Although I’m not personally a fan of the “extended family household” concept (I need my privacy), I do intend to look after my folks if and when they get feeble, senile and/or start uncontrollably peeing on themselves. I would never, ever adopt the Great American tradition of putting them in a “home”.
China is changing faster than I can fully comprehend these days but I seriously hope its culture, values and traditions can withstand the tidal wave of Western influence in these coming years. After all, how interesting is a society of Asian folks who all talk, act and think like the average white American?
And besides, don’t we already have that over here?
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12.19.07
Posted in Editorial at 9:24 pm by william_lee
There’s a fundamental problem with adopting babies that have a skin color that’s different from yours– you take away the child’s right to keep the adoption a secret or to let it be publicly known. Many same-nation adoptees, if they know that they’re adopted, will NEVER tell you that they’re adopted unless you’re someone they hold in they’re highest confidence. It’s a very personal thing. It’s something that one holds dear to oneself. It’s not something that you go around boasting about. Aside from this, there are a whole host of identity issues that can and do arise in children who are adopted transnationally. For example, how do you think a child’s psychological development is affected when they are constantly reminded “you’re adopted” every time friends of the family come over to visit? Such a situation simply would not occur if the parents and the child shared the same ethnic heritage. If you’re all the same skin color, the topic of adoption just doesn’t come up.
In this extreme case, these parents decided that their transnational adoptee suffered from a “severe form of fear of emotional attachment.” Apparently, neither skin color nor personalities mingled all too well in that family.
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Posted in Weekly Poll at 4:51 pm by william_lee
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