In the US, Asians and Asian Americans are written about in three main ways.
All three approaches have these things in common:
- “Asia” mainly means China and Japan.
- “America” mainly means California.
- Not much class analysis.
- Important issues:
- How Whites and Asians get along.
- Asians becoming part of American society.
- Stereotypes (pushing them or opposing them).
The three main ways are:
1. Anti-Asianist
- glory days: 1850s to 1920s.
- authors: White.
- audience: White.
- stance: Asians as a threat, based on (supposed future) history and “science”.
- ideas: Yellow Peril, racial competition, eugenics, clash of civilizations, the Rise of China, etc.
- example: Michael Crichton, “Rising Sun” (1992).
The main reason to write about Asians is to warn Whites of the Coming Danger before it is Too Late (maybe it already is). Whites and Asians are too different to live together – either in America or in the world. If Whites do nothing, Asians are going to take over – demographically, politically, militarily or economically.
Asian men are stereotyped as underhanded, inscrutable, dangerous. Like Fu Manchu or Ming the Merciless. Asian women are highly sexualized: “Me so horny. Me love you long time.” Broken Asian English is another stereotype.
2. Liberal
- glory days: 1920s to 1960s.
- authors: mostly White, some Asian.
- audience: White.
- stance: cultural broker: speaking for Asians to Whites against anti-Asianists, based on insider knowledge (as missionaries, sociologists, Asians. etc).
- ideas: American triumphalism, internationalism, social gospel.
- example: National Geographic.
The main reason to write about Asians is to defend them against anti-Asianists, who do not properly understand Asians, democracy or even Christianity.
Liberals see America as a nation of immigrants. Chinese immigrants are not far different from Irish immigrants. Liberals have faith in American institutions to protect everyone’s rights regardless of race. Stuff like the Japanese American internment are “mistakes” that they somehow try to explain away.
Racism is seen as mainly coming from working-class Whites who are afraid of being thrown out of work by Asian immigrants. Politicians and the press take advantage of their fears to get votes or sell newspapers.
Liberals see Asia as ancient and backward, America as modern and the great hope of mankind. They believe in the Americanization of Asian Americans, even if it means getting stuck between two worlds.
Asians are pictured as harmless, quiet, diligent and serving White interests. Think Charlie Chan. Or as needing to be saved by Whites. Think Suzy Wong. Or Vietnam.
3. Asian Americanist
- glory days: 1970s to present.
- authors: Asian.
- audience: Asian.
- stance: by and for Asian Americans.
- ideas: pan-Asian identity, voice, agency, representation.
- example: Maxine Hong Kingston, “The Woman Warrior” (1975).
The main purpose to write about Asian Americans is to understand their past, where they come from, who they are, their experience in America and the issues they face. Asian Americanists want to preserve knowledge of their past before it disappears.
They lack the Liberal faith in American institutions. Like Liberals, though, they do find themselves fighting anti-Asianist stereotypes.
Asians are pictured as real people.
Source: Mainly “The Columbia Guide to Asian American History” (2001) by Gary Y. Okihiro.
See also:
- Asian Americans
- Tips on writing about Asian America
- Stereotypes about East Asian women
- How to tell if a character is a stereotype
- Non-Westerners in National Geographic
How is Okihiro’s book compared to the others? Does he compare the white view of Asian-American history vs. the Asian-American perspective?
One day I would like to see the black American view of Asian-American history and vice versa.
I have not read any of Maxine Hong Kingston’s books, but I do have a hardcopy of “China Men” – I should go read it. It traces 4 generations of Chinese-American men in the USA.
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Abagond said:
True. Yet, this aspect in particular:
…is probably, imho, more central, common and long-lasting than mentioned when white people write about (East) Asians. I think this dynamic is far more powerful than implied, because, it seems that the desire for, and romance with, the Asian woman is the theme that pops up again and again, and is pivotal.
In recent times, I can think of David Guterson’s “Snow Falling on Cedars” and “The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet” (I haven’t read the latter, just the summary), which have the central white male character inevitably being motivated by the love for the Asian woman. I remember cringing through “Memoirs of a Geisha” because of conflicted feelings about the author, Arthur Golden, characterisation and first person telling.
It’s not that I think it’s impossible that a write can write a character that is not their own race, ethnicity or gender. I think it IS possible, definitely, but I don’t believe it is easy to do well.
It is not at all easy for many, or most, writers to write about another race without BEING the other race, as “race” is defined in the culture they know most about and grew up in.
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OK, Bulanik, supposing that someone is writing a story that involves characters from different racial and ethnic groups. How can a single person write that story?
And even if one writes about one’s own ethnic group in their own society, they will make stereotypes about people from different social classes, different geographical regions, different occupational groupings – is it possible to write about someone without introducing dehumanizing elements?
I suppose you are not saying that it is not possible, just that it is not easy.
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Abagond, how about a post on blacks in Asian history? You might start with India where Malik Ambar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malik_Ambar) made a name for himself as a great general and city planner. There was sidi Saiyyed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidi_Saiyyed_Mosque) the architect and Yakut Khan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakut_Khan) the Mughal admiral who defeated the British at the end of the 17th century. The accomplishments of the Africans and their descendents should be better known.
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Yes, Jefe, exactly.
It IS possible for someone to write as someone from another place or time.
Of course it is! There are barriers, but they are near- surmountable in some cases. Writers and story tellers have always striven for the interiority of people that are not immediate to their own story; I think it’s natural part of human creativity. Perhaps “being in another’s skin” is the purpose of fiction.
Take William Styron’s “The Confessions of Nat Turner,” an account of an 1831 slave revolt. Styron, a white man, speaks in the first person as Nat Turner.
It is a novel, a work of fiction. Styron can be whoever he wantst o be in this creation. Just like James Baldwin, who knew Styron, and wrote from the perspective of white characters and had already done so in “Another Country”.
Both writers had taken a risk: Styron was condemned for his, but Baldwin was not.
I don’t know how it’s done, though. Maybe through living as someone else, researching and traveling, both physically and emotionally?
Baldwin wrote from the shadows and as an outlier to majority culture, a marginalized person by race. He had had a lifetime of being immersed in what it was to be white and what it was not to be. But, Baldwin was Baldwin, not just anyone, so he was far more skilled than most at not dehumanizing someone he was not — in his writing.
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http://www.bigwowo.com/2012/07/asian-american-writers-workshop-launch-party/
This conversation reminds me of the picture of the Asian American Writer’s workshop with white men prominently in the front. It just seems like there’s a conflict of interest that no one in the community wants to acknowledge.
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“gro jo
Abagond, how about a post on blacks in Asian history?”
Linda says,
Gro Jo, you will have to wait for Abagond to get around to “ non-American black African and Asian history month” –
I’m still waiting to hear about my suggestion on Chinese-Jamaican billionaire, Michael Chin. Right now it’s all about the “Americans”, so get with the program 🙂
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😀
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Great post! I’m enjoying Asian history month, I’m learning a lot.
@Bulanik’s first post
I agree, this extends to cinema, too. The story seems to revolve around the White male’s conquer of the Asian female; the Asian male is often relegated to a supporting part in the White male’s story, and in doing so, it becomes about the White male’s experience of a culture that he’s identifying as exotic, as opposed to the full presentation of a culture and its humanity. This is always the biggest barrier of writers successfully portraying characters outside of their group, because of the tendency to view another group as a novelty.
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As far as the song lyrics “Me so horny. Me love you long time” sung by the band 2 Live Crew…
you can blame that sentence, which hyper-sexualized both Asian and black women, on 2 Live Crew rapper Fresh Kid Ice (aka Chris Wong Won), a Chinese-Trinidadian.
http://blog.angryasianman.com/2010/09/guest-post-fresh-kid-ice.html
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3. Asian Americanist
Kristina Wong is hilarious!
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGziflpR6OI)
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Actually better website to watch her (Kristina Wong)
Title: I’m Asian American and… I Want Reparations for Yellow Fever –
http://www.myx.tv/iaaa/#.U3LAGigVB2C
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Excellent analysis, Ebonymonroe!
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I wonder how Asian women feel about being a fetish and hypersexualized. Do they see this as advantage? I wonder if opinion is different among groups Chinese vs Japanese vs Philipinovs Thai vs Vietnamese and so on. The east Indian women I have spoken with clearly do NOT appreciate this stereotyping.
I just bought a book “A Principled Stand The Story of Hirabayahi Vs The United States”. It’s a good read. ..very informative. I know a lady who was placed in an internment camp. She spoke of discrimination she faced afterwards and how she became aware of the pervasivenessn of anti black and anti Latina discrimination. White supermacy destroys all it touches.
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Yes. I myself only thought about it after adding my vote that Michael Lee Chin, a Sino-Afro-Jamaican, resides NOT in the US but in Canada. I think it all pertains more to his nation of residency than to his his place of birth.
From what I have noticed over my lifetime, one need only be a resident of the US (and not necessarily a citizen) before one might be categorized as a ‘hyphenated American’.
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Linda
Thanks for the link. Kristina Wong is hilarious.
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OMG, Linda,
Episode 1
0:21-0:29 “symptoms (of Yellow Fever) include considering yourself an expert in Asian culture”
And she doesn’t stop there. 😛
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Kristina is good at nailing in on, tearing apart and exploiting the Yellow fever stereotypes, but I wonder
What kind of man would she want to date other than for Yellow Fever reparations.
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Kristina is the type of gal not many Asian American guys would be interested in (she has a face only an Asian fetishist could love), at least not the kind that she would give the time of day to… She writes in one of her articles that it is impermissible for white dudes to point out that she seems to favor white boys… so it probably wouldn’t be permissible for jefe to do that either. It’s just cause she’s stuck in a country with too many white men, doncha know? I guess it’s a real burden for Asian American women to have white dudes interested in them, especially since, as Kristina noted in her article, the Asian fetishists now seem to include some attractive, socially graceful guys.
Here in Asia, I also have to deal with unwanted attention because of the color of my skin. For instance, a while back I was sitting down eating with these female (Chinese) friends and they are joking about my good (Chinese) friend’s supposedly small wanker and insinuating that mine must be much bigger… Their incessant giggling made me very uncomfortable. Many of the girls here assume all white guys are promiscuous and will put out on the first date (it’s enough to make a guy feel like a piece of meat, a sausage if you will). Many of them seemingly only date white guys, despite being in a country where 99.99%+ of the guys are non-white.. It can be traumatic, but I try to be strong… (cue the butthurt comments from Kiwi and jefe).
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@ Ebonymonroe
Thank you for seeing the worth of my analysis.
Kiwi has broken it down over and over, mostly on the Open Thread, especially in discussions with Jefe.
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Write an article about Bruce Lee
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@ Ebony,
As for film, I believe King also provided some filmed “counter-narrative” to those portrayals, too. Also on the OT.
My reply to that:
King’s reply to one of Kiwi’s observations:
Kiwi’s response is a little way down after that.
In fact, I believe King has done a number of superb analyses about these dynamics over the years.
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@ Ebony
More of Kiwi’s perceptions:
Followed by Jefe’s insights:
And, how that squares with white beauty ideals:
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@ Ebony
I posted the above links (in moderation) to previous discussions because I’m not sure if you saw them. I know I miss a lot on here, and am often surprised by what I missed! LOL.
Anyway, there was another conversation that you might find interesting on this subject. Jefe and Kiwi discuss families and environment, etc: https://abagond.wordpress.com/2014/05/01/welcome-to-asian-american-history-month/#comment-231705
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@ Ebony,
Jefe’s last comment on that final link, still has me pondering the dynamics…
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@ biff
99.999% of Asian women, in Asia, prefer Asian men and find them attractive. Of course some women (and men) are open to interracial dating – that’s the same in every country.
Most women fantasise about men from their own racial background and Chinese and Korean women are no different. I’ve spent extensive time in Asia, mainly in South Korea and Singapore. The vast majority of the men considered heart throbs are – you guess it (or maybe not!) Asian.
I have never ONCE been heard an Asian woman, in Asia, compare the respective **** sizes of Asian and white men’s whatsits, and believe me women are often quite open about those topics with one another.
You are completely full of sh*t.
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@ Bulanik
I would like to wade into that as I am (I think!) the only person on this board in an AM/WF coupling. But I think if you’re actually in that situation it’s near impossible to analyse the dynamics of privilege etc.
What I will say is that in my experience, my husband and I have confronted little to no hostility from Asian men and women. What we have had to contend with is a lot of hostility from White men and also sometimes women.
I’ve received very strange and sometimes hostile questions/comments from white people, many of them acquaintances, some of them random strangers. For example:
1. Why did you go down that ‘route’
3. Why are you with him? You should be with an Aussie guy.
3. I’m guessing he’s rich
4.Don’t you want your kids to look like you?
Every time another white person (e.g. a coworker) meets my husband for the first time their reaction is a little strange and goes beyond simple surprise or curiosity. I’ve kept my maiden name so people don’t realise that I’m married to a Vietnamese Australian until they meet him or I mention it.
We’ve also had some pretty scary incidents involving drunk guys swearing racist abuse at my hubby, directing some pretty nasty epithets at me and on a couple of occasions it’s nearly escalated into violence.
I’m not sure whether this equates to a loss of privilege. We’re both educated, in good jobs etc so I don’t think our opportunities have changed for the better or worse due to our marriage. But I do think that White people (particularly men) view white women who intermarry in a different way – it’s like leaving the circle a bit I guess.
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* I should clarify that the reason why I have kept my maiden name is because my husband didn’t want me to change it! Vietnamese women keep their maiden names. My mother in law, for example, has a different surname to my father in law’s.
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@ wordy
Thank you for explaining. I had no idea it would be like that, and that bad.
Dealing with those people….wow. How do you and your husband respond, btw?
To be honest with you, I have never spoken with white women who are married to Asian men about this subject, so I have no clue. I have only heard the accounts of white women married to black men, and those situations and IRRs are simply not the same. Different IRRs have different dynamics. When I see an East Asian with a white woman, I notice it more because of it’s far, far less common than the other way round. But…confession time…I don’t have the same emotions as when I see the more frequent white man and East Asian woman couples. That could be because I actually know of 2 East Asian men married to white women (but not their wives), and I had the sense their relationships were based on compatibility and attraction rather than racist stereotyping and sexualization.
What you and Jefe say is an eye-opener. And very thought provoking.
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@wordynerdygirl
My mother always told me about when my parents were dating, and white men would walk up to them and say the same things to them (except replace “American” with “Aussie”). My mother told me once a group of 3 white sailors said that to her, yelling obscenities at my father, and when he stepped away (eg, for the toilet) they told her to drop that ch*nk and go out with them). She told me that she punched them in the face and they finally left.
That was already the PRIOR generation, but it seems like it is still happening today.
She also told me about an incident which I saw a repeat of in the movie, “Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story” (1993), where they go to a nice restaurant, but are told they have to wait (queue) in a long waitlist. They were told that all the empty tables were reserved. But then many parties arrived after them without a reservation and were seated. The explanation was that they would just have to wait. They ended up going to this Chinese-American restaurant that whose family owner was well known by Bruce Lee.
My parents had the exact same incident happen to them VERBATIM. But I guess it was in the similar time period as Bruce Lee, but it was then that I realized that my parents’ experience was not that unique. However, what was different back then was that their marriage was still illegal in over 20 states when they got married.
It sounds like you got hassled from people, but did you ever get outright discriminated against (ie, refused housing, refused service, refused employment, etc.)
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@wordynerdygirl
Is that only in Australia? What about in Asia?
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You know what would have happened pre-1960s!
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Great post. Living and volunteering in Sacramento, CA, I have learned about the diversity in the Asian American community across racial and class lines. There are so many different groups with widely varying immigration stories and stories of generational adaptation. I mentor a youth who is Hmong, and is a first generation American whose grandparents brought her parents, aunts and uncles in flight from war at home. They are poor, struggling, and her generation is rife with youth involvement in gangs and high school dropouts. I work with her on getting to college, and I am succeeding, but over the past 3 years she has told me repeatedly in response to my planning for her college education “That’s not my family. We’re not like that”. There is so much diversity that never ever gets airtime- it’s weird. I guess the media and politicians must figure, if we can keep a lid on their pain, then we don’t have to include their needs in our budgets.
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Thanks @Bulanik
I’ve learned a lot about different cultures on this site and how they relate to the world around them and their experiences through this site. I knew of some things about the South Asian community, but not the East Asian community. Asian history month has been great.
@Wordynerdygirl
Great posts.
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AND said above:
Oh…but: did you expect Asian men or black women or white women to be prominently in the front?
Even a writer such as Toni Morrison, extraordinary and brilliant as she is, had to LEARN that she “could write about black people for black people, that she did not have to concern herself with the white gaze.”
That had to be un-learned.
Abagond, in his post about Ms Morrison, said that she learned how to do this by reading African authors.
He says: “they showed her how. If whites liked her books, great. If they did not, so what? She never gave up her day job, so she never became dependent on the white demographic buying her books.”
Writing for non-white people in a white supremacist heterosexual patriarchy (!) is a conscious act of defiance.
It is a deliberate skill-set.
It is a a constant work in progress.
Toni Morrison amputated NEED. She walked away from submission. She did not cater her works to what white people care about, and this, as Abagond says: “allowed real, fleshed-out black characters to take stage…”
So, she CAN write about subjects like the
*self-hatred, and,
*mental slavery of a racialized people.
This is why I am unconvinced by the 3rd way that Asians are supposed to be written about. If the most credible, successful and widely read voices are Asian women writer who ONLY marry white men, how credible are their voices?
How authentic are their fictional creations if their adult, interpersonal, romantic bonds are exclusively with white men, how authentic can their writings be — if this what they draw from emotionally and intellectually time and time again?
How can their characterisations of maleness and relationships with Asian manhood be authentic?
If as Abagond says: “the main purpose to write about Asian Americans is to understand their past, where they come from, who they are, their experience in America and the issues they face, and Asian Americanists want to preserve knowledge of their past before it disappears….fighting anti-Asianist stereotypes, and Asians are pictured as real people”, then how true is this of the Asian women artists who, everyone, ONLY marry white?
This has everything to do with sex and race.
Kiwi has said:
“…America, being a white patriarchy, protects the privileges of white men who marry out but punishes white women who do the same”, simultaneously, according to Jefe:
“… Asian men who marry white are conferred with some limited form of white male privilege, then Asian women who marry white must be conferred with even greater white privilege, because not only are they receiving it through a white spouse, they are receiving it from a white male spouse who has power over white females.”
To write is a privilege. To be heard is a privilege, and white privilege is not a perk Asian women who write seem to want to forgo…
How these Asian women writers relate to their sons, though, is a question.
How will these white men relate to their sons, too.
These sons, may be well, even though they have a “white” or European sounding last names, may not LOOK WHITE and may experience being perceived as Asian man. They will be discriminated and culturally emasculated as Asian men — unlike his father and unlike his mother and sisters…
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*unlike their fathers and unlike their mothers and sisters..
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@ Ebonymonroe
Same here!
Because the 2 men, Jefe and Kiwi, have shared some of their knowledge and experience about what it is to be Asian and male, it has made me think.
I am only starting to understand some of the Asian and Asian mixed-race men that I know and have known. I understand better now the times I’ve seen mixed-race ones (who have Asian fathers and mothers who are part black) straight-out deny and refuse to accept they have any Asian heritage at all.
Like my brother. He always did, and still does.
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“Bulanik,
I understand better now the times I’ve seen mixed-race ones (who have Asian fathers and mothers who are part black) straight-out deny and refuse to accept they have any Asian heritage at all.
Like my brother. He always did, and still does.”
Linda says,
I think for mixed-Asians, it’s tough growing up in countries dominated by other groups… and I guess this goes for anyone who belongs to a minority group trying to fit in with their peers of the majority group.
Jefe posed a question:
That would be interesting to see. I can only speak from my perspective coming from the Caribbean.
Self-identity/culture for Asian-Caribbeans (like Chris Wong Won) can sometimes be complex because you feel just as black/Caribbean as your peers and are proud of your mixed heritage.
I always felt like there was/is both love and fascination for the Asian culture but there is also a facet of disrespect for the people (and I believe this attitude went/goes both ways) but I don’t think it was based on any kind of animosity, just ignorance at times.
My half-Chinese grandfather was always called “Mr. Chin”, even though that was not his last name. I was always referred to as “coolie girl”, even though I don’t have Indian (from India) ancestry but they knew my father was Spanish and “something else” — my neighbors seemed to use the term coolie as an “all purpose” description to cover all possible mixtures.
My brothers and I always had to be somewhat “extra” growing up because the other kids would assume we were soft, so we had to fight harder or be “more Jamaican” …then of course, when Bruce Lee (and Godzilla) came on TV, all that changed and we were “popular” because it became “cool” to be part Asian and Asian men were no longer portrayed as soft.
My father brought us nunchakus because we all became interested in Kung Fu, so you know we were practically “running things” in the neighborhood then 🙂
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I always wondered how Nancy Kwan felt in Hollywood being Asian and fetishized. .
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Abagond, if you see duplicate posts it’s because for some reason, my comments aren’t showing up.
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@Bulanik’s posts
Bravo! Fantastic commentary!
@Mary B
Thank-you.
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@Bulanik
You made me think about “Flower Drum Song” by CY Lee, himself an immigrant (but from Hunan, not from the traditional sources of immigrants, and he came to the US for university). His book was a best seller, but for a white readership (and the play / musical was for a white audience). His work never gets used in Asian American ethnic studies as an example of Asian American literature or of the Asian American experience as it is branded as taking the “orientalist” view – which by Ms. Morrison’s terminology could be defined as the white gaze towards Asia and Asians.
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@MB,
Recall that she had a white Scottish mother. I suspect that growing up in HK, people had always associated her with white “gweilo” foreigners. Then in America she is fetishized as the Suzy Wong type. I am not sure that she could have ever understood the issues of Asian America before she did all her movies in the 1960s and it explains why she might have been chosen to play Asian and Asian-American roles that fit the white gaze.
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@Bulanik
I think you might have hit the nail on the head.
These sons, may be well, even though they have a “white” or European sounding last names, may not LOOK WHITE and may experience being perceived as Asian man. They will be discriminated and culturally emasculated as Asian men — unlike his father and unlike his mother and sisters… I am glad you are asking these questions. They have to endure something that does not have a voice – having a white father who lost little white privilege in marrying his mother, and an Asian mother who bashed Asian men to assume and enjoy her husband’s white privilege. He can try to be white on paper, but when he goes out the door, he may often experience getting bashed and emasculated as an Asian man, but without any family support. I hope that their uncles and cousins on their mother’s side will step up to the plate and understand the cognitive dissonance they might be experiencing – their parents bash Asian men, and they try to copy them, but then they get bashed as an Asian man by others.
I used to be active on some Eurasian / Hapa sites, and of course they talk a lot about their parents, their siblings, their aunts, uncles, cousins, where they grew up and there is a complex dynamic at play. It is not just a matter of what one is perceived to look like, but that also adds to the complexity, as there is no consistency there either.
BTW, Bulanik, I think you sometimes have problems with the blockquotes because you nest them inside each other. Maybe you don’t always close one before starting another.
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@ jefe
I really value your contributions on this site. I learn a lot from them.
I don’t think that my husband and I have been denied housing, employment or any other opportunities for that matter. But there are a few important qualifiers here:
– we live in a very liberal, diverse area
– my husband works in a global firm which has a strong diversity policy and, more importantly, is prioritising its business expansion in the Asia Pacific.
The stares, comments and attitudes about our relationship are very disheartening. But I do think that this is changing and will continue to change as Sydney becomes more diverse.
@ Kiwi
Your uncles-in-law sound like complete and utter tw*ts. But I think their behaviour has affected your confidence to an extent where you’re really starting to be negative about Asian women in general. I don’t think it’s fair to call an AF who marries a WM ‘cheap’.
Have you studied/worked anywhere in Asia yet? I really think you would be pleasantly surprised. There certainly are men with Asian fetishes (and vice versa) but in my experience the VAST majority of people in Singapore and South Korea prefer other Asians.
Singapore has a huge expat community but there is also a more even balance in terms of the interracial couples there – I noticed almost as many AM/WF and WM/AF couples. I’ve mentioned before that my sister is married to a Singaporean guy. They now live in Singapore and mix with a very diverse crowd of people.
As China/Korea and other Asian countries increase their economic influence I think the power dynamics at play in WM/AF relationships will also continue to change. The K-Pop phenomenon is a signal that this is already happening – a couple of decades ago most Korean girls would have had posters of Western pop idols on their walls. Now they crush on G-Dragon.
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@ Jefe,
I am trying to get my head around the great many things you explain.
Wordy is right: your contributions to this site are standout, and it’s turned into an amazing education 😀
Only the last day or 2 have I begun to understand my brother and nephews’ behaviour and struggles because the dialogue and analysis you and Kiwi have provided. It’s ongoing, of course. Thank you for that.
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@ Ebony, that’s kind of you, thanks.
@ Linda
Asian-Caribbean identity IS complex. It’s also marginalized in the islands were Asians are minorit, like Jamaica. Obviously you understand why Asians who were born in this culture OWN & INSIST upon our multi-racial, multi-ethnic heritage.
I didn’t grew up with my brother. He grew up in the US, and made a decision to follow the ways of race there. He likes to keep things simple (his words).
As a male, he has to be extra-tough, super-raw and over-masculine — I suppose it’s the Jamaican AND American style (sometimes for both sexes! LOL! 😀 😀 ). But he does it to over-compensate for his Asian-ness.
It was compounded because his Asian mix is not one kind of Asian. It’s South Asian and West (Turkish Sephardi) Asian, and there is East Asian too, therefore his Asian-ness does not have a straightforward “cool” factor that comes with kick-ass East Asian-ness. But he made up for that by toughness and choosing a life-partner who endorses it.
It’s caused a distance with our father, Asian family members and his own feelings about that part of his heritage. It’s something he has blotted out, like some kind of time-wasting to talk about that kind of thing. He avoids it and won’t speak when issues sorrounding that subject arises…he doesn’t like being mistaken for an Arab, though. Whenever he goes to Jamaica, people usually “see” what he is. I don’t think he likes that.
He avoids those visits.
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Bulanik,
Have you heard of Percy Chen (b. 1901), a Trinidadian-born lawyer who was the son of a Trinidadian Chinese Eugene Chen (b. 1878 in Trinidad) and a Mulatto French Creole mother (who herself was the daughter of a white man and his black servant)? About 25 years ago I found the book, “China Called Me” and got it and read it and learned about this guy. I read it as an inspiration for multiracial Chinese born overseas who decided to go to China and HK. But he does discuss his experience as a Chinese – Mulatto family growing up in the early 20th century in Trinidad and his stay in China and Moscow and eventual settlement in HK, where he was active in civil life.
Even before that, I was familiar with Cuban and Jamaican Chinese and mixed Chinese, but this expanded my interest in learning more about the Caribbean Chinese history. And I learned that it is tied to the US Chinese history, esp. that in the South.
He even has a wikipedia entry
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Chen
I appears that his father Eugene Chen remarried a Chinese-born Chinese after Percy’s mother died.
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Bulanik,
The US culture and society, due to historical factors, still forces its members to assume a “racial” identity for social purposes. It was unforgiving and left no room for grey areas. I think it has changed a little bit in the past 20 years, but the legacy is still strong and you can still find it strongly in this blog (you know what I am talking about).
Has your brother decided to assume a racial identity? Does he have children? Did he try to divorce them from their Asian heritage?
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No, Jefe, I haven’t heard of him. I haven’t heard of A LOT OF THINGS!
I am having to learn and get with it at a rate mucher faster for what’s normal for me to handle, lol!
The Chinese forbears on my father’s side are the most distant, and I have not read much about the experiences of the Chinese in the Americas, not as much as I’d like to, I mean at least.
There’s seem to be more about the Chinese than the Indians or Sephardis/Turks, and that would frustrate and turn me off.
I suppose I wanted more “specific” narratives.
It’s been a long time since I really looked for New World literature about those ethncities and mixed families.
The book sounds fascinating. I started to wonder about the Chinese that were in Jamaica a few years back when I had to accompany an elderly relative to the doctor. The doctor, a young Chinese man, asked her some searching questions about her condition and when my relative explained, I practically fell off my chair when he used the Jamaican words and phrases to confirm what she was saying. When my relative asked him how do you know this, he replied: “My mother was born and grew up in Jamaica, and was sent to HK to get married — how your relative speaks is just how she speaks…”
From the sounds of it, it’s a worthwhile read. Thank you for the link and the information.
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I am a bit wary about asking him what his official racial designation is.
Too personal.
It’s like that now.
He has children. Obviously they know there are a lot of different kinds of people in their father’s family (and their mostly Lebanese mother), but I have the feeling their mother enforces Plain Ole Black at all costs, and their father doesn’t talk about it, so it’s not a subject that may be aired.
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^ I see you understand why asking someone their racial or ethnic “heritage” can be a spark to a powder keg. There can be a lot of emotional reaction to that simple question.
And how the transference of racial or ethnic identity is a complicated thing and not so “black and white”.
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Complicated is how it is. 😀
My siblings are American, I grew up in Europe: the lenses differ and overlap.
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Jefe:
Have you heard of Percy Chen (b. 1901), a Trinidadian-born lawyer who was the son of a Trinidadian Chinese Eugene Chen (b. 1878 in Trinidad) and a Mulatto French Creole mother (who herself was the daughter of a white man and his black servant)?
I’ve been communicating with Jay Chen, Eugene’s grandson and Percy’s nephew for more than a decade. Jack Chen’s (Percy’s youngest brother) third wife, Yuan-Tsung Chen, wrote a book about the family. For some reason her website appears to be down (at least from my machine) so I had to retrieve it from the wayback machine:
https://web.archive.org/web/20130605151729/http://www.yuantsungchen.com/photo.htm
The book that Yuan-Tsung Chen wrote about the Chen family on Amazon:
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Jefe, not exactly in reference to your inquiry, but a nice excerpt from a Chinese Jamaican.
His story brought back memories for me, since the writer and I share similarities…he grew up in a Chin-ey shop and my mother did also.
Jamaica 50: Chinese Jamaican Tony Wong remembers growing up in a Chin-ey shop in Montego Bay
The Chinese prospered, and “Chin-ey shops” as they were called, would soon dot the island in every parish and town.
Like most Chinese, we lived above the store. My parents had five kids, Evelyn, Cherry, Victor, Jennifer and me. The building was Third World concrete-block housing on a busy street that had all the charm of a nuclear bunker. But my parents made it a home.
At home, the child of independence would grow up speaking Chinese. In the streets, I spoke patois. At school, run by British ex-pats, I spoke English.
I was conflicted. I thought I was black. But I looked Chinese. At school, I used to pretend that I was a Maroon fighting the British for independence.
“A who you-a call Chin-ey?” I would yell back at friends who dared question my roots.
My friends at the Anglican-Church-run St, James Preparatory, were of African, South Asian, British, Scottish, Irish, Lebanese, Syrian, Portuguese and East Asian descent — all part of the vast diaspora on the island.
Author Malcolm Gladwell talks about the sequence of events that led him to his own success in his bestselling book Outliers.
His grandmother couldn’t afford to send his mother to school. So she borrowed the money from the local Chinese-Jamaican shopkeeper. That loan set off the fateful chain that sent his mother to England where he was born. Years later, he would become an influential writer.
Such is the butterfly effect of the “Chin-ey” shop.
I recently went home to Jamaica with my mother and she took my children to visit the old “Chin-ey” shop she grew up in (shop downstairs, apartments upstairs). As a young girl, it seemed so “grand” back then…but my children were not impressed
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I typically post links but Abagond set it up so that the word Chin-ey, spelled as one word won’t go through and the original link contains the full word.
so here is a link which might work and take you to the original article.
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@ Linda,
You know that most of the descendants of the Chinese who settled in the US South after Reconstruction are now largely African-American today? They also lived in or above their stores back then.
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I wonder if Angela Bassett has Chinese ancestry, she looks it. I believe her people are originally from the US south.
Yes, the Chinese migrants in 1800’s were more “organized” in a way due to how they got to the Caribbean and America. There were organizations in China that “assisted” them in their travels as workers, and also served as a conduit that helped them get into trade (for a fee of course).
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Agreed about Angela Bassett.
Come to think of it, Ne-Yo, the R&B singer’s mother is from the US south, his mother is half Chinese.
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@Linda,
Many of the Chinese entered the US South from the Caribbean, instead of California, via New Orleans and Savannah. The Suez Canal opened in 1869, making it faster to bring Asians to the Caribbean and SE USA than via the Pacific.
However, I wouldn’t say that they were more organized than the ones in California or the Pacific coast (e.g., to Peru). Those organizations in China were there for middlemen to get paid for selling indentured labourers overseas. Chinese formed their own organizations overseas in each respective place to provide the social and financial support to open businesses and for legal protection. You can still find it in various places today.
@Bulanik,
I don’t know about Angela Bassett, but Ne-yo’s maternal grandfather was a Chinese-American from Arkansas.
The Chinese men in the US south came as single men without women. Later on, they could not bring over Chinese women due to the Chinese Exclusion Act (1882). Those that got married mostly married blacks (but over half remained bachelors, or never reunited with their wives in China). After Jim Crow laws came out in the 1890s, their children were forced to be classified as colored.
They could not start bringing over Chinese wives until a few years after the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906 (I wrote about this – maybe it will get posted).
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@ Jefe
Whilst checking info on the exclusion of Chinese women from US shores, I saw information on the the Page Act of 1875.
This is stunning piece of legislation. It was created to keep out female “undesirables” — aka –Chinese women were all no more than prostitutes.
Chinese women were dangerous to The White Family BECAUSE white men could not resist their seductive powers! :-O
They also carried disease, another “official” reason.
*
The effect of this meant that without women, there would be no Chinese families.
This caused Chinese men to be perceived as a sub-population of bachelors — men of questionable manliness.
They would also be perceived as rootless, and therefore untrustworthy.
The precedents are there to explain contemporary stereotypes:
Perpetual Foreigner / Over-sexualization of Asian Women / Questionable Maleness of Asian Men / Obvious Attraction Partnership of White Men & Asian Woman.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Page_Act_of_1875
This pattern of “distorted” genders and gender relationships seems to be repeated in news reports I’ve seen in the lat 10 years from India AND China. Reports show that there are not enough women for Asian men to marry and start families with.
There are 37 million more men than women in India — and, apparently this will cause the rapist tendencies of Indian men to get worse.
There are 32 million more Chinese men than there are women, and so far the implications of this are only being called potential “social instability”.. p(http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/may/19/china-gender-ratio-women-men)
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@Jefe: Thank you for responding.
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@Bulanik,
I am sure there must be a book out there on this.
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@ biff
Comment deleted for racist slur.
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Really? I spent a long time writing that comment. I have no idea what would have been considered a slur in it. If you can’t say it, can you at least tell me what it started with?
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was it a slur against white people I was making in jest to illustrate a point?
Anyway, the deleted comment dealt with a few different things, including (i) exploring the fact that a white woman with an Asian man was the one who was most upset by my previous comment re: Asian women and white men (ii) critically examining Kiwi’s implicit assumption that only loser guys would go for Asian women, and what that says about his own feelings of inferiority; and (iii) noting the fact that there are a lot of people here with very traumatic experiences, which seems to be a primary reason they come…
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@ jefe
I forgot to answer your question about whether my husband and I experience any hostility about our relationship in Asian countries.
We’ve been stared at quite a bit, particularly during our honeymoon in Japan. But most of it seemed like curious/surprised staring rather than nasty staring.
We had one older lady in Singapore who took my husband for a Singaporean Chinese guy. She made a few comments to him when I went to the bathroom at a restaurant – comments quite similar to the ones I get in Australia. But that was our one and only experience with overt hostility in Asia.
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@ biff
I was upset by your comment because it EMASCULATED Asian men. My husband is Asian so of course I dislike it when a man – any man – propogates racist and FALSE stereotypes about Asian males.
Why is that so hard for you to grapple with?
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*propagates
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@ Kiwi
Um, of course he was. Why would he mention the issue of d*ck sizes? His story is bullsh*t and should be treated as such.
I’m sorry but I wish you would not accept and support the absolute lies this guy is telling. I don’t believe he’s even living in Asia if he is trying to claim that women are telling him about d*ck sizes anyway.
There is NO WAY that a Chinese woman (I think he claimed he’s living in China) would talk about d*cks with a man, unless she is a working girl.
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@wordynerdygirl, You said that Singaporean lady made comments to your husband. Was it really overt hostility (the kind that you said was borderline violent, or using obscene language, racial slurs, etc.).
How about from in-laws, yours and his?
Anyhow, I think modern day Sydney will not have the same climate as the 1960s and 1970s. Did Australia ever have anti-miscegenation laws?
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@ jefe
Not borderline violent or even overtly hostile – something to the effect of, you look like a nice boy, why aren’t you with a Chinese girl?
My parents had no issue whatsoever. We’ve lived overseas and my parents have friends from all different backgrounds.
My mother in law was not particularly impressed when my husband brought me home. There was one incident where (after we were engaged!) my MIL told my husband about a nice Vietnamese girl who owned her own pharmacy – while I was sitting at the same table!!
But I think her concerns were more based around the fact that she would have liked to have at least one daughter in law that she could speak Vietnamese with etc rather than any real racism or hatred toward white people. We get along fine now.
My father in law never had an issue.
I was born in the early 80s so I don’t personally know what it would have been like in the 60s and 70s. Sydney is very cosmopolitan and of course much more tolerant than it would have been in the 60s and 70s. I don’t think it’s as tolerant as somewhere like Singapore and Sydney still has quite a lot of alarming racist incidents. Google the Cronulla riots (2005) for example or read these articles:
(http://www.smh.com.au/national/racism-on-the-rise-in-australia-migrants-report-cultural-shift-20140405-365a5.html)
(http://www.news.com.au/national/no-conviction-for-racist-sydney-bus-rant/story-fncynjr2-1226692200846)
Australia did not have any anti-miscegenation laws BUT there was the White Australia policy. So apart from the Chinese Australian families who moved here during the gold rush there were no Asian immigrants at all for most of the 20th century. No Asian immigration = no possibility of mixed marriages etc.
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@ jefe
This article is probably the best of all: (http://www.theage.com.au/comment/curse-of-australias-silent-pervasive-racism-20130404-2h9i1.html)
It’s by Waleed Aly – he’s one of the best political writers/commentators in Australia at the moment. He’s also married to a white Australian woman. They’ve been subjected to a lot of hate mail and racist comments.
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@ Wordy
4.Don’t you want your kids to look like you?
I had to stop and allow uproarious laughter to escape from my body at your point number 4. Who knew your kids will now bear no resemblance to you because of your husband’s um, interference? Poppycock! (and that’s a very, very nice word to use).
“Don’t you want your kids to look like you.” Ha ha, much more pleasant than, “You know, you really ought to do your part to keep the white race pure.” Polite liberal scum, but scum nonetheless.
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Well werdynerdy,
You are directly accusing me of lying, and no, I wasn’t. In my original comment, I noted how women (or all races and nationalities) derive social status from the status of their husband. I make a general comment about a certain type of behavior, which Kiwi has seen, and share my own experience. Yet you perceive this as a personal insult against your husband (trying to emasculate him by relating this incident that happened to ME), which must mean I’m lying. This is female solopism at it’s finest and why I don’t bother to responding to most females on this site.
Kiwi,
You said, “Not sure what’s going on with your situation, but I doubt it looks good.” What possible basis could you have to doubt that my situation is good? Let’s just say your assumption is not correct. In my high school there were no Asians and I felt it was natural to like only white girls. I felt like I could get with anyone in my school. Later, in college, I came to see most white girls as way too promiscuous (trying to use language that won’t get my comment deleted) and they eventually became almost invisible to me. Not that all Asian girls are angels, but I was able to date several attractive (and marry one) girls who had not had sex before marriage, were reasonable intelligent and not feminazis. So, I don’t fit with the stereotype the nice cartoon you shared was trying to propagate, though you can throw me in another stereotype with the majority of men worldwide who have no interest in masculine domineering gals of any race (including Asian American “activists” of any kind).
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@ Wordy, et.al
I felt the need to comment. It went into moderation, confused at first but then I realized, I had used the word c0ck, and no, it’s not what you’re thinking you dirty minded fiends.
Ahahaha! 😀
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@ biff
I know that you are being deliberately obtuse. Anyone with any sense of logic would immediately see your comment as an attempt to undermine the masculinity of Asian men.
You commented on **** sizes – this is a typical way that white men put down Asian men. You know that and I know that.
As I mentioned, I doubt that the typical Chinese woman would comment on d*ck sizes at all. You’re right, most Chinese women are quite conservative about se*ual matters, which is why I think that:
(a) you are lying about the conversation; or
(b) you are very much mistaken about the virtue of the women you have encountered.
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@ Legion
LOL 🙂 You’ve piqued my curiosity because I can’t imagine what (non-dirty) word you could have used that included that syllable!
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@ Wordy
Haha! You’ll see, you’ll see…
🙂
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@ jefe
One further thing to illustrate my point because you seem to be skeptical about (white) racism in Australia.
The Cronulla riots happened in 2005 – only nine years ago. 5,000 white Australian men participated in a violent riot targeting Middle Eastern and ‘brown’ men:
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZO6d0VT7gQ&index=3&list=PLSEPGHCWiW6QGlzVx9BrkcQXbfYyNwSi1)
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OQF10BChY0)
These kinds of attitudes are still shared by a LOT of white Australian men.
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Now I have something in moderation!! Two y*utube links unfortunately.
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@ jefe
Last news link I promise: (http://news.ninemsn.com.au/world/2012/11/27/09/32/korean-media-report-racist-attacks-in-australia).
You just seem to be fairly skeptical about my/my husband’s experiences so I thought I’d illustrate to you the level of racism I’m talking about. I think you’ve only ever been to Australia on holiday so it might be a bit difficult for you to judge based on that limited experience.
The fact of the matter is that there are a lot of WM/AF couples in Sydney. I have never, ever witnessed racism against those couples yet my husband and I have experienced racist comments, harassment and hostility time and time again. This is because (I believe) most of the racism in Australia is directed toward Asian men and ‘brown’ men in general.
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@ jefe
Yes, you’re right. It’s in no way comparable. I feel very sad for you and your family when I read your stories about what happened to your parents and how unhappy they were.
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@ jefe
Well, I think that the appearance of Australian cities would definitely resemble the North American cities (e.g. Toronto/Vancouver). I also think there are some other commonalities between Canada and Australia, particularly in terms of the historical treatment of Aboriginal people.
Culturally, however, Australia is far more similar to the UK. We sound more like English people, the vast majority of Australian people have English/Irish ancestry; we watch a lot of UK TV; and our sense of humour is much more like the British sense of humour. Aussies and British people like dry, dark comedy whereas the slapstick, more obvious SNL genre of comedy is not popular here at all.
Your observations about the main racial conflicts (anglo vs asian/anglo vs middle eastern) are absolutely on point, as was your comment about the level of racist violence. I’ve said before that racial politics in Aus are far less divisive (in my opinion) than the US.
I was really responding to your query (which Bulanik quoted) about the privilege dynamics in a WF/AM partnership. I don’t think that I have lost opportunities for work or housing. I do think that I am perceived differently (and in a more negative light) by white people because of my choice of an Asian man for a partner.
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Wordynerdygirl…is that you and your husband in your avatar?
you all look like a great couple…congradulations
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@Legion
re: your comment to wordynerdygirl
This is a very common thing that people say.
After hearing stuff like that hundreds of times, it’s not so funny any more.
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@ Legion
As jefe mentioned, it’s a very common thing that people say to me about my relationship.
It is funny/ridiculous – because as you said it’s just a more polite way of saying that by having kids with my husband I would be diluting whiteness.
The interesting thing is a guy I work with who is MARRIED to a Chinese (from China) woman has made challenging remarks to me about my marriage. He asked me why I wanted to put up with ‘being controlled’ by an Asian man and told me that his wife prefers Aussie/Western men because they treat their wives better.
He has a son and I’m scared about how his attitudes might damage his son’s sense of self and masculinity as he grows older.
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@ BR
Yes, that’s us.
To be frank I think a lot of people on this site tell fibs about where they are, who they are etc. Particularly those who comment on Asian/white issues. That’s why I decided to put the picture as my avatar – authenticity is important.
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”
How Whites and Asians get along.
Asians becoming part of American society.
Stereotypes (pushing them or opposing them).
”
Wow. That pretty much sums up the trailer of ABC’s new/first ever Asian American comedy “Fresh Off the Boat”
Interesting how few African Americans appear in the preview of the show and yet still manage to be the antagonists
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@ Wordy
He has a son and I’m scared about how his attitudes might damage his son’s sense of self and masculinity as he grows older.
*sigh*
His son will hopefully receive a blessing (fortunate circumstances/strong will) that protect and uplift him. Some people get married and just focus on the happiness of the spouse with the children considered kind of just “there”, it’s a terrible thing.
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@wordynerdygirl
Isn’t it interesting how white men married to Asian women are experts on Asian / white relations, ethnic Asian groups in western countries, Asian culture, and the nature and psychology of Asian men?
NOT
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@wordynerdygirl
I do think that there are some general differences in the psychological exposure between children of AF/WM and AM/WF.
When I was young I used to think that the sons of a white father and Asian mother got to enjoy more white privilege when they were growing up, something I felt denied to me. But as an adult, I realized that the reality might be something different. They got to grow up witnessing their father’s white privilege more, which is not the same thing. They may also have some issues with their mother bashing Asian men in front of him. So he might not exactly inherit his father’s full white privilege, but he may become alienated from any positive sense of self as an Asian-descendant man. A somewhat similar, but different thing happens to the child in an AM/WF household *if* the white mother always feels the need to assert her dominance over the Asian husband.
It can be more complicated if their parents divorce.
I hope that you don’t object too much to my using the term “white privilege”. As you said, some people have regarded you personally in a negative light after learning of your choice of husband. That negative light nowadays rarely affects white men who marry Asian women. So, I would say that the white man loses little white privilege in marrying an Asian, but the white woman does lose some.
In the USA, I get the impression that nowadays a white woman loses more white privilege marrying an Asian man than when marrying a black man.
You know who I had to look at as a character role model as a child? – Spock, the son of a Vulcan and a Human. I really believe that his character was based on the idea of a Eurasian man with an Asian father (the “alien” part) and an white mother (the “human” part).
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@ jefe
I don’t object to you using the the term ‘white privilege’ at all, because of course that is what we are talking about.
When you say ‘dominance’, though, are you talking about privilege dynamics playing out? I can see how this might happen in relationships where the WW still (subconsciously or otherwise) believes some of the false stereotypes about AM.
I think my family is also somewhat unique. We lived for quite a while in Asia + my parents always had a very diverse circle of friends. I was exposed to positive portrayals of Asian men/women, in an Asian majority country, during some of my formative years. I think this creates a different dynamic between my husband and I than, say, if I were a white Australian woman who grew up in Broken Hill.
If you don’t mind me asking (and I understand if you do!) did you ever talk with your mother about the way her issues with your father affected you? Did she realise the impact her/her family’s attitudes had on you?
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@ Jefe
The popular psychological self-help book “The Road Less Traveled” by M. Scott Peck says that with the right tools, human beings can make a good stab at life. Do you remember this book? It was so popular, I’d sometimes hear that readers believed it “changed their lives”. I read it, and like it, too.
It said: Life is hard, but you CAN become competent at life by being disciplined and responsible.
It seemed very human, familar and good sense.
Dr Peck also talked a good bit about romantic love in the book, especially the destructive narcissism of falling in love and sexual self-indulgence: true love wasn’t about gratifying the ego; instead it was what you do for others…
Then one day, I saw Dr Peck on TV and he was talking to a young East Asian American man that I later learned was his son, Christopher Peck.
I don’t know what happened inside my head when I learned that Christopher Peck was his son, because suddenly, M. Scott Peck’s message and meanings were altered and I no longer trusted him or it. Something was off, intuitively, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I believe some of it was akin to what you observed here:
I didn’t know than what kind of father or husband M Scott Peck was (and I don’t really know now!), but later, I learned that he was a habitual philanderer, drunk and drug user and was estranged from 2 of his 3 chldren. Similarly, when he was a doctor in the military, he urged changes in the Pentagon’s drug policies whilst using illegal drugs himself.
Later, when he died, there was more backstory:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/m-scott-peck-316071.html
I wonder Christopher Peck felt about his father thinking his wife is a “Ch*nk”? I wonder how he felt about her “Ch*nk-ness” being the sole reason for his father’s “love” for her, because she was a way for his father to experience the Exotic East. I wonder if his father ever looked at him and saw a “Ch*nk”, ever called him a “Ch*nk” or his mother and sisters that, when he was drunk and angry, or some such?
How proud was Christopher Peck of his father?
How proud could Christopher be of himself during these times?
I don’t believe that a book or a message suddenly loses all its worth because the author did not practice what he preached. After all, human imperfection is normal. But, when I learned this about M. Scott Peck, what ran through my mind was: “This is how most white men think about Asians and this is how white men behave with Asian women, even the ones who make a living out of appearing evolved and holy …”
The book doesn’t ask for change — that is too much.
What it teaches is greater competence at conducting life, no matter if the ends are for good or not. Much of self-help literary and TV culture seemed like that at the time, as his message was absorbed into managment training.
I recall seeing white men enter managment skills courses, and come out more adept at simply being privileged white men, because they were more at peace and more accepting of themselves just as they were.
M. Scott Peck’s white male privilege not only allowed him to re-languaged the religions of Asia, but permitted him to transgress his own teachings without reprisals or guilt.
He liked the fantasy of having an Asian woman and the chldren he had with her, but outside of symbolism and fantasy –in his own life — he spent his life avoiding her and them.
In effect, he was writing about Asia and Asian life-philosophies, but in fact he may have been writing about Asian women and his Asian family life. He was at least informed by it.
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Jefe, comment in mod.
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@WordNerdy Girl: If that is you and your husband in the avatar, you guy make an attractive couple. You are very pretty and he’s handsome.
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@ Wordy,
I am with Mary Burrell about your avatar 😀
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^ Whatever! It isn’t as awesome as a future dystopia where flying around in your flight capable cop car and hounding the masses is so much fun that you go back to your dingy apartment and swim around in whiskey for the rest of the evening until you pass out or go out to gun down sentient robots after getting a call from your racist boss who enjoys violence and mayhem waay too much.
Actually Wordy, I’m just jealous that you have a time machine and that you and your husband look so gloriously Art Deco!
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@ Mary Burrell & Bulanik
Thanks 🙂
@ Legion
Awesome that you noticed that! Our wedding had an Art Deco theme – even the cars were from the 1930s.
BTW I dig the Blade Runner avatar, that’s one of my favourite movies of all time.
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@ jefe
One last thing (I promise!): based on the most recent census figures Australia’s non-white population is now 19.5%. So I think we’re getting pretty close to the same level of diversity as Canada.
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@Bulanik,
Thank you for bringing up M. Scott Peck. Of course I have heard of his famous book but I have never read it. It looks like he is from my father’s generation, so I guess his kids are around my generation.
It said that he was estranged from 2 of his kids. If Christopher Peck appeared on TV with him, that must have been he one NOT estranged. But you illustrated another point – people’s impression of others do change once they see them with a multiracial kid, at least in the prior generation. Nowadays, it still does to some extent, maybe in oher ways.
There is a different dynamic in every family. I wouldn’t even attempt to make any sweeping generalization and apply it to an actual case. I did discuss / speak with many hundred, thousands of people with one Asian and one non-Asian parent, and it is common to have some problem in the family. Probably over half of them had divorced parents and they were estranged to some extent from one or both parents.
I am still thinking about writing a story into a book that is in the back of my mind. I brought it up last year in a thread. The idea is more about how race relations can cause estrangement within families.
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@ jefe
Was that for a study or something? If so, I would be interested in reading it.
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@wordynerdygirl,
Does that % include groups that the USA classify as “white”, e.g., Lebanese, Syrians, Central Asians, north Africans, other Arabs? In the USA, they are all classified as white.
Australia seemed hyper-white to me when I visited, and that included Sydney and Melbourne. I suppose the small towns are even more white. It also seemed very unpopulated in general. I am sure it is getting more and more Asian. So, I think the comparison with Canada is also reasonable here.
I felt that the US is more like Brazil in many respects, with its history of slavery, Native genocide and mass immigration in the late 19th century and early 20th century that included some Asians too. When I went to Sao Paulo, I felt like I was back in the USA (but maybe a version from the 1970s, not today). But USA has already diverged and has become more Asian and Latino (Mexican, Central American and Caribbean, not so much south American).
I think that Australia has slowly started to accept that their future is more aligned with Asia than with Europe, and maybe in 100 years, the population might be largely Eurasian with a mainstream Eurasian – Aussie culture. The USA will evolve differently. I suspect that in 100 years, the USA might have a power elite descended from Jewish fathers and Asian Tiger Moms, perhaps subsuming the current Jewish power elite.
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@ jefe
There are 22.5 million people in Australia. It is the most urbanised country in the world, so I find it difficult to accept that Melbourne or Sydney would feel depopulated to anyone, even a tourist. This is what Sydney looks like: (http://images.theage.com.au/2010/03/16/1227026/420-sprawl-420×0.jpg).
There are, of course, vast tracts of land in central Australia (and even about 3 hours’ drive west of Sydney) that have no residential areas whatsoever.
The top ten countries of birth in 2011 for overseas born Australians were:
UK
New Zealand
China
India
Vietnam
Italy
Philippines
South Africa
Malaysia
Germany
Clearly, Australia is not a ‘hyper-white’ country. More than 13% of the population is East Asian. 2.5% is African in origin – mostly from Western and East Africa as north African immigration (e.g. from Egypt etc) is negligible. Central Asian immigration to Australia is also negligible. Yes, Middle Eastern people are counted as non-white here – they are also counted as part of the ‘visible minority’ population in Canada.
By the way, what do you mean by ‘the current Jewish power elite’?
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@ jefe
Here’s my source:
(http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Lookup/BEF8BD30A177EC39CA257C4400238EED?opendocument)
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@wordynerdygirl
I guess basically that is what I mean. It may have also had an aspect of the 20th century concept of the husband breadwinner having a say of what goes on in the family. Anyhow, exerting dominance from the white spouse would mean ascribing more credibility in the white spouse’s decisions due to the the authority of the white spouse’s white privilege.
That is not exactly what I meant. I ascribe it more to the belief of the naturalness of white privilege phenomenon in a westernized society, as though it was the normal course of things. Of course, the white spouse could invoke stereotypes about Asians to support that position, but I don’t believe it is directly because of false stereotypes about Asians. It is probably more the result of a western education, the belief that whites were the Good guys of history, whites created the best forms of government, etc., etc. etc.
Does your family (both sides) automatically link Asian Australians with Asia? How much has this “diversity” extended to Asian-descendant Australians? Was your husband educated in Australia during his “formative” years? How much have either of you learned or studied about Asian Australian history or about how Asian Australians are depicted in Australian culture and politics (something that would be along the lines of the subject of this post, except for Australia version?) I wonder if you often link Asian descendant Australian issues with Asia, say, more than you link white Australians with Europe. Of course it is very related, but you often talk about Asians in Asia more than about Asians in Australia as a frame of reference.
You mentioned before that your mother-in-law initially was slightly disappointed that her daughter-in-law didn’t speak to her in Vietnamese. Is there a reason why you didn’t learn Vietnamese? I actually think it is a good idea.
I talked to both my parents. But sometimes I had to step back and look from outside to understand what went on.
I realized that my mother grew up fascinated with the Good Earth and Love is a Many splendored thing, etc., not to mention getting out of her home town. My father grew up looking at Jane Russell pin-ups and after becoming a member in the electrical workers’ union, became obsessed with fitting in (a very “good ole boys” crowd of men whose parents came from southern Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina, etc.) some of whom had had a tour of duty in the Korean War and learned to treat Asians as g**ks.
My mother always said she was raised with higher standards and upbringing, and constantly made comments about Asians, about how my father’s upbringing was a lower standard and also about how other Asian families should be raising their children. I told her she just thought white people were better. She hated that.
As they got older, passed through middle age, and got divorced, they mellowed out a bit. My mother actually had a very wide range of friends. About 30% of the attendees were African-Americans and 25% were Asian and they all adored her. My father got more interested in Asian-American issues as he got older and started making a new set of Asian-American friends (not just the few from his childhood). I like to think I had some impact on that.
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@ jefe
See, one thing I notice is that you conflate US patterns of immigration etc with those in Australia. Apart from a very small Chinese Australian community descended from people who moved here during the Gold Rush, Asian immigration to Australia was non existent until the mid-late 1970s. My husband is quite a bit older than me and moved here in the late 70s, before I was born.
If you look at the context of my comments you’ll notice that they are mainly in response to claims by biff and other men who CLAIM to know all about Asian women living in Asia. I specifically talked about my experiences in response to claims by biff and Kiwi regarding the ‘charisma man’ effect and white men’s popularity in Asia. My point was that in my experience this popularity is vastly overstated.
I also tried to contextualise my responses to your questions about my marriage and the dynamics within it. There are not many Australian people from my parents’ generation who have spent significant years of their lives living in an Asian country.
What that means, in my opinion, is that my parents, siblings and I are far less brainwashed by negative stereotypes about Asian men (and women) than the average white Australian who has been fed a steady diet of Hollywood movies etc. That’s why I talked about those experiences rather than the day to day experiences that I have living in a very diverse city and connecting with Asian Australian people on a daily basis.
Like anyone else I can only draw from my own experience, as you do from yours.
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@wordynerdy girl
It is highly urbanised in a very expansive place, so yes, it felt VERY unpopulated to me, similar to how Canada feels unpopulated to me. High rate of urbanisation does not mean highly populated. Some of the highly populated regions are not necessarily highly urbanised.
The photo you sent would be just a *small* city in China. A medium-sized city would be double the size.
I am originally from the DC/MD/VA area and also lived in New York and Boston (plus Hong Kong and Tokyo). Metro DC is about the size of metro Sydney and metro baltimore is nearly the size of metro melbourne. Therefore, the National Capital region (DC / Baltimore) feels like Sydney plus Melbourne added together, but fitting inside an area that is only 10% the size of Victoria or 2-3 % the size of New South Wales. I wouldn’t have classified either Sydney or Melbourne as big cities, more like medium sized urban areas (not exceeding Toronto and Vancouver or Montreal). Both Houston and Dallas are already larger than Sydney in metro population.
Greater Metro NYC has about 22 million people, roughly equal to the entire country of Australia, and has roughly the Asian population of the entire country of Australia, and possibly more ethnic Chinese (yes, than entire Australia). It has nearly 4 milion blacks and over 4 million Latinos in a single metro area. I felt the Blue Mountains area was so empty of people. Try driving out to the Poconos or the Catskills. People everywhere.
Even these are not as populated as places I have spent time in, like the Pearl River Delta or the island of Java. Those places just blow my mind (in the opposite direction). Java fits 145 million people in an area 1/16 the size of New South Wales (smaller than Alabama). The pearl river delta fits about 115 million in an area that is basically the size of the Southern California coast. Yet Java, is probably NOT mostly urbanized.
So, yes, Australia felt exceedingly unpopulated to me, with the bulk of its population fitting in a small area, and even that it not that crowded. Felt less crowded than even the St. Lawrence valley / Ontario Peninsula area in southern Quebec and Ontario, and I don’t find that crowded either.
When driving along the coast from Cairns to Port Douglas (is it about 100 miles?), I saw beach after beach that was unpopulated and more or less pristine. Past Port Douglas it is even more unpopulated. You cannot find anywhere like that in the USA – try driving the florida coast anywhere from Key west to Daytona Beach or to Pensacola.
So, yeah, Australia kinda blew my mind how empty and unpopulated it was. I knew it had a small population, but it had even more open space and vast wilderness than I was expecting.
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@ jefe
Oh, and I didn’t say my mother in law was disappointed because I didn’t speak to her in Vietnamese. I was newly engaged at the time and had only dated my husband for a year – so it would be very impressive if I had learnt to speak Vietnamese by then, particularly when his main language is English!
My husband’s ex girlfriend is Chinese Australian. She didn’t learn Vietnamese and they were together for 9 years. I wonder whether you would you expect her to? Of course I have learnt as much as I possibly can about Asian Australian history – I read a lot about it, talk to my husband about it, and talk to my friends about it.
I was really saying that my MIL would have liked to have one daughter in law that shared her culture. My husband’s sister in law is Indonesian and she had similar comments made to her by my MIL in the beginning of her relationship.
I find your parents’ experiences (and yours of course) very interesting. As you’ve mentioned before, though, they aren’t directly comparable – you were in a different country and from a different era altogether.
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@wordynerdygirl
I dont’ think I conflate them at all. I have read a lot about Australia’s white Australia policy, about the situation of the boat people in the 1970s and about the gold rush era in Australian history.I am aware of the time frame of Asian immigration to Australia and how it compares with the timeframe in the USA. I know that the immigration pattern is not the same (but actually also has a lot of similarities).
Americans also believe that their Asian population is largely foreign, really not *THAT* different from Australia (yes, different, but no so much that we cannot draw some comparisons). Many Americans act and believe as if Asian American history started only after 1970.
That was not really my point, however,
Australia does have an Asian-Australian history dating back to the 19th century. They also had an immigration ban from China in the early 20th century (which could draw some comparisons with the one in the USA). But, there has been an aspect of white – Asian relations history for the past 160-170 years that even impacted the White Australia policy, so I would say that there has been a history that has impacted white attitudes towards Asians in the country, Asian attitudes about being in Australia and a relationship between the two that extends well back to the 19th century. For example, you can examine what people learn when they are taught Australian history, both what is included and what is left out.
IF your husband grew up in Australia, then he most likely *HAS* learned something about what Australia taught him about Asian Australians (as well as you). Besides, the white Australia policy has been repealed long enough for us to have 3rd generation Asian-Australian teenagers already. How has Australia revised its depiction of history that it is now teaching its high school students?
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I think it is always good if both spouses learn their spouse’s family’s native language. So, if your husband married his ex-girlfriend, I think it would have been good if she learned Vietnamese too. I would think it would be terrific if your brother-in-law learned Bahasa Indonesia and her native dialect (if any) and if she learned Vietnamese.
I certainly would do it. If I married someone from a Vietnamese speaking family, I would make sure i learned vietnamese to the best of my ability (ditto for Indonesian, Filipino, Chinese dialect, even Swedish or Portuguese). But that is just me, I realize. But I also really love it when I see parents do that for their children.
Maybe you can do what my mom did with me. She went to Chinese (Cantonese) school with me when I was 6 years old. But she dropped out first. 😛
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@ jefe
Yes, my husband was educated here and when he was at school much of Australian history – including the history of Aboriginal Australians and Asian Australians – was whitewashed from high school history books. I was educated partly abroad BUT I was educated in international schools – so yes, I was also taught from a Western perspective.
Things have changed now. Students in every year of school learn about Asian history and culture, the history of Australia’s engagement with the Asia Pacific region, the history of Asian immigration in Australia AND the history of racial conflicts in Australia. See here for a summary: (http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/crosscurriculumpriorities/asia-and-australias-engagement-with-asia).
I mentioned on the other thread the Lambing Flat riots. They were a watershed moment in Asian Australian history and was one of the events leading up to Deakin’s very famous anti-immigration (‘yellow peril’) style speech at Federation and the beginnings of the White Australia policy. That’s why I thought it would be a very interesting post.
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@wordynerdygirl
If that is the case, then Australia is *lightyears* ahead of the USA. Americans are largely clueless about their Asian-American history, or resort to stereotypes. They replaced Asian-American history with a blank sheet or one provided by Hollywood.
So, whilst the Lambing Flat Riots would be very interesting and help us to understand the implication to Australia’s immigration ban on Chinese and its overall white Australia policy that was in force for many decades, we have Americans (I would even venture to say most of them) who did not even know that US prohibited non-whites from becoming citizens for the vast part of its history. Australians *know* that the government plucked Aboriginals and mixed-raced Aboriginals from their families to have them raised and educated as whites and apologized for it. Most Americans do not know that the US govt did the same thing to its Native Americans and its mixed-Native American population and the USA never apologized for it. We have so much more work to do in the USA and for the readers of this blog.
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@ jefe
I see what you mean. I just think it’s important for American people to realise that there are other perspectives and paradigms than those in the US. One of the problems I see – as a non American – is that Americans tend to conflate heir history and their experience of race relations with that of the rest of the Anglosphere.
Thanks for mentioning the Apology to the Stolen Generations. I quoted it long ago on another thread.
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*their history
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Maybe one way of handling it could be including other countries’ experience when discussing American issues. Abagond does this sometimes, but not all the time.
eg, when discussing
– the California Gold Rush, also compare it to the gold rushes in Canada and Australia and its implication to how white migrants encountered the Asian migrants for the first time.
– the Transatlantic Slave trade, mention the transpacific slave trade and the coolie trade
– the Transpacific Slave trade, include Mexico and Peru with the USA.
– when discussing the coolie trade, discuss how it tied into the Caribbean coolie trade (and South African, indian ocean, SE Asia, etc.) and also how it is connected to the abolition of the African slave trade
– the Chinese Exclusion Act, mention how Canada and Australia handled the similar issue
– the stolen generation in Australia, mention what the USA did similarly to its Native American / mixed Native American population (I am not sure that Abagond did that when he discussed Rabbit Proof Fence)
– the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965 v. Australia’s repeal of its White Australia policy and Canada’s and the UK’s immigration laws
– Hollywood stereotypes of Asians, how that impacted people in other countries, esp. white majority countries with Asian minorities.
– the definition of “Asian” – Abagond did mention about the UK, but not Australia or Canada or about other countries.
etc. etc.
Then Americans would not conflate their experience so much with other countries and non-Americans would not always assume that Americans are doing that.
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@ jefe
Well, I do feel that many American people in general take a tone of superiority and an attitude that their history is somehow more important. Why may the stories of other communities in the Asian diaspora only be told in the context of American stories?
This is the kind of forehead-slapping experience that many non-Americans have when they speak to Americans: (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJ3RrqBqk14). It’s comedy but you get the point.
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@ Jefe
Perhaps, but we don’t how it’ll go.
I just looked up what an “Asian Tiger Mom” is, as it’s not a phrase that’s used where I am, and seems to be an US meme(?) I am not sure if it’s a totally serious and researched phenomenon or not, but it surprises me that it’s perceived as “significant”. Among other nationalties, it’s quite well-known that French mothers successful parenting is partly based on their strictness:
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052970204740904577196931457473816
I’m very much enjoying your conversation with Wordy, yet, I am once again getting the nagging feeling that India’s (big, and growing) population and possible emigration pattern is being left out of the picture when theories and projections about Asians are being discussed. I am interested to know about Asians in the countries you are both from, of course, but I am left wondering about such a huge section of the Asian population (India) when talk shifts to future trends.
I heard that more Indians are going to Australia and more are staying there, for example. I don’t know abou the US.
***
I am also wondering what you mean by the “Jewish power elite?”
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correction: *Perhaps, but we don’t know how it’ll go.
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@ Bulanik
Good point! There is a very big gap in current Australian discourse – I rarely hear about the stories, needs and concerns of South Asian people in the Australian media. As you point out, the Indian community is one of the fast growing though.
I don’t think this has been recognised by the Government either. I just checked the curriculum websites and while Indonesian, Japanese, Korean and Mandarin are core second languages there’s no mention of Hindi, Bengali or Urdu.
I think the US has a very large (and growing) South Asian community too, as does Canada.
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@ Wordy,
Firstly, excuse me for not addressing @ you in that comment above:
I had intended to word it to both you and Jefe, but I sometimes make a mess of my (dyslexic) posts whilst also trying to type up legible sentences with proper spelling! Haha.
I wonder how come Indians/South Asians seem to become a customary “afterthought” in those projections and narratives? I always notice it and then wonder if it’s only me, and feel slightly stupid for mentioning it 😀
Do you have any ideas about that reason for this gap in the discourse?
As I probably said on another occasion, when I have been in the company of white Australians in the past and the subject touches on Asia, the individuals I knew (about half a dozen of various ages) would let me know Indians weren’t Asians because India was a “sub-continent”: Asian “started” in China, and anyone who was Asian looked more like that….
I really didn’t know what to say when I heard this (a few times) because I was confused by this interpretation of geography and what these particular individuals believed Asian people looked like (Middle Easterners, Arabs).
I stress “individuals” because since then, I remain in the dark about whether this interpretation of Asia/Asians is widespread among Antipodeans…
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@ Bulanik
That does sound pretty typical. When people use the term ‘Asian’ here they almost invariably mean East/South East Asian. South Asian people are unfortunately lumped under the heading of ‘Indian’ whether they are Indian, Pakistani or Bangladeshi.
There are very few representations of South Asian Australians on tv etc at the moment, although there some really awesome people who are changing that – e.g. Indira Naidoo and Senthorun Raj.
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@ Wordy, that’s good to know.
It sounded dubious, but those Australians I knew were honest and straightforward people, so I wasn’t sure what to think.
The truth is, in some discussions, South Asians are really not perceived as Asian, and are left out of the discussion, unless there is a little “prodding”, and then the reaction is “yes, of course”… It’s not intentional, as such, more habit.
Therefore the narratiion, theorizing and speculations for future trends exclude them as Asians too, beyond reminders like that. It’s a bit unhelpfu as a perspective, because this particular Asian population will be THE BIGGEST IN THE WORLD, or at least the size of other Asian nations, in the future.
I agree with you that will change, and the perspective will be broadened, willy-nilly.
From the impression I get about South Asian Australians, the fashion seems to be to do well educationally, make bags-o-money and marry white if you can.
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@Bulanik,
I am not in the US either, so I learned the term Asian Tiger Mom mainly from the media, and Abagond even mentioned it a few times. He said he might do a post on Amy Chua.
South Asian American is an exploding population, esp. in places like New York City / New Jersey (although many other places are experiencing it also, e.g., metro DC and Silicon Valley in CA). In particular, Indian Americans include a large brain drain element not too unlike Taiwanese Americans. But of course, not all are brain drain.
I got the impression that Australians tend to think of East and SE Asian first when they use the term “Asian” and South Asian is like an afterthought, so it is not like the UK at all. In the USA, Asian has come to include South Asian since the 1980s.
Yeah, the term “Asian” has different interpretation in different places and to different people. It is not a simple term.
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@ Jefe, I am not based in the UK.
The Irish know that India is Asia, but ALWAYS believe, or presume, that an Asian is an East Asian or a Southeast Asian, not South Asians.
I never knew what Abagond was going at when he mentioned the Tiger Mom thing, and it’s every time I want to ask “what do you mean?” when the conversation is full swing…know what I mean?
As the populations of South Asia grow and grow, the perspective and language will probably have no option to change with it.
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^^ I mean to say, I don’t always feel okay asking Abagond (or someone else) to explain something that is understood in the US that isn’t obvious elsewhere.
I just don’t understand and refrain from participating for fear of looking like a dummy.
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@ Bulanik
A third of my traffic comes from outside the US, so if you do not understand something, you are probably not alone. Living in the US it is hard for me to know what people outside the country do and do not understand.
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@ abagond, I see what I mean: it’s impossible to always know what will be understood everywhere.
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@ Bulanik
I will do a post on Amy Chua sooner or later, if not this month. She is a Chinese American who credits her children’s success to her strict Chinese parenting. The fact that she and her husband are Yale Law professors has little to do with it, apparently. She is a cultural racist who believes that ethnic groups in the US rise or fall based on three main qualities: superiority complex, impulse control and insecurity. Racism, class and wealth have little to do with one’s success. She seems to be a huge believer in the Bootstrap Myth and the Model Minority stereotype. She is Charles Murray – or Randy – in drag.
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Cultural racism and Amy Chua…
Looking forward to that post, Abagond.
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@ Abagond
It sounds like you’ve read Chua’s latest book: The Triple Package, have you?
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NAh, Feel free to ask. The stuff happening in the USA now is new to me too, including this Suey Park / Colbert stuff.
Most of it is searchable, but sometimes that doesn’t answer all your questions.
You might not be in the UK, but you do seem to follow what goes on there more closely. 😛
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But of course, Jefe: at least I understand the British — they make more sense than the Irish! lol.
But thinking about it…Ireland was not one of Europe’s colonial powers, with direct interests in Asia or Africa. Still, the many Irish participated in British society meant that individual Irish participated and also benefitted from British imperial interests in those continents, so the Irish were part of the colonial presence, even though their own country was under Brtish Rule.
The Chinese and Indians are both long-standing immigrants communities. Chinese are usually and colloquially classed as “Asian”, whilst Indians are noe termed as “non-Chinese Asians”. This maybe be due to a US influence on the culture, as Ireland seems as open to American norms as British ones — but I can’t be sure, as both East and South Asians are well-established in Ireland.
In fact, Indians might be better integrated — can’t be certain though.
It is this latter group (Indians, Bengalis) which make up the highest level of new immigrants, a trend which may continue in Ireland as the Irishh govt endeavours to double the number of overseas students in Irish universities: India is high on the shortlist. I also have the impression that Indians are encouraged to stay, because they have a history of integrating into Irish society well. Ireland’s Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport is of Indian descent.
The Irish though, don’t collect data based on ethnicity, so no precise numbers exist. Many seem to be medical professionals, business, pharmaceuticals. Most “Indian” restaurant are in fact, Bengali. http://www.irelandindiacouncil.ie/community.php
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“Jefe,
You know that most of the descendants of the Chinese who settled in the US South after Reconstruction are now largely African-American today? They also lived in or above their stores back then.”
Linda says,
Jefe, I forgot to address this…
Yes, from the comments you’ve made previously, I know that the Chinese settled in the South and intermixed with the African-Americans there but where are these descendants today? and do they still honor or acknowledge their Chinese ancestry and culture?
or did it get lost and swallowed up– just like their Native American or any other racial admixture.
From my outlook, when it comes to race, America is rigid and binary — it’s either black or white as far as Americans are concerned because that’s the way the white government/society wanted it (and that’s why issues between black and white people are so polarizing);
everything else is pushed aside and marginalized by American society…(hence, most people not having a clue that Chinese people are not new immigrants) and if they can’t push it aside, they demonize it or try to neutralize it (like with the Latinos/issue of immigration)
In Jamaica and the Caribbean, as I mentioned, everyone acknowledges mixtures and many mixed-race Asians have retained parts of their Asian culture and practices within their family.
The Chinese have added much to Jamaican culture– ie Jamaican beef patties, music (Byron Lee and the Dragonaires–popular song “Dollar Whine”)
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taJIc1PBmdU&feature=kp)
“By this time, in the 1940s, many of the second-generation, those who were truly Jamaican-Chinese, began to rebel against their parents’ desires to remain wedded to Chinese culture. They left the family business, went into other professions and embraced aspects of Jamaican culture. Many also converted to Roman Catholicism. Resentment from African-Jamaicans waned as tolerance of aspects of Chinese culture grew and some amalgamations occurred. One of the most notable examples is the numbers game “drop pan.” Drop Pan in Cantonese “Jih Fah” and Hakka “Sue Fah,” is named for the fact that tickets numbered 1 to 36 are dropped in a pan to see who wins.”
http://jamaica-gleaner.com/pages/history/story0055.htm
It seem like the concept of “Blasians” seems like a new phenomenon for many African Americans, even though mixed black and Asians are not new– so did these mixed-race Chinese people manage to get swallowed up by the African American community in the US?
Were they rejected by the Chinese community? so therefore, they had no choice but to be absorbed by the African American community.
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@Linda,
Did these 2 posts answer some of your questions?
I don’t think that the Chinese community rejected their mixed black Chinese kids per se in the beginning, but the white community forced them to later on.
In the case of War Bride blasians, where black servicemen brought back Asian wives from Asia, after WWII and the Korean War Black veterans frequently encountered Jim Crow or other forms of segregation back home, and their kids would likely have to be raised in black communities with little contact with Asians. Besides, wives of military men connection to the community would be primarily through their husbands- eg, a Japanese (or Korean) woman from Japan (Korea) married a black veteran would not likely integrate much with the Japanese-American (Korean-American) community in the USA, as she is not connected by family, social origin or occupation to those groups.
One possible exception – those Blasians born in Asia who had been abandoned by, estranged from, or otherwise lost contact with their fathers. If they ever come to the USA, it will be difficult for them to integrate much with black American communities.
2 other possible even smaller exceptions: 1. Some Chinese fathers (in both Jamaica and Mississippi) sent their mixed black-Chinese children back to China to live for a while, or for an education. In these cases, they might return to the USA with Chinese spouses; or 2) Since the early communities were mostly male, the blasian locally born female might be married to one of the men. There are ways that blasians could get integrated back into Asian communities, but most of it is definitely in the other direction.
Post-90s, the Model Minority Stereotype might be an indirect way that whites make Asians abandon their mixed black relatives. But I am sure it is not a simple thing. There may be mixed accommodation.
Finally, I always believe that in many cases, the father has more impact on how the family (and thus the children) interact with the wider community, whereas the mother might have some more impact on how things are run inside the home. The Asian father might introduce his blasian children to the wider community, but the Asian mother might introduce them mainly to just her immediate family.
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[…] Three ways to write about Asians […]
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Going by this post, “Fresh Off the Boat” has White Liberal view of Asian Americans.
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The book “Fresh Off the Boat: A Memoir” was clearly in category 3.
Once the TV executive producers got hold of it, the scriptwriters switched it firmly into category 2. No wonder Eddie Huang no longer recognizes “his” story.
The Republican Guide to Asian Americans is basically category 1, with the model minority thrown in. The White Liberal view is mostly category 2.
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I know I’m responding to this post way, way late but I did notice this when I’m watching US shows with Asians in them. Not Asian-Americans but Asians. Jefe, you said something really interesting about the Chinese community accepting mixed-raced children but then later on, not doing so but then being forced to by the white community. That’s sick and wrong. And it speaks volumes about how the white community in America saw people who are not white back then. I wonder if it’d been a half-white kid, they would’ve forced the Chinese community to abandon them? Or if the father had been a Chinese guy and the mother a white woman? But then again, I suppose the Chinese guy would’ve been killed. Ideally, race shouldn’t be a factor but in US society, for some reason it is. Don’t understand that. Still trying to understand it. But somehow, I don’t think I ever will.
@wordynerdygirl you mentioned how a guy you work with who’s married to a Chinese woman made challenging remarks to you about your marriage. Asking you about why you wanted to put up with “being controlled” by an Asian man and told you that his wife prefers Aussie/Western men because they treat their wives better.
This is racism towards your husband and well, I’m not sure if it’d be racism towards you but it’s definitely some kind of something. It looks like he’s trying to one-up you. Like he’s saying his relationship is better than yours solely because he’s White and his wife is Chinese/Asian. That is some kind of mental disease that I think there’s no cure for. I’d worry for his son too. In my opinion, I think it’s the other way around. It’s usually white guys who like to control everything and everyone. Every single white guy I’ve come across in my life has exhibited that behaviour. They really can’t stand it when their opinions don’t matter and heaven forbid, especially if it’s an Asian guy’s word over theirs. Things can get violent and ugly fast.
If he’d ever said that to me I’d have laughed in his face and told him about my cousin and her partner. Maybe showed him some pictures of things he’d bought her and exactly just how well he was treating her. Both are Asians and the husband of which treats his wife like a princess.
I despise the way the mainstream media paints Asians. And that first gif…god. Is that how Asian women were portrayed in US? No wonder Asian-Americans have it so tough. My heart goes out to you guys. Help each other guys. Because no one else will. And to the Asian-American women out there, help your Asian-American brothers out. When a white guy makes a d*** joke, don’t laugh. Because when you need help, Asian-American men probably won’t help you out because they’ll remember all the abuse you heaped on them and they’ll remember how you sided with a racist bully. Don’t let White guys dictate your friendships with Asian-American guys.
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Also very late to the party, but why do we so rarely see Asian characters as just being characters rather than caricatures and why are their roles often so much about their Asianness? I’m sitting here trying to think of a TV show or movie made for an American audience that shows an Asian character and doesn’t involve martial arts or some kind of worn-out “ancient wisdom” BS or coolie hats, and all I can think of is Glenn from “Walking Dead”.
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@ James Parks
What about Daniel Dae Kim and Grace Park, in the roles of Chin Ho Kelly and Kono Kalakaua respectively, in the TV-series Hawaii Five-O?
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You may very well be right on that, but last time I watched Hawaii Five-O, Jack Lord was in the lead role.
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@ James Parks there is also B.D.Wong who is always stellar who portrays Special Agent George Huang and Constance Wu who has great comedic timing on Fresh Off The Boat along with Randall Park as her husband. John Cho has sex appeal and is seen on Fox’s The Exorcist as child psychologist Andrew Kim. And Steve Yuen was a favorite as Glenn on Walking Dead.
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@James Park: B.D. Wong is Special Agent George Huang On Law And Order And Law And Order Special Victims.
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Don’t laugh:
https://herneith.d.pr/enKaZ7
The Excorcist season @ with the redoubtable John Cho.
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