Comments

1. OG wrote:

   Great insightful criticism on CRASH! Fact is, most Asian “activists” are de facto guilt-ridden White liberals - who see race as Black & White only and are thus constantly trying to relieve their hereditary guilt over their historical mistreatment of Blacks. These patronizing liberal White sympathies and longing for redemption do NOT extend to Asians though - who instead get negatively associated with this country’s very strong anti-Communist sentiment/Yellow Peril paranoia.

   Their Asian-American imitators never formed their root identities as ASIAN activists, but derive their IDs by mirroring White American liberal racial rhetoric. Thus, they do not recognize when Asians are actually getting shafted, if the overall scenario is still liberally-correct (eg - Asians exempt from affirmative action in undergraduate collegiate admissions). Liberally-correct actions against Asians seem to induce a cognitive dissonance that quickly gets ignored by Asian liberals.

   Hence, the quiet acceptance of the abject hypocrisy of this flick which claims to be an enlightening look at race - but only for non-Asians. Asians, as usual, are only negatively portrayed with the usual xenophobic paranoidal stereotypes. Their role is limited to serve as the marginalized props for the main humanized characters - Whites & Blacks. There is not a typical “normal” (see socioeconomic stats - http://www.bls.gov/cex/2003/Standard/race.pdf) Asian in the flick. Produced by Don Cheadle and written by a White Canadian - what does anyone expect, I suppose?

   I was a bit disappointed to hear how Phil Yu seems to fit this mold. Although he writes well, he is not nearly as well-spoken and I don’t believe his activist ideology has matured much past the stage of simply parroting guilty White liberal rhetoric - which may at times be at odds with Asians. Hence, he is not very concise or articulate when it comes to deeper analysis of his face-value observations.

   Posted 21 Nov 2005 at 11:03 am ¶

2. the hip hapa wrote:

   ^ I totally agree about how Phil Yu fits into this whole white liberal rhetoric, rehashed for Asian Americans. He seems to have a staunch anti-miscegenation stance on the white male/Asian female dichotomy, and considering that (some) hapas do come from this union……it’s a full-blown assault against mixed people. Yu fits the whole entire “white men are stealing our women” APA activist frame of mind. How many APA men do you know stand up for their APA sisters in their issues?

   There are MUCH larger problems within the APA and mixed race construct, like domestic violence, and inter-Asian conflict. (Yes, we can be as racist, perhaps even more so to our own!) I’m tired of that pseudo-progressive APA male construct.

   Posted 22 Nov 2005 at 10:44 pm ¶

3. Zhenhua wrote:

   Actually, Phil specifically said that “Angry Asian Man” was NOT about being embittered about the “curse of the Asian man.” Nor is he anti-hapa. So, I feel you may be projecting some of your own 1-track issues upon him, here?

   “How many APA men do you know stand up for their APA sisters in their issues?”

   Well, if these issues include relieving their guilt about White male supremacy/fetishism by relentlessly bashing Asian men/culture (aka “Joy Luck Club feminism”) like many APA sistas (Amy Tan, Maxine Hong Kingston, Kim Wong Keltner, Lucy Liu, Kelly Hu, Michelle Kwan, Connie Chung, etc) - then APA men would be fools to endorse such mis-Sino-andrist discrimination. Although many still do out of de facto guilty White liberalism/feminism.

   And most APA activists are not against IRs per se, but see the extremely high overall numbers and gender disparity of them amongst Asian-Americans as SYMPTOMATIC of deeper underlying problems - like low racial/cultural self-esteem and ingrained hyperbolized Orientalist stereotyping of Asians as a whole. The persistent reductionism of Asians to the crudest base 1-dimensional stereotypes is what has led to such lopsided and high numbers.

   Were Asians more self-respecting(ed) with higher racial/cultural self-esteem, IR numbers would likely be lower and more evenly balanced between males and females overall. Just like Whites - whose IR marriage numbers are only about 5% - for both genders fairly equally.

   Posted 28 Nov 2005 at 12:08 pm ¶

4. the hip hapa wrote:

   I meant REAL issues, like domestic violence, ethnic infighting within the APA community (I can’t even count how many times I’ve been dissed by some East Asians because Pilipinos are considered “dog people”), crimes within our own communities (e.g. Pilipinos preying on aging WWII veterans and Koreans using their own people in sweatshops, i.e. the case with Forever 21). I have NEVER met an APA man who supported APA women’s rights, nor feminist APAs.

   Unless you can find me an APA man who is truly down with the collective progressive movement (that transcends every racial and ethnic boundary), I stand by the fact that very few so-called APA progressive males don’t really support APA women’s issues.

   Posted 29 Nov 2005 at 2:21 am ¶

5. Taboo wrote:

   Ok, first you hijacked the discussion to Orientalist dating-by-the-stereotypes from out of nowhere - and then you downplay its significance as a “real” issue.

   Well, if it wasn’t “real,” then why did you bring it up out of the blue?

   And while the issues you just raised are all certainly meaningful, bringing others up is too often used as a diversion from whatever other issues are at hand.

   But the reality is:

   1) High numbers of IR dating, and skewed gender disparities ARE of REAL significance to the present and future of Asian-Americans. In fact, it may be the most significant influence of all. Just ask the Native Americans - whom basically committed auto cultural/racial genocide by outmarrying with Whites at such extremely high rates. Moreso, the pairings were all primarily White men/NA women - with their descendants thus assimilating into and preserving White culture while progressively shedding their NA heritage like unwanted snakeskin. Today, most full-blooded NAs live on casino reservations while the rest disappeared into a homeopathic “Cherokee Grandma” heritage amongst Whites long ago. Again, I am not against IR dating, but against the underlying mis-Asian-andrist stereotypes driving so many of them en masse.

   2) This issue is very real and prominent in the lives of a majority of Asian-American youth today. And its future impact several generations from now cannot be downplayed - as seen with a similar case of Native Americans.

   3) I’m not sure why domestic violence and intra-Asian beefs/crime are “APA women’s” issues? Or any APA man who wouldn’t support the resolution of such problems? And I know plenty of APA male feminists - most who parrot guilty White liberal rhetoric are. On the other hand, I know of MANY, MANY prominent APA women who are not only unsupportive of APA men’s issues, but downright condescendingly hostile towards them and have played a HUGE part in the propagation of anti-Asian misandrist propaganda in modern America. How many APA women are against these APA celeb women though? APA “Amy Tan’s” need to stop the hate before we can all start the healing.

   “I see Tan as a product of racism,” says Laureen Mar, a literature and writing teacher in Seattle. “I don’t like the negativity and self-contempt, the attempt to blend in with white American culture.” In her judgment, The Joy Luck Club perpetuates a tradition of self-contempt that found its ultimate expression in the late 1950s and ’60s with the practice of Asian-American women taping their eyelids to create a double fold and, hence, a “whiter” look.

   All relevant issues certainly deserve to be addressed - but to ignore IR dating is to ignore the elephant stomping around in the middle of Gen-X Asian-American. And that’s generally an unreal cop-out to relieve one’s own guilt about it. Meanwhile, some do focus too solely on it to use as a wedge issue to further divide Asian men and women - which is counterproductive as well.

   Posted 29 Nov 2005 at 11:07 am ¶

6. Taboo wrote:

   Ever wonder why Americans view Asians as such an EXTREMELY PATRIARCHAL, PARENTAL, MISOGYNISTIC culture?

   Yes, family is important and men are burdened with the greater responsibilities in serving nation, family and himself last in traditional Asia. However, our culture and history have been completely twisted and distorted by culturally-illiterate “banana” authors like Maxine Hong Kingston and Amy Tan:
   —–
   Fifteen years after the publication of The Woman Warrior, he still literally rises in anger at Kingston’s transformation of the girl heroine Fa Mu Lan from a Confucian figure of romantic love into the female avenger who rides into battle with the words of her parents carved across her back. In “The Ballad of Mu Lan,” a Chinese fairy tale for children, there are no tattoos.

   “She doesn’t know Fa Mu Lan,” asserts Chin, pacing in the office of his Los Angeles apartment. “Her conception of Fa Mu Lan is racist. Her portrayal of the Chinese—racist! Her portrayal of Chinese culture —racist! Every assertion she makes about Chinese culture is wrong. She says the character for woman and slave are the same word in Chinese. Not so! Just not so! Any Chinese student who studies the language knows that that is not so. And it is so offensive.” - FC
   —–
   Such women have empowered themselves by reinforcing the delicate lotus flower stereotype of Asian women and claiming perpetual victimhood from Asian men and culture for remotely distant or wholly imagined oppressive acts. All the while ignoring cultural strengths/counterpoints that counterbalanced the gripes they cherry-picked out of context. In doing so, they had to actually falsify culture and history in order to FULLY project and express their own deep self-hatred. And the American public of course wasted no time in deep-throating such Orientalist neo-minstrel rhetoric just like they did living caricature William Hung - but as cultural truth, not neurotic fiction.

   Posted 29 Nov 2005 at 11:20 am ¶

7. John wrote:

   Excuse me “OG” & “the hip hapa” but your spin on PHIL YU’s interview & angryasianman.com just reveals your own political & personal(social) hang-ups. I don’t know how Phil has the energy to keep that site going w/ accusatory emails coming from every side (anti-American, self-hating Asian).

   “the hip hapa”- you “NEVER” met an APA man who supported “REAL” APA women’s issues? I dont know what to say to that… how old are you & where the fuck do you live? Wow, if this is true & not an exaggeration- no wonder you see the APA male activist as nothing more than a self-serving sneak.
   Who wants to play Racial Mad Libs w/ me? “I never met a [insert race] who [insert blanket stereotype].”

   Posted 07 Dec 2005 at 9:49 pm ¶

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