Tag: model minority myth

Categories
Blog

My Asian American Identity Demolition Project

Over the past few months, there has been a lot of pain, loss, tension, defensiveness, apologism, defaulting to those dominant hierarchies and norms in the Asian American/Pacific Islander (APA, APIA, AAPI, used interchangeably here) world—whether consciously or not. We heard different voices, including from those naming themselves or their organizations as representative of the entire or specific APA communities, those who have tried to push out the boundaries of that invisible/hyperinvisible Oriental box we exist in and those who think they are saying something fresh, but falling into another American race trap.

I am tired of the lack of nuance … Read more “My Asian American Identity Demolition Project”

Categories
Blog

Today’s API movement: confronting racism, capitalism, and war

 

Over the past year, growing numbers of Asian Americans have taken up the call for #ModelMinorityMutiny, rightly pointing out the falsehood of Asian American uplift, but more importantly, rejecting the very idea that chasing after such a precarious and inhumane notion of success is something even worth doing. In reality, Asian Americans have been mutinying for a while now. In this spirit, several people asked me to share the following remarks, given during a recent panel discussion titled, “What Can Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders Do About Racial Justice?” at the National CAPACD conference in Washington, D.C. Hopefully … Read more “Today’s API movement: confronting racism, capitalism, and war”

Categories
Blog

“Asian Privilege”: Racial Stereotyping 101

File Bill O’Reilly under “unoriginal” and “unsound.”

As the Ferguson crisis continued to roil this week, the Fox News talking head chimed in to deny the existence of “white privilege” in the United States. The implication, of course, was that deeply-rooted, historical patterns of anti-black racism had nothing to do with African American poverty, unemployment, disenfranchisement, and criminalization. To prove his point, O’Reilly turned to “Asians,” trotting out decontextualized numbers to “prove” that our nation is a land of unlimited opportunity for those who conduct themselves in the right ways—including people of color. “Asians” succeed in America because “their families … Read more ““Asian Privilege”: Racial Stereotyping 101”

Categories
Blog

Deeper Than Words: Donald Sterling’s Racism and the Model Minority Myth

By now much virtual ink has been spilled about the racist comments made by Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling. I’m not going to draw any more attention to that. Instead, I want to focus on a pattern of racial discrimination lawsuits against Sterling, and on the complex and critical role that Asian Americans play in battles over race.

More disturbing and worthy of bigger news than Sterling’s verbal faux pas are the civil rights lawsuits that his real estate business has faced. Sterling is best known for owning the Clippers, but his wealth comes from real estate investments he … Read more “Deeper Than Words: Donald Sterling’s Racism and the Model Minority Myth”

Categories
Blog

Donald Sterling’s Love of Koreans Ain’t No Kind of Love at All

I was going to write a post about Clippers owner Donald Sterling’s apparent love of Koreans, even to the extent of renaming a housing development “Korean World Towers” in order to attract Korean tenants. Sterling’s preference for Koreans as tenants (and employees) came at the expense of African Americans who he has allegedly said are undesirable because they “smell and attract vermin.” And that makes his particular brand of racist jujitsu a near perfect example of how the model minority myth is so often used to justify racism against “problem minorities.”

But then a Race Files reader linked me to … Read more “Donald Sterling’s Love of Koreans Ain’t No Kind of Love at All”

Categories
Guest Bloggers

Why We Should Fight Hard to Uphold Affirmative Action

The Supreme Court of the U.S. delivered a temporary death knell to racial equality in the state of Michigan today by upholding Michigan’s ban on affirmative action policies. In doing so, the Court clarified that the Constitution merely permits, but does not require, the use of the kind of race-conscious programs barred by the Michigan Constitution, and that individual states can choose to ban affirmative action programs. The decision comes on the heels of efforts by the California legislature to revive affirmative action.

I support affirmative action. Contrary to mainstream media claims, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders are … Read more “Why We Should Fight Hard to Uphold Affirmative Action”

Categories
Blog

Model Minority Suicide: Five Reasons, Five Ways

It’s time to kill the Asian American model minority myth, and I mean really kill it.

That myth is one of the tenets of American racism, used repeatedly for decades to promote the idea that racism and structural racial disadvantage are either non-existent or at least entirely surmountable, while suggesting that some people of color, and Black people in particular, are just whiners unwilling to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. And that belief, that the black poor are just entitlement junkies, has negative consequences for all poor people because the tough “love” solutions this belief inspires, like cutting back … Read more “Model Minority Suicide: Five Reasons, Five Ways”

Categories
Blog

The Movement Will Not Be Twitterized

I haven’t had the heart, energy, or time to read through the #CancelColbert tweets. From the resulting hullabaloo, it seems that on the whole, Suey Park’s intentions were completely missed. Also importantly missed was, you know, the whole genocide/ disenfranchisement/ misrepresentation of Native peoples thing, AND Colbert’s original gross display of anti-Asian racism, not just the “offending” Comedy Central tweet.

That said, I had the same reaction to #CancelColbert as I did last winter when I scanned the #NotYourAsianSidekick tweets. Thousands of young APIA women and allies were connecting virtually. My ambivalence about hashtag activism is that, while it has … Read more “The Movement Will Not Be Twitterized”

Categories
Blog

The Model Minority is a Lever of White Supremacy

The Asian American model minority myth has been getting a lot of attention lately. Articles like this one, in Colorlines, and posts here on Race Files like this one and this one are just a few among a growing number of attempts to speak to the origins and meaning of the Asian American model minority. To me, that’s great news. Anti-black racism may be the fulcrum, or pivot point, of white supremacy, but the model minority myth is one of white supremacy’s many levers.

The articles referenced here all make the important point that the model minority is … Read more “The Model Minority is a Lever of White Supremacy”

Categories
Blog

What LGBT America Can Learn From Asian American History

The growing number of states legalizing same-sex marriages has many in the LGBT community convinced that full assimilation is inevitable. But as an Asian American gay man, I’m unconvinced that assimilation for the whole LGBT community is inevitable or even possible, nor that simply being assimilated is even desirable.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I understand why some in the LGBT community are advocates of assimilation. I was shamed, bullied, and occasionally assaulted through a big chunk of my life, most of which was lived at a time when hatred of LGBT people was a sign of moral turpitude. There … Read more “What LGBT America Can Learn From Asian American History”