YOU HAVE to hand it to Jose Antonio Vargas. The Filipino/American journalist knows how to get your attention. He isn't afraid to make people uncomfortable - very uncomfortable - especially when it comes to racial issues.
Race is an issue many people are uncomfortable talking about especially across cultural lines.
The Times' #EmergingUS campaign that will be launched this fall may be the forum that Starbucks tried to be in its failed attempt to start conversations about race earlier this year. Reading about these issues over a morning cup of coffee in the privacy of your own home will give people a chance to soak in these issues and maybe give it a second thought.
He has two projects coming up that will make a lot of people of all races confront some of the racial issues facing contemporary America: one with the youth-oriented MTV and one for a broader audience with the Los Angeles Times. .
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| Jose Antonio Vargas |
Social media will give readers a chance to engage with others on these topics.
Of course, none of this matters if no one reads the articles or bothers to engage. EmergingUS will be a new digital magazine.
For MTV, Vargas will speak with white teenagers and young adults about their experience with topics such as affirmative action, white privilege, frustration, guilt and racial identity.
The documentary White People focuses on five main characters, "All with the goal of starting some real and honest conversations in a thoughtful, judgment-free environment," according to MTV.com.
When some young people walked out of a roundtable discussion, Vargas exhorts them, "This is good! Let's all get uncomfortable together."
The film is part of the network's Look Different campaign. Viewers can log onto the initiative's site to further explore racial bias and whitness. "Whiteness often remains unexamined in conversations about race in this country, even as it acts as the implicit norm against which other racial identities are judged. By shining a spotlight on whiteness, we hope White People will serve as a powerful conversation starter that encourages our audience to address racial bias through honest, judgment-free dialogue," says MTV's president Stephen Friedman.
Of course, none of this matters if no one reads the articles or bothers to engage. EmergingUS will be a new digital magazine.
In a July 3 oped that he wrote for the Los Angeles Times, he explained why the newspaper is embarking on the EmergingUS project.
As we celebrate our country's birthday, let us also acknowledge that the country that declared independence in 1776 does not look like the country we live in today.
In fact, America today is not even the 1960s version of America that we study in history books, when the country was 85 percent white and 10% black. Today, Asian and Pacific Islander are the fastest growing racial and immigrant groups, according to the Pew Research Center. (Almost three-quarters of all Asian American adults are foreign-born.) In the last few decades, the growth of the Latino population has been so robust that 51 percent of all Californians under age 25 are Latino, according to the U.S. census.
America’s demographics are shifting to resemble the minority-majority reality in California, with Los Angeles as the country’s most diverse metropolis. Almost 200 languages and dialects are spoken daily in L.A., which is home to the largest communities of 25 nationalities (including Mexican, Filipino, Persian, Korean, Guatemalan, Armenian and Vietnamese) outside of their native countries. Forty percent of Angelenos are foreign-born, including me.
For MTV, Vargas will speak with white teenagers and young adults about their experience with topics such as affirmative action, white privilege, frustration, guilt and racial identity.
The documentary White People focuses on five main characters, "All with the goal of starting some real and honest conversations in a thoughtful, judgment-free environment," according to MTV.com.
When some young people walked out of a roundtable discussion, Vargas exhorts them, "This is good! Let's all get uncomfortable together."
The film is part of the network's Look Different campaign. Viewers can log onto the initiative's site to further explore racial bias and whitness. "Whiteness often remains unexamined in conversations about race in this country, even as it acts as the implicit norm against which other racial identities are judged. By shining a spotlight on whiteness, we hope White People will serve as a powerful conversation starter that encourages our audience to address racial bias through honest, judgment-free dialogue," says MTV's president Stephen Friedman.
The discussions in White People are bound to make some viewers uncomfortable. The tension involved in racial dialogues is apparent even in the trailer. The documentary promises to change the way you think about white history, white privilege, and white frustration.
These young people had to grapple with the role race plays in their lives — something that can be difficult when it’s something you don’t have to think about it a lot. Vargas said that speaking with young Native American students in one segment helped provide a bit more perspective on what being white represents from the outside.
“That was really overwhelming to experience, when you talk to the young people, the young Native Americans, of that high school, they don’t necessarily think the European settlers are settlers who saved this country,” Vargas said. “They are the ones who invaded. They are the ones who took.”
Be sure to check out White People when it airs on Wednesday, July 22 at 8/7 c. on MTV. OR you can also check it out on MTV.com, the MTV App, MTV’s Facebook page or YouTube channel. And , if you miss that, you can still get it Thursday (July 23) morning on iTunes, Amazon and MTV’s Video On Demand services. It’s a must-see, y’all.
These young people had to grapple with the role race plays in their lives — something that can be difficult when it’s something you don’t have to think about it a lot. Vargas said that speaking with young Native American students in one segment helped provide a bit more perspective on what being white represents from the outside.
“That was really overwhelming to experience, when you talk to the young people, the young Native Americans, of that high school, they don’t necessarily think the European settlers are settlers who saved this country,” Vargas said. “They are the ones who invaded. They are the ones who took.”
Be sure to check out White People when it airs on Wednesday, July 22 at 8/7 c. on MTV. OR you can also check it out on MTV.com, the MTV App, MTV’s Facebook page or YouTube channel. And , if you miss that, you can still get it Thursday (July 23) morning on iTunes, Amazon and MTV’s Video On Demand services. It’s a must-see, y’all.
As one of our country's most outspoken advocates for immigration reform in regards to undocumented Americans, Vargas revealed his own undocumented status in 2011 after he won a Pulitzer Prize-winning as a Washington Post reporter. The Filipino/American also launched another campaign last month called Define American, in which he encouraged undocumented Americans to "come out" online to humanize the plight of undocumented immigrants, many of whom - like Vargas - did not know of their immigration status until they were adults.
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