Today in history: Why were Selma marchers wearing Hawaiian leis?

Civil rights struggle linked Asians and African Americans

The picture above is a famous one published in history books and recollections of this weekend 50 years ago when a band of protestors marched arm-in-arm across the Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma, Alabama resulting in a day of notoriety that became known as "Bloody Sunday."

On this occasion, speeches and reenactments recalled that day. President Obama walked across the bridge with some of the original marchers, his family and dozens of other politicians.

I've always wondered what the deal was with Hawaiian leis worn by Martin Luther King and others in the front ranks. Now I know the rest of the story thanks to an article in the Daily Beast. 

The Asian American community is often the forgotten factor when discussing the Civil Rights Movement. Now we know that the community was not just sitting around wondering if the civil rights people were dying and bleeding for also included them. 

Now we know. The leis are a visible link between the broader Civil Rights Movement and the Asian Americans. We were there, in spirit and in body.

The actions of the marchers and protestors in the South influenced the actions of people across the nation, including the Latino and Filipino farmworkers who in 1965 were fighting for their rights for better working conditions.

While the struggles in the California farm fields didn't receive the national attention of the protests in the South, they were all part of the same movement. Leaders like Larry Itliong, Martin Luther King, Cesar Chavez saw it all part of the same movement; the struggle for justice and human rights.

So - my nephews and nieces and anyone else reading this - Asian Americans were not silent at that time, they were not bystanders when black protestors were getting their heads bashed in and sprayed with water hoses - Filipinos were also getting beat up and threatened with the loss of their jobs. They were activists, fighters for the right to be treated like human beings. 

RELATED: 

President Obama: 'There are places, and moments in America where this nation's destiny has been decided ... Selma is such a place.'

Who was Grace Lee Boggs and what was her role in the civil rights struggle?

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Why the Oscars' acting nominees are all white

Hollywood is shooting itself in the foot

A LOT of effluent has been stirred up about the lack of racial diversity in the acting categories of the Motion Pictures Academy Awards this year. Sunday, the motion picture industry will hold their annual celebration of themselves but this year, the tinsel and glitter surrounding the Oscars has been sullied and stained.

Why should it matter to us? Unfortunately - like it or not, wrongly or rightly - most people form their opinions and world views through the movies, television and the Internet.

All of the 20 acting nominations went to all white actors. A lot has been written about the composition of the Academy members and to no surprise, the overwhelming majority are older, white men who tend to vote for what they are most comfortable with, you know, people with whom they can relate - other white people. I'm not defending this attitude of privileged familiarity, but I do understand it. More details here. Huffington Post had a good article explaining just how exclusive the Academy is.

Of course, it doesn't help the diversity issue when they have relatively few actors of color to choose from. Not that there aren't any actors of color, there are more than you'd think. There just aren't that many roles in which minority actors can show off their acting prowess.

That sorry situation falls in the laps of the directors and producers who decide who - or "type" - to seek when filling the roles. It doesn't occur to them to go beyond the stereotypes that minority actors find themselves auditioning for. Color-blind casting is much talked about but in reality, rarely used.

A recent example of color-blind casting was the choice of John Cho on the short-lived TV series Selfie. The producers were not really looking for an Asian male to play the romantic lead, but Cho's audition made his selection a no-brainer. Adding Cho to the cast added a whole new dimension to the comedy even though "race" was never made a central issue on the series.

The other side of the coin is, all things being even talent-wise, producers will choose the white applicant because in their own mind, white actors are more marketable. Never mind the data that shows the growing number of American moviegoers, tube watchers and social networkers whose skin color is not white (or pink, or light beige, ... whatever.);  never mind that in a few years, people of color will be majority in the United States; never mind that in the international market, the largest audiences are in Asia;  That is the particular lens they view the world; it just is.

"Why was Selma the only film that was even in the running with people of color for the award?" asks Ava DuVernay, director of the critically acclaimed Selma  which was nominated only in two categories, Best Picture and Best Song. "You know what I mean? I mean, why are there not—not just black, brown people? You know what I mean? Asian people, indigenous people, representations that are more than just one voice, just one face, just one gaze?"

That brings us to the other hurdle facing the industry. There's not a strong interest in investing in source material from which they could develop strong story lines featuring black, brown, yellow and red actors

It's not only important for writers to diversify their own characters and tell stories around minority themes and issues; producers need to widen their search for source materials beyond Marvel comic books (OK, Marvel is doing more to diversify it's own characters than the movie industry is; but that's the subject of another post.)

Despite the power and influence of successful minority producers like Tyler Perry, Dean Devlin and Oprah, Hollywood's culture has hardly moved an inch towards inclusion.

I can empathize with those actors of color who study their craft for years but are reduced to playing stereotypes.

I once auditioned for a role on a popular TV series. I read the lines given to me and the casting director was so enthusiastic and encouraging over my reading (which-  I figured out later - was the normal Hollywood B.S. way of speaking.) Then he said, "Now try it with an accent." What accent? I think to myself: A Filipino accent? Chinese? Japanese? Vietnamese? French? British? "You know," he said, "an Oriental accent."

Needless to say, I didn't get a call-back. That's why I became a journalist.

Ava DuVernay

Sorry for straying away from the topic; back to the bigger question of why there are no actors of color nominated for this year's Oscars. DuVernay, got down to the meat of   the motion picture industry's problem.

“The obstacle, it is systemic. It’s systemic," she said in an interview in Democracy Now. "It’s a system that’s been set up in a certain way. Times have changed, ideas have matured, and the system might not have caught up with that or stayed up with that, ... “Perhaps all of the hoopla this year will trigger some action.”

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