If you like the Asian-girl fantasy, you are in for a surprise

NO SOONER did I mention Nancy Kwan and this vlog popped up. As a quick follow-up to my earlier writings about sexual stereotypes, James Shigeta, the aforementioned actress Nancy Kwan, etc., Let me introduce you to vlogger Anna Akana, she gives Yellow Fever a new meaning from a contemporary point of view and explains better than I can, the attraction Asian women possess for a lot of guys.

Katy Perry

Anybody who has spent serious time with an Asian woman know that they are anything but quiet and submissive. Most of the Asian women I know are strong individuals, smart, defiantly outspoken and definitely do not fit the stereotype. Some are sexy, some are not. Most fall somewhere in-between. 
Katy Perry's performance during the American Music Awards, dressed as a geisha, did nothing to dispell the stereotype. Her angry response show's she just didn't get it. She's probably never had the "ching-chong" insult hurled her way either.

It's heartening to see that a new generation of Asians - like Akana and a host of other bloggers, vloggers and social and educational activists - is continuing the fight against old prejudices and confronting the same issues that I had while growing up as in America. But at the same time, despite all the examples  counteracting the demeaning image in almost our all our institutions, it's kind of sad after all these years, to see the staying power of this particular stereotype and how it still dominates the view of Asian women.

"Breakthrough" actor James Shigeta passes away

James Shigeta and Flower Drum co-star Myoshi Umeki.

ONE OF the few Asian American actors in the last half-century who could play leading-man roles passed away today (July 29) at the age of 81. Here's the article about James Shigeta from the Daily Variety http://variety.com/2014/film/news/james-shigeta-dies-at-81-1201270730/. 

Shigeta played a lot of movie roles throughout the years - hero, villain, spear-carrier, etc. - and to his credit, he never had to resort to portraying a stereotype.

The role that he is best known for and the one that had the most impact on me was the musical "Flower Drum Song." Originally a Broadway musical, it was released as a motion picture in 1961, The musical and movie were not what we would call "politically correct." It had so many things wrong with it from a 21st century perspective. However, as a young boy, it was a revelation to see an all-Asian cast up on the silver screen singing and dancing and being (so anti-Asian stereotype) - gasp - sexy!

Having Nancy Kwan perceived as sexy is a no-brainer. Who can forget her brash, aggressive performance of "I Enjoy Being A Girl?" American culture has always linked Asian women to sex as in a provocative and sometimes demeaning way-- either as the Dragon Lady or as the exotic creature that will willingly do anything to satisfy men's needs.

But along came Shigeta, a handsome leading man with his deep, sexy voice and presence. He made women swoon. He went against the grain of our society's image of Asian males -- unsexy, geeky and unattractive. With our unfortunate pop-culture tendency to turn screen heroes into role models, Shigeta was the only male role model who looked a little bit like me and a whole generation of Asian boys.

Yeah, "Flower Drum Song," written by two white guys, Oscar Hammerstein and Richard Rogers, was a bit cheesy but it was also groundbreaking in its use of an Asian cast instead of having white actors play the roles in yellow-face and taped-back eyes. Credit the producers for insisting on Asian actors, singers and dancers play the roles.

What was amazing was that the rest of the populace, no matter what race, was also drawn to the musical and its story of culture clash, mistaken identity and love-overcoming-all. Somehow, along the way, despite its financial success, Hollywood never attempted anything like it again.

Thank you Mr. Shigeta for being a bright light as I came of age. He was a reminder that we can aspire to be more than the "acceptable professions" of doctors, engineers or businessmen (or, in my case, an architect). We can take risks. We can be actors, artists, poets, writers, singers, dancers or whatever else we want to be.

Asian American social networkers make their presence felt

INTERESTING STATS, eh?

The graphic above, from pollster Nielsen suggests that the typical social media user is a mid-20s Asian woman who graduated from college, has a pretty good income and most likely, is a Red Sox fan. (I think if the same poll was taken today, it would show that she is a fan of the Giants or Golden State Warriors.)

In June 2012, the PEW Research Center issued a report on the use of social media among ethnic groups. "Their" ethnic groups were Whites, Latinos and Blacks.

This caused an uproar among Asian Americans who felt they were slighted. "What about us?" they asked. PEW explained that Asian Americans were difficult to poll because of our great diversity and languages and beside, Asian Americans -- all 17.3 million of us -- didn't make up a big enough ethnic group to be significant.

Not significant? Reduced to insignificance again! Well, that riled up the AAPI community again.

The following three paragraphs is what I imagined happened within PEW's office -- and keep in mind I'm making this up:

The response from the Asian/American community hit a nerve and in order to compensate that particularly vocal minority -- from academicians to ordinary Tweeters and Vimeo users -- PEW staff decided to do another study of the Asian American community. That report, titled "The Rise of Asian Americans," which conjures up an "invasion", came out later in 2012 covering the usual categories of where we live, family income, out-of-race marriage, etc.

PEW researchers were probably surprised at the response. Here they thought they were doing something good to appease its Asian/American critics and all they got in response was ... more criticism! 

Now they were being criticized for portraying the the Asian/Americans as well-educated, better than average income, loyal Americans, strong family ties -- in other words, the data presented reinforced the stereotype of the "model minority," an image that I and millions of other "average" Asians have had a hell of a time correcting.

The criticism apparently hit a chord (again) and in 2013, PEW updated the report to include data from other Asian groups and emphasized the poverty and lower test scores for some of the Asian groups.

I don't think PEW will put "insignificant numbers" and "Asian Americans" in the same sentence again, especially in regards to use of the Internet and social media. Therefore, it would seem, Asian/Americans should be included in any study regarding the Internet or social media.

Other polls have come out indicating Asians' use of social media goes beyond their numbers in the United States. If you go to to some social media sites such as Yelp, Twitter, etc. simply judging by the photos of the users, you will see the preponderance of Asian participants.

RELATED: Asian/Americans love the Internet, social media

When the TV show "How I Met Your Mother," recently aired an episode where its white actors donned yellow-face, the social media response was swift and heavy as Asian Americans flexed their new-found virtual muscles. It wasn't long before the show's producers issued an apology.

The online outcry that occurred when Asians were made the butt of offensive jokes at the 2016 Oscar telecast rallied people in the entertainment industry to express their disappointment which eventually led to an apology from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts.

RELATED: Chris Rock went one joke too many during the Oscars

Despite its apparent flaws, I found the PEW report interesting for the important information that they presented. It may be the closest thing we have of a researcher's acknowledgement that Asians are part of this American stew and although small in numbers, the influence of Asian/ Americans goes beyond their numbers. Business, political consultants, marketers and policy makers need to keep this in mind when viewing the data.

PEW's response indicates that a lesson was learned. America is not just a black-and-white world and the country's perception -- and the world's perception, for that matter -- of what an American looks like needs to be broadened beyond the broad brushstrokes used by traditional mainstream media,

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Dreaming with the American dreamers

Just a reminder: While most of the media focus is on Mexicans crossing the border, the attraction to the United States is still strong among Filipinos. Immigration reform and issues are still major issues for Filipinos.

(The question that raises up in my mind is why isn't there any media concern about all the Canadians crossing over the border with America and taking American jobs and American dollars? People like -- Justin Beiber, Ryan Gosling, Michael Cera, to name a few?)

As the video illustrates, you may know some undocumented Americans but don't know it. They are just like you and I and impossible to identify as undocumented unless they have the courage to come and admit it.

Undocumented Filipinos have along been an issue with the Filipino American communitiy that they've come up with a term for it. If you are here without the proper paperwork, you are called TNT. Tago ng tago basically means "hiding" or maintaining such a low profile that one has disappeared. 

Many young people who were brought here at an early age had no idea that their parents were TNT and that they, themselves, were not citizens of this country until they sought financial aid for college or tried to sign up with the military.

Other tidbits:

• The waiting period for someone from the Philippines to the United States can be as long as 23 years.
• According to the latest Census of 2010, there are more first-generation Filipino immigrants than there are Filipino Americans (those born and raised in the U.S.).
• As a result, Filipinos make up the 2nd biggest Asian ethnic group in the U.S. (Chinese are first). According to a recent survey by PEW, Filipinos from the Philippines like the United States more than Americans do. (More on this in an upcoming post.)

As for the most recent border boondoggle where thousands of Central American kids have been caught trying to enter the U.S., many critics are quick to shout "Send them home." The law requiring that we give them hearings is a law that was signed by the last President Bush -- a Republican. 

The U.S. has given refugee status to people from dictator-run countries, from the old communist bloc and other countries we don't like. But what if the country they are fleeing doesn't have a government and it is run by a bunch of gangsters and if you don't join their gang, they kill you? The second video explains the situation under two minutes and worth watching then ask yourself, "do you still want to send them home to almost certain death?" That's a tougher question now, right?

Look, I'm for control of our borders and yes, most countries wouldn't give a second thought to sending the kids home -- but this is America, and we're supposed to be better than other countries. We're supposed to be exceptional.

Lest we forget ... greeting all ships in New York harbor is the Statue of Liberty:

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free;
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless,
Tempest-tossed to me
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

The significance of the Great Port Chicago Explosion

A little bit of important history took place almost next door 70 years ago. Historians are starting to recognize that the desegregation of the U.S. Armed Forces began in a small unknown base in Port Chicago, just a few miles from where I live.

The deadliest home front disaster occurred in 1944 and took the lives of 322 sailors, 220 of them African American. The Port Chicago Weapons Magazine, later to be known as the Concord Naval Weapons Station, was the main munitions supply depot for the war in the Pacific Theater during WWII and during the Korean War.

The black sailors who volunteered to fight the enemy were instead assigned the unglamorous job of loading ammunition aboard ships. It was dangerous work and the sailors - without any proper training -- were encouraged to speed up their already unsafe work. When the sailors refused to work under dangerous conditions, they were threatened with court martial. Most of them returned to work but 50 remained steadfast in their refusal. Those 50 were placed in the brig and eventually court martialed, 

Years later, 49 of the 50 sailors were pardoned (but, not exonerated.) The one holdout maintained that what they did was not treasonous and refused the pardon.

The blast leveled the surrounding area in a mile radius and could be heard as far away as Vallejo, a distance of about 25 miles. (Unsubstantiated rumors say there was a nuclear device involved because that was about the time the U.S. began testing the nuclear bomb drop out in the Pacific.)

The explosion and the aftermath fought to the forefront the segregation that existed in the U.S. military through World War II. (That's why we had the Tuskegee Airmen, the famed 442nd Regiment made up of second-generation Japanese American,  and the 1st Filipino Regiment.

The Navy was the first branch of the U.S. military to desegregate which led to President Truman's order to desegregate all the Armed Forces. Many of the black soldiers, sailors and airmen who fought for our country came back home to a country that deprived them of the rights they fought for. They  came to realize the gap between the military opportunities and the way they were treated in civilian life. As part of the Greatest Generation, they helped fuel the Civil Rights Movement.

Here's a great column about the Port Chicago explosion by Tom Barnidge of the Contra Costa Times: http://www.contracostatimes.com/barnidge/ci_26179065/barnidge-civil-rights-lessons-port-chicago-disaster-still

    

Jose Antonio Vargas: An undocumented American

Jose Antonio Vargas

JOSE ANTONIO VARGAS, a Filipino immigrant, may be the poster child for the thousands of undocumented people awaiting action from President Obama that may legalize their status.

And, oh yeah, he won the prestigious Pulitzer Prize as a member of team of Washington Post journalists covering the Virginia Tech shootings. In 2011, in a moving essay published in the New York Times, he revealed his status as an "undocumented American." Note the terminology. Those are his words Vargas prefers to use.

Since that essay he has become an activist in support of the undocumented Americans. He has formed an organization Define American, challenging the legal concept of American. Are Americans defined by a set of papers, birth, or is an American someone who thinks, believes and lives as Americans, like
Vargas has done since he was 12 years old when he was sent to live with his grandparents in the San Francisco Bay Area. It wasn't until he was 16 that he learned that he was in this country without papers. He attended local elementary and high schools and graduated from San Francisco State.

Since he is over the age of 30, he doesn't qualify for the Dream Act that legalized the status of the children who brought here at an early age by their undocumented parents. Their being in this country illegally, the act says, was not their fault or their intention. Vargas is speaking up for people like himself who were raised to be Americans; who believe they are Americans and who, by their values and mores, are American,

Vargas got himself in a pickle last week when -- as a freelancer -- went into the border town of McAllen, Texas to lend support and record the plight of the thousands of Central American young people who tried to cross the border fleeing the gangs and violence that have taken over their countries.

In a prepared statement, he said: "As an unaccompanied child migrant myself, I came to McAllen, Texas, to shed a light on children who, in parts of America and many in the news media are actively turning their backs on."

Never having been in that part of the country, he was surprised at the level of militarization of the Texas border. There are checkpoints on all the roads leaving Allen as if it was in the Gaza strip. While they were glad to see him, one woman was prompted to ask him, "How will you get out?"

As expected, when he tried to board a flight out of town, he was asked for his ID. All he had was a Philippines passport, which apparently wasn't good enough. He was detained. Fortunately, a few hours later he was released with orders to appear before an immigration judge at a future date.

Homeland Security, taking note of his well-known status, was quick to issue a statement that he was not arrested or charged with anything. In essence, they said they had other priorities that demanded their attention and the status of one individual who was deemed non-violent and who did not have a criminal record, can be dealt with later.

Vargas' documentary "Documented" aired on CNN earlier this summer and will probably be aired in other time slots. Watch for it.

If his purpose was to bring attention to the plight of the Central American children, Vargas has certainly done that. Their hope is that they will be granted refugee status so they can remain in the U.S.A.

Ironically, the fact that thousands of these children were apprehended at the border is a strong sign that the efforts put forth to prevent illegal immigration is working.

The president has asked Congress for another $3.5 billion to make sure the children are afforded their due process (that, too, is the American way) and if necessary, send them back where they must choose to be gang members or get killed.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow @DioknoEd on Twitter.

A tip of the hat to Derek Jeter

IT IS ALL about respect, isn't it? Whether or not you are a baseball fan, respect is earned and Derek Jeter has earned that accolade for his remarkable 20-year career. To be in the public eye for that long and not be smeared by a single scandal is quite a feat in this day and age of celebrity-worship where paparazzi lurk behind every corner and TMZ is ready to jump on any social blunder.

We should give a nod to Jeter for entering the Hapa Hall of Fame (I just made that up!) as the product of an African-American father and a mother of Irish-German descent. He has been so good, his bi-racial roots have never been an issue. He is cheered by sports fans everywhere, including the racists and bigots among them, for his athletic ability.

("Hapa" is a Hawaiian term describing people of mixed ethnicity. I'm not sure the of the linguistic  roots of the term but I like to define it as - and excuse my pidgin - "Hapa dis and hapa dat.) 

Well done, No. 2

Now that his playing days are drawing to an end, I'd like to see him address that aspect of his heritage - "come out", if you will. As African Americans like to point out the many Blacks who have contributed to our culture and society, and the LBGT advocates single out the many gays (closeted or open) in our society, the strategy advances their causes and increases the acceptance of those groups by increasing their visibility. Perhaps, if Jeter owns up to his roots, it will help the biracial folks - as their numbers increase in our country and the world - to accept their own hapa selves instead of having to choose one over the other.

In the meantime, the moving tribute commercial done by Nike, will air tonight (July 15) at the All-Star game. Nice job. It should be an emotional moment. Let's take the tribute for what it is and tip our hats to one of the greatest shortstops to ever play the game.

Imelda Marcos' story is made for theater

When the Marcoses were in power in the Philippines, they banned the musical "Evita" because the parallels to the dual dictatorship was too obvious. It was perhaps inevitable that Imelda's rags-to-riches story - with her penchant for memorable quotes, infamous shoe collection, a reputed affair with actor George Hamilton and a love for the glamor and spotlight - end up on the Broadway stage.

"Here Lies Love" returned to Broadway July 9 for an open-ended run after garnering rave reviews last year.

Even with the uncertain future of George Takei's "Allegiance" and the too-short-of-a-run of the Bruce Lee musical, which starred Filipino-American martial artist/dancer Cole Horibe, Asian dancers and singers will have more than their normally limited number of opportunities to portray Asians in revivals of Miss Saigon and The King and I. Slowly, in little baby steps, producers are starting to cast Asians in roles that don't specifically call for an Asian actor.

Plans are afoot to put up productions of the Marcos musical in London and San Francisco. I can't wait when it comes to San Francisco, which was the center of anti-Marcos activities in the U.S. during the 21 year reign of the dictator.

Deep in the middle of the anti-Marcos movement in the U.S. was the Philippine News, where I honed my journalistic chops as a layout artist, proofreader, columnist, reporter and editor. Led by fiery editor and publisher Alex Esclamado, some of the stories that we printed about the despots'  regime seemed so fantastical that mainstream media couldn't believe it and as a result, the PhilNews suffered a credibility problem it could never overcome.

However, when the dictatorship fell, and the horrors of that rule were fully exposed, and western reporters began reporting on the Philippines dictatorship, especially by Phil Bronstein with the San Francisco Examiner -- only then did the U.S. media realize that things were even worst than what was reported by PhilNews. Reporting by US media, usually using Esclamdo's contacts and sources, eventually put pressure on the Marcoses.

Many of the people who walked in picket lines, wrote letters, made films, wrote scathing commentaries and risked their businesses, reputations and lives working against the dictator still live in the Bay Area. It will be interesting to see if they join the audience to sing along or dance with Imelda and Ferdinand in the highly  interactive production where the audience become part of the story. At various times during the show they are fellow nightclub dancers, Filipino voters and finally they become the masses that became the "People Power" that dethroned the dual dictators.

The production wanted to move into a mainstream theater but the physical requirements of the show, ie. no seats in the orchestra section, precluded any of the traditional venues. And that's a problem the show will have when it moves to London in October. Unfortunately, there are not many venues in SF that can accommodate the production. (How about the vacant Palace of Fine Arts? Imelda would love the irony of finally winding up in a palace again.)

The musical is NOT an ode to the dictatorship. It is NOT a history lesson. It is a musical that offers an unapologetic look back at an era in the Philippines that is still having repercussions on the political  scene. 

We may not have brought down the final curtain on the Marcos story. Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos' son, Bong Bong, has been elected President of the Philippines in 2022 after extensive rewriting of history and the collective memory loss of voters, many who were born after the reign of the conjugal dictatorship.

Editor's Note: Having not seen the musical, I can't give a review, but here is a sampling of reviews from the early production.

Here's a review from the Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/style-blog/wp/2014/06/18/here-lies-good-stuff/

And a review from the Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/entertainment/theater/review-here-lies-love-is-a-swirling-dynamic-first-ladys-biography-to-a-disco-beat/

Random thoughts on July 4, 2014

This Independence Day I'm worried about the future of America. Watch the video above and watch the pain and awkwardness of the Republican's holding hands with Democrats and singing the anthem of the civil rights movement. What an awkward moment for an event that was supposed to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Civil Rights Act on July 2 it symbolizes much of what's wrong with out country today.

One of the most significant pieces of legislation, the law made it illegal to discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. It ended discrimination in schools, at work and at public facilities. The Civil Rights Act barred placing barriers to voting that would impact certain groups of people.

Sadly, if introduced today, the landmark legislation might not even pass. The split between lawmakers and the Republican radicals' unwillingness to meet the opposition half-way, the traditional definition of politics, has made Congress ineffective. Rachel Maddow wrote about this interesting premise at http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/john-lewis-civil-rights-act-would-not-pass-today

***

Then there's the Hobby Lobby decision by five members of the U.S. Supreme Court. I thought the court couldn't make a worst decision to undermine our democracy than Citizens United but this decision issued last week comes in pretty close.
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Take away all the noise and alarm over the birth control issue, what makes the decision by five male members of the court is it opens the doors to business owners imposing their religious beliefs on their employees. Even though the majority tried to narrow its ruling, the court expanded its Citizens United decision that corporations are people and money is a form of free speech, by saying corporations can hold religious beliefs and they can ignore laws that might impinge on those beliefs.

The Washington Post had a pretty good analysis: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2014/07/after_hobby_lobby_there_is_only_rfra_and_that_s_all_you_need.html

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At a recent meeting, the facilitator opened up with an ice-breaker, She wanted all of to introduce ourselves and answer the question, "What do you look forward to tho summer." I had the misfortune to be sitting right next to her and then she turned to me. With no time to think, I blurted out, "The seventh inning stretch."

The guy sitting on the other side asked, "Is that it?" I think he was stalling for time trying to think up an answer. At any rate, I said, "Yes. Its one of the few times you can get 40,000 people - all races, creeds. Democrats, Republicans, Tea Partiers and Libertarians and fans ob both opposing teams - to stand up and sing that sappy song, 'Take Me Out To Ballgame." and for a brief moment in time, we are united, That's America."

I was saying that tongue in cheek but around the table I saw a bunch of people nodding in agreement.

I do enjoy baseball (Go Giants! Go A's) and its relaxing pace on a languid summer day, hot dogs, cold beer and the 7th inning stretch. Well, that's good enough for me ... considering all the other craziness going on.

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Trying to end on a positive note, here's the Coke commercial that debuted during last year's Super Bowl. The singing of "America, the Beautiful" raised a storm of controversy from xenophobes who thought that it was unAmerican.

The Filipinos in it are from the Basco family who used to live next to us when I was growing up on Carolyn Drive.

Below is the Tagalog version. The comments of the little girl who sings it demonstrates more wisdom than most of our Congress members. Her words express the hope of a youngster who hasn't been made cynical with all the crazy unAmerican stuff going on. Ahh ... she is the hope I've been looking for today, July 4, 2014.

Getting swept up in the World Cup

I'm not a huge soccer fan (except for every four years) but several of our family and extended family are, having played soccer in high school and other youth leagues. Believe it or not, we have a lots of athletes out there.

But the wonderful image of Team USA's fans' diversity and the team's diversity speaks volumes about what America is about.

All of a sudden, and for 90 minutes or so, "We" takes on new meaning expanding beyond sports!

Enjoy this video produced by fans and allow yourself to get swept up - however, briefly.

ADDENDUM: Belgium 2, USA 1. Why do soccer players wait unit the final five minutes to generate any scoring? Belgium was clearly the more aggressive team. Wait until 2018!

Beam me up Scotty: It got better for Mr. Sulu

IT GOT BETTER for actor George Takei.

People may laugh to learn that I'm a die-hard fan of the TV show Star Trek, a pop culture icon that doesn't shy away from its science fiction roots. The genre is often looked down upon by the intelligentsia or literary snobs.  

While I can't claim to be a Trekker (Don't call me a Trekkie) I can't tell you how influential Star Trek has been in my life. There may be a book out there already written entitled "All I really need to know about life I learned from Star Trek." If there isn't, there should be. Hmmm?

When George Takei "came out" it was not surprising that the news didn't create such a fuss among  the many fans of Mr. Hikaru Sulu, chief helmsman of the original Enterprise crew. Besides the gadgetry, Star Trek was about diversity, tolerance, passion, compassion, logic and friendship. Also not surprising, most of the cast rallied around him with the notable exception of one starship captain.

With an interracial cast, the sci-fi series has always dealt with race either metaphorically or allegorically. It featured TV's first interracial kiss (Kirk and Uhuru) and a number of episodes dealt with inter-species prejudices and discrimination, just like we deal with race on Earth.

But, I digress.

Despite the daring themes Star Trek tackles, Sulu's role - and I dare say, Uhuru's role too, is just a cut above the red shirts, those unknown cast members who end up dying whenever the crew tackles dangerous missions. Their backstories don't get filled in years after the series ended in the books/novels/comics or follow up movies featuring the characters whose fans won't let them fade away. Only do the characters of Spock and Worf get rounded out.

In the five years since coming out, Takei's career has skyrocketed. To say he has been "busy" is an understatement.

Takei's role as mentor for Asian entertainers and elder statesman continues to grow. He is also cemented as a civil rights activist, not only for gays but for all people living on the Edge. His most recent project is a musical called "Allegiance" about the internment of Japanese Americans during WWII. The Broadway-bound production also includes Tony-award winner Lea Salonga in its cast.

In the meantime, catch the premier of the documentary "To be Takei" on DirectTV starting  July 3 through August.

That darn football team that shall remain nameless

HERE'S THE GREAT commercial that aired during the NBA championship game on Tuesday (June 10).

If the National Basketball League can force Donald Sterling to sell the Cliippers after his racist rant was made public, the National Football League (NFL) can do no less.

The owners of the Washington DC NFL franchise fall back on "tradition" for ignoring the public pleas to change the name to something besides the racial slur that has been compared to the N-word.
Imagine a team named the Gooks, or the Slopes, Kikes, Wetbacks, or any number of racial insults. There would be unquestioned outrage, right?

The hollow argument of "tradition" falls apart when you consider that it was tradition that allowed southern schools to use the Confederate flag as its logo; tradition that kept blacks from playing on baseball teams with whites; tradition that kept country clubs lily-white; tradition kept women in the kitchen and blacks in the back of the bus, tradition allowed segregated schools and poll taxes to prevent African Americans from voting.

While many of those "traditions" have fallen by the wayside one-by-one, the current owners of the Washington team remain steadfast in their knuckle-headed refusal to join the 21st Century.

In the hullabaloo that followed Sterling's diatribe, it is almost forgotten the actions of the team's corporate sponsors. They didn't want to be associated with a racist and they began withdrawing their financial support. That may have been what really forced the NBA to act as it did.

Moral outrage is fine and can be a powerful force, but it is the threat of losing almighty dollars that may have forced the NBA to do the right thing. Maybe that same thing can happen if enough people tell the sponsors of the Washington franchise -- Nike, the brewers and the automakers -- that they disapprove of their association with a team named after a racial slur.

Isla Vista: Making of a wannabe white guy

Elliot Rodger

IF ELLIOT RODGER hated anybody, it was himself.

I've avoided commenting on the shootings at Isla Vista where Elliott Rodgers went on a rampage because a lot of people with more expertise on the topic wrote tons of material trying answer the question of "Why?"

Why would someone who -- on the outside-looking-in -- had "everything?" Why kill six people, wound a dozen others then kill himself? He came from an upper-income family, drove an expensive BMW, was going to a good university which would normally give him a good foundation for success. If he wanted to, he already had his foot in the door if he wanted to enter the entertainment industry because his father was in the motion picture industry, which allowed the young Rogers to occasionally rub shoulders with the rich and famous.

Immediately after the carnage, pundits wrote about white male entitlement, mysogyny (hatred of women), mental illness, when, truthfully, all of them were part of the reason that led a young man to go on a shooting spree, stab his roommates and run down several others with his car.

To this list, I'd like to add one more: Rodgers was a white-guy wannabe.

Very few writers mentioned that Rodgers was biracial, with an Asian mother and a white father. In his hate-filled screeds found in his computer and a delusional manifesto, he often referred to himself as "Eurasian" and considered himself a cut above those who considered themselves as 100% people of color.

At the same time, he saw himself "less" than his full-blooded white counterparts.

I certainly don't want to give excuses for his inexplicable and despicable behavior, but in a way, it can be argued that he was a victim of our own Euro-centric society where our ideas of beauty, power and reward derive from the standards set by our culture and perpetuated and reinforced by our media.

Only in brief spurts did anybody question the idea of what and who is beautiful -- i.e. most notably the groundbreaking Black is Beautiful movement spurred by the militant 1960s, and more recently by Academy Award-winning actress Lupita Nyong'o, who used her moment of fame during the Academy Awards to speak about her own doubts of acceptance because she didn't meet the traditional (nee caucasion-based) standards of beauty.

Rodgers especially wanted the attention of blonde women, who -- in his twisted mind -- were the ultimate gauge of his masculinity.

At this point, we need to remind ourselves of the desexualized, unassertive, wimp Asian male stereotype in American pop-culture. Although Rodgers didn't say it outright, he thought his Asian roommates were "ugly" and he had no problem stabbing them to death while they slept, thus acting out his unspoken hatred of himself, or at least that half of himself that he never could accept.

He thought that since he was half-white, he should be deserving of all the trophies of being a white male, which included sex with white women and easy access to money (he spent a fortune on lotto tickets thinking a big bankroll would give him access to acceptance by the white power structure).

Instead, his inability to reach his goals in status, sex and fortune led to his frustration and ultimately to his instability: He was a virgin, he was middle-class but not uber-wealthy and he was half-white. He seemed to ignore his Asian half but he thought he was white enough, which he believed should have given him access to the white-guys' club with all the benefits bestowed on that membership.

Like many angry white males in our society (and he considered himself more white than Asian) Rodgers thought he was entitled to certain  rewards simply by his privileged standing in our society. In his twisted logic, anyone who is not white, but were obtaining those prizes that were rightly supposed to be "given" to him, only compounded his anger and drove him over the edge.

The rewards of being white have been drilled into us from the moment we are born, the books and magazines we read, the movies and TV commercials we watch, the history we are taught and the heroes we worship. It is not a simple thing to change that world-view, consciously or subconsciously, imposed on all of us -- no matter what color we are.

Only by reexamining our values, definitions of beauty and by making a conscious effort to change what we are told to believe will we, as people of color, be able to gain a sense and respect of one's self. Fortunately, that's not a new lesson. It is a well-traveled road many have had to explore in order to maintain a sense of sanity and self-worth.

The amount of melanin in our skin doesn't determine the degree of perfection,  neither do almond-shaped eyes need to be surgically rounded, black hair doesn't need "highlighting;" rounded noses don't need to be pointed and ... stop being so conscious of height.

Rodgers is literally and figuratively, a person who was not comfortable in his own skin. But he is also an example of someone who allowed himself to lose himself in our culture's unrealistic standards of perfection, especially those highly imperfect benchmarks based on race or ethnicity.

--------------

For more insight, link to:
-In his own words, "My Twisted World" http://abclocal.go.com/three/kabc/kabc/My-Twisted-World.pdf
-Elliot Rodger's Vlog: https://www.youtube.com/user/ElliotRodger

EDITOR'S NOTE:  For more commentary, observations, tips and references, follow me on Twitter @dioknoed

Unsung heroes: Dad, the Major

ANOTHER Memorial Day is upon us. I think of my dad - an Army man, through and through. The Army-Navy game every winter was the one football game he would never miss even though he didn't have a stake in the game other than he was in the Army. 

Unlike other veterans he never talked about what he did during World War II or the Korean War. To this day he remains an enigma to me.

So last week, out of curiosity, I Googled his name "Melchor V. Diokno." He died before this computer age so I was surprised to see his name pop up. It turns out there's a webpage about him and his service in the Philippine Scouts, an elite unit of the U.S. Army. His uniform is on display in a museum at the San Francisco Presidio.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Earlier versions  of this post used an outdated link to the page about the Philippine Scouts that no longer exists. The new link brings you to the correct page.

So, another chapter is filled in about a man who rarely talked about himself. Maybe it's because no one asked him about his war experiences. I tried to get him to open up his experiences in the military, but he would divert the conversation to something else. 

There are a few tidbits gathered through the years: Such as when he found his way home after being a POW, he was so emaciated, dirty and "smelly," his daughter Benicia ran into the house because she didn't recognize him. My mother also said that he was in charge of the grave detail of the POW camp. The POWs used the daily ritual of burying the dead as a means of escaping the camp. The prisoners would be hidden from the guards by placing the dead prisoners on top of them. When the guards were not looking, they would dash into the surrounding jungle.

It seems the more I learn about him, the more questions are raised.

Many of my nieces and nephews also knew another side of him. He had this ability to pull candy out of their ears. Sure, maybe they were humoring an old man but he took so much pleasure in their company and the surprised and delighted look on their faces when he would seemingly find candy in their ear. 

My father had hoped to continue his service but after being skipped over for promotion, he retired as a major. I know he was disappointed. In today's context, I can't help but think he was denied the promotion to colonel not because he didn't deserve it. He didn't fit the prototypical image of a high-ranking Army officer in 1954 America because he was not brash enough or loud enough, short of stature at 5'2" and his skin was several shades too dark.

I don't know how many Brigade commanders sought him as their Executive Officer. He was forever the XO, excellent at managing day-to-day but in the eyes of his superior officers, but not good enough to lead. Sound familiar?

But he couldn't fathom that the country he fought and bled for might be capable of discrimination. He didn't say a single disparaging word.  In the view of that generation of immigrant soldiers, America could do no wrong.

He was proud of his service to his country -- as I am proud of him, as all of us should be. This Memorial Day, don't forget him and the other Asian/American servicemen and women of that first generation who served their adopted country.

One of my greatest regrets is never sitting down and having a serious conversation about what he did in WWII and his views of the state of Filipino America. Let this be a message to all of you who have never really talked with your parents. Do it!

Here's a column I wrote for the Contra Costa Times (June 27, 2004) for Father's Day:

Unspoken conversations with my father

MY FATHER was a man of few words. We didn’t have long conversations. He never dispensed advice like the father in “Father Knows Best.” He would rather show than tell.

One day when I was 7 or 8, he took me to get a haircut at the International Hotel in San Francisco’s Manilatown. I thought it strange because for two bits, we could get a haircut just down the street at Mr. Willis house. A former barber, Mr Willis had set up shop in his garage and that’s where everybody in the Warren Way neighborhood got their haircuts.

The I-Hotel was home for many of the manongs, the elderly men who made up the first wave of Filipino immigrants who came to the United States in the 1920s-1930s. They found jobs in California’s farm fields and worked in the kitchens of the city’s hotels and restaurants. Some found a career in the Merchant Marine and lived in the residence hotels of Manilatown between journeys.

The International Hotel, the last vestige of San Francisco's Manilatown. 

Manilatown used to stretch for blocks along Kearney Street, just below Chinatown. The Filipinos and Chinese shared Portsmouth Square where they would get some sun, gossip or play checkers or mah jong. By the time my father and I made our trip, the financial district had gobbled up most of Manilatown. All that was left of the Filipino neighborhood was the hotel, two Filipino restaurants and the pool hall across the street managed by a white woman who had married a Filipino. Still, for hundreds of bachelor men (because immigration law limited the number of Filipinas) it was a home.

We walked up the hotel’s stairs and knocked on one of the doors. Inside were a couple of elderly men waiting for a haircut from the room’s tenant.

In the corner there was a single bed, a bureau where a statuette of the Virgin Mary was framed by a pair of unlit candles, a cushioned chair covered with a crisp, white doily, and a high stool on which one of the men sat with a bedsheet draped around his neck. Old photos were pinned up around the small room. It had the smell of a barbershop with the feint presence of after-shave and Pomade. One small window opening to Kearney Street below lit the dim world encased in that room

”Captain,” they greeted my dad, “How are you, sir? Have a seat, sir.” My father retired as a major but apparently, old habits died hard for these men. Both of us got our hair cut for a buck and a healthy tip.

They talked in Tagalog with my father. I was never sure how my father knew these men so far from my little world in suburbia. By the respect they showed him and because they addressed him by his military rank, I surmised that perhaps they used to serve together in the military.

After I got my haircut, my father took me to a restaurant downstairs on Kearney Street. To
my surprise, the owner greeted my father like an old friend. He ordered some Filiplno dishes that he knew I liked: dinaguan, adobo, kare-kare and pancit (translation: pork stew, chicken or pork in a savory sauce, braised ox-tail spiced up with shrimp paste, and a Filipino variation of chow mein.) My father grew more mysterious to me. The man I never knew. Why was he so well known there?

I didn’t know then what I know now. My father wanted to expose me to a world beyond Warren Way where we lived with other families of Filipino/American soldiers, airmen and sailors. He wanted to show me that not all Filipinos were as well off as we were on our blue-collar street. And I learned there was more to my father than I knew.

One night, my father came back from one of his innumerable meetings. He was excited. “We got the money!,” he exclaimed to my mother. It turns out he was part of a group trying to get funding to build retirement housing for farmworkers. He and his group were able to raise the money through grants from Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to build Agbayani (Heroes) Village in Delano, where retired farmworkers, usually without family to take care of them, could spend their retirement. The magnitude of my father’s late night meetings took years to dawn on  e: That he knew Larry Itliong, one of the founding Filipino leaders of the United Farm Workers, was astonishing to me. As a veteran, my father went to the commissary at the Oakland Army Base to buy groceries to bring to the grape strikers. He lived part of the Asian American history.

Ironically, I found myself covering the eviction of the I-Hotel’s manongs as a reporter for the Philippine News. The lessons my father sought to teach me in that single visit came flooding back in an “ah-ha” moment as Manilatown’s last building fell to a wrecking ball.

After my father’s death, I found a faded snapshot of a young man, in white blousy shirt, dark pants, boots and — this is what stood out — a red sash around his waist. The man in the picture was dashing and handsome in a Rudy Valentino kind of way. His smoldering, dark eyes stared defiantly back at the camera. I couldn’t believe it was a photo of my dad in a heroic pose, feet firmly planted and fists on his hips , as he perhaps saw himself at that stage of his life.

It’s funny but we usually think of our fathers as old men. We forget that once they were young and facing life with youthful optimism with all the world at their doorsteps.

My dad suddenly died years ago, before we could have that father-son talk that both of us seemed to avoid. Just as I was realizing the value of what he taught me, he was gone. I like to imagine that if we had a that conversation, we would have had lots to talk about.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow @DioknoEd on Twitter or at his blog Views From the Edge.

Is America ready for a TV show with Asian leads?

Could ABC's new television show featuring an Asian American family be the series I've been waiting for since the 1950s? I'm hoping it is.

All props to Mindy Kaling for "The Mindy Project" but I suspect mainstream America never thought of her as Asian after her long run in "The Office." There are two ways to battle stereotypes: one is to play down the differences demonstrating that we're all the same with the same flaws, same wants, and same dreams and goals; the other way is to bust the stereotypes wide open.

The Mindy Project depicting a young woman looking for love, looking for respect and career success, clearly is using the former approach. From the looks of the trailer and other sneak peeks, FOB is going for the latter approach.

The sitcom is based on the childhood of chef and restaurateur Eddie Huang as he grew up in Orlando, Florida in the 1990s. "Little Eddie," (how can you not like that name?) is also a bling-wearing, swearing hip-hop fanatic, a far cry from the nerd stereotype most caucasian Americans have of Asian students. The lead character is the son of fellow blogger Jeff Yang and he writes:

"The show is like nothing you will have ever seen before on television. If it makes it to the air, it will blow minds, raise eyebrows and, to quote a line that my son says as Little Eddie, 'change the game.'" A game-changer, eh? That's a lot to put on one single show. But if you consider the scarcity of Asian roles on TV and the movies, much less, fully-rounded characters, its hard not to think in those terms.

I remember the first attempt - "All American Girl" starring Margaret Cho. That was a dismal failure when producers tried to turn Cho into an all-American girl. It didn't last a season and is one of the big regrets of the comedienne.

I faithfully watched it, even when it wasn't funny, out of loyalty and eagerness to see it succeed, as if I counted in the Nielsen ratings.
Since then, a few inroads have been made by Asian actors, but roles for Asian actors have been far and few between and never as the main roles.

I may seem to make too much of media portrayals of Asians but the media -- TV, movies, commercials and print --- is where most Americans gain their impressions of unfamiliar situations, countries and people -- even if it's crazy and fantastic. There are people out there who are preparing for a zombie apocalypse, for goodness sake!

But more importantly, the media is where stereotypes are born and reinforced. The quiet, studious image is one that I've fought against all my life. Not that that's a negative stereotype, but there is so much more to individuals that people overlook because of the first impression that's made. Many times, that first impression is made before they even meet you ... because of that damn stereotype playing on the silver screen or the boob tube: always the sidekick, not the hero; always the doctor's assistant, not the surgeon; always the submissive one, not the leader; the friend, but not the best friend; always the nerd, not the hiphop fanatic.

Its taken 20 years for a major network to attempt an Asian family comedy again. And I'll probably watch it out of loyalty and curiosity. For sure I'll be pulling for it. I just hope its funny and the audience is laughing "with" -- not "at" -- the characters.

The month of May is . . .

I'd be remiss not to mention that May is Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month. Let's hope next year at this time we'll be talking about the second season of Fresh Off the Boat.

The cast of "Fresh Off the Boat." Will non-Asians be able to relate?