NMA.TV responds to US college student’s racist video, “Why I’d hate to be Asian”

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Taiwan’s Next Media Animation, which produces animated commentary on news events, has become a reliable source for grins after every big international news story for their… uh, slant on world affairs.

This time they’ve responded to a U.S. college student Samuel Hendrickson’s racist rant on YouTube, Why I’d hate to be Asian” (which has since been removed, but you can read his points on 8 Asians’ response). His video evoked memories of Alexandra Wallace, who produced an offensive video after the 2011 Japanese earthquake and tsunami that made disparaging remarks, among other things, about Asian students at UCLA who were calling their families in japan to see if they were OK.

NMA’s response had me laughing out loud, though to be honest, it traffics in Hendrickson-style racist stereotypes by showing white women in Indiana to all be big fat farmers. My favorite responses are to “Most Asians look alike” and Hendrickson’s comment about pot-smoking Asians (the point he makes is that smoking pot makes Asians’ “Chink-eye” so small they look closed). (Language NSFW…) Also, NMA’s counter to Hendrickson’s crack about sweat shops is a little too approving of the reality of sweatshops.

It’s been a bad week for anti-Asian racism:
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Pop culture including J-pop builds bridges between Japan and the US

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I’m a fan of anime and manga, although I don’t actually follow the zillions of comics or animated series and movies, because they’re instrumental in building bridges between Japan and the United States. I’ve spoken with eager young Caucasian anime fans in full cosplay (dressed in costumes playing the part of their favorite anime characters) who said they’re taking Japanese classes, and are planning on Japanese Studies in college, because they love anime so much.

That’s some powerful tug on the hearts and minds of our country’s future leaders.

And anime and manga are just the most visible signs of pop culture’s powerful effects, thanks to the many festivals and conventions across the US, and the popularity of anime programming on cable TV. Just take a look at video games, movies, and music, and Japan’s influence on America goes way beyond instant ramen and sushi happy hours. (Ramen shops are exploding in cities everywhere, but that’s another post….)

Curiously, though, J-pop, or Japanese pop music, hasn’t made too much of a dent in the American charts over the years.

Just last year, if you have kids you may have caught a catchy bit of bubblegum rock called “Sugar Rush” from the soundtrack of the Disney animated feature “Wreck-It Ralph” (notice how if it’s an American film we call it “animated feature” and if it’s Japanese we call it ”anime?”). The song plays over the end of the film, which will be released on DVD and Blue-Ray, etc. on March 5. You can see the super-sweet adorable video of the group singing it on YouTube above.
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Korea’s obsession with plastic surgery is creating a generation of clone-looking young people

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The striking graphic that opens the article on Jezebel.com

The striking graphic that opens the article on Jezebel.com

As I read with disbelief the daily dispatches about North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un’s bellicose statements about aiming nukes at the United States, threatening South Korea and putting his impoverished country under martial law to “prepare for war,” I know that there are very serious issues hanging in the balance in east Asia.

But I can’t get this story, I Can’t Stop Looking at These South Korean Women Who’ve Had Plastic Surgery from a couple of weeks ago out of my head, so I had to comment on it.

South Korea is the world’s busiest country for plastic surgergy, especially for women. By some accounts, 20% of South Korean women have had some form of cosmetic work done on their face, with eyelid surgery to add a fold being the most popular cut. This particular surgery’s been popular with Korean women in the U.S. too — back in 2009 I mentioned it in a post about contact lenses that make eyes look like an anime character’s eyes.

But in South Korea, the societal pressure has apparently become so strong to conform to certain ideals of “beauty” that young women and men — teenagers — are getting their face sculpted.
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Hello Kitty hitches a ride into space

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Like zillions of other people, I’m enchanted by Hello Kitty and amazed by the worldwide phenomenon of the cute cat that was born in Japan and now adorns all manner of products and objects and toys and appliances worldwide. And, I’m enchanted by this totally cool video of a 7th grade school science project, in which Hello Kitty flies into space and back: