Ethnic studies classes ruled illegal in Arizona because it would promote “racial resentment”

By | | , ,
Leave a comment

Arizona state seal I can’t think of a good reason for me to want to live in Arizona. Via Yahoo, here’s news that a judge has ruled that the Tucson Unified School District’s Mexican-American Studies course violates state law because it’s “designed primarily for one ethnic group, promoting racial resentment and advocating ethnic solidarity instead of treating students as individuals.”

Part of the school’s funding is being withheld until it complies with state law and quits offering the course. The judge wrote in his ruling that the course crosses the legal limits because “such teaching promotes activism against white people.”

Apparently it’s OK to “objectively” teach about racial oppression, but not OK to teach from an activist perspective. However I’m not sure how you teach objectively about, say, the enslavement of African Americans; the genocide and systematic uprooting of Native Americans; racism against Blacks, Hispanics and Asians; and the imprisonment of Japanese Americans in concentration camps during World War II without people getting pissed off. Aren’t we allowed to be angry? Isn’t that a free speech issue?

I love the United States and I consider myself a patriotic American citizen. But I’m allowed to be angry at my country, and resent it for a host of things including the lousy management of the economy, unnecessary wars, rampant cultural imperialism, institutionalized racism, white privilege, legislative gridlock and other stuff.

I’m also all about ethnic solidarity. If we’re a racial salad bowl, people of color need to be proud of who we are AND celebrate our place in the multicultural richness of American society. That doesn’t mean we’re fomenting a race revolution against white folk. I mean, seriously.

I’m dumbfounded. Speechless. And saddened. It’s another reason to avoid AZ unless I’m just driving through.

Lowe’s pulls ads from “All American Muslim” series, sparks debate on both sides, brings out the haters

By | | , ,
Leave a comment

TLC's All-American Muslim

NOTE: UPDATE BELOW, ON DEC. 16

Lowe’s this week backed out as an advertiser on the TLC network’s superior reality TV show, “All-American Muslim,” which follows the lives of five Muslim American families in Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit that’s home to the largest Mulsim population in the U.S.

I visited Dearborn when I attended the 2011 convention in Detroit of the Asian American Journalists Association and was impressed with the palpable sense of community among the Muslims. We spent time at the Arab American National Museum, and felt the same sense of cultural pride alongside patriotism for accomplishments as Americans that I feel whenever I visit the Japanese American National Museum in LA.

Muslims are misunderstood by a lot of Americans who confuse anyone who’s Muslim with being a terrorist or the enemy we’ve been fighting in parts of the Middle East. That specter of hate also reminds me of Japanese Americans, and the blanket condemnation JAs faced after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, even though many of them were loyal to the United States.

I understand that Lowe’s was concerned because the show became what they called a “lightning rod” for “strong political and societal views” — the words they used on their Facebook page to defend their decision — in the emotional debate over Muslims in America.

Here’s the company’s Facebook post about pulling the ads:
Continue reading →

Seriously? Controversy about Obama kids getting “Asian” food including teriyaki chicken on Dec. 7?

By | | , , , , , ,
4 Comments

Obama Family Portrait

This about takes the cake for lame-ass non-issues. WUSA9, Gannett’s DC affiliate (and sister station to Denver’s KUSA 9News, the top-rated station in Denver and home to Adele Arakawa, the Japanese American top-rated anchor), posted this video and text followup about the Obama girls’ private school serving Asian food on Dec. 7: “Sidwell Friends School, Sasha and Malia Obama’s School, Opts For Asian, including Japanese Food On Pearl Harbor Day.”

If you watch the video, it criticizes the yahoos who turned the lunch menu into political commentary about dishonoring those who died at Pearl Harbor 70 years ago. But the text is much more ambivalent and invites readers to get worked up into a frenzy, even with its headline spotlighting “Japanese Food.” Come one, teriyaki chicken? Yeah, it’s Japanese but it’s hardly un-American. Nothing to convene a new HUAC investigation over.

OMG — no one should have any Japanese food on Dec. 7. For that matter, we should have any German or Italian food in addition to Japanese food, on Memorial Day or Veterans’ Day. And don’t forget Korean and Vietnamese food… oh wait, there were Koreans and Vietnamese who were on our side. God forbid, if anyone gulped down any sushi yesterday, they’re traitor bastards.

This kind of crap is why I grew up dreading Dec. 7 every year.
Continue reading →

PHOTO: Who are these incredible women fighting fires at Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941?

By | | , , , ,
Leave a comment

Women firefighters at Pearl Harbor

UPDATE DEC. 13: NBC Nightly News reported last night that one of the women in the photo above has come forward, and said that the photo was not taken on Dec. 7, as has commonly been captioned every time it’s been published for decades. Instead, Katherine Lowe, who’s now 96 and still living in Honolulu, says she was at church the morning of the attack. But she and her friends from the Dole pineapple factory signed up as civilian volunteers and she’s sure the photo was taken sometime after Dec. 7, during a training session at Pearl Harbor. It’s great to have this incredible mystery cleared up, and from my perspective, the photo is still an amazing testament to the fact that a multicultural group of women worked together in the days following the Pearl Harbor attack, for the cause of protecting our country. It’s a powerful, moving image even though it wasn’t shot during the bombing.

I thought I’d seen pretty much every photo taken at Pearl Harbor 70 years ago — so many of them are so iconic. But here’s a new one that’s already seared into my visual memory: Women firefighters aiming a hose following the attack on the U.S. Navy base that terrible Sunday.

It was included in a series of photos on the MSNBC Photo Blog, and then posted by itself on MSNBC’s Open Channel crowdsourced investigative blog when the photo began to attract a lot of attention. None of the women are identified, but it appears that there are Asians and a Polynesian or Pacific Islander (maybe African American?) woman among the group.

I’m posting it here with apologies to Three Lions/Getty Images as a public service to help get the word out and hope that someone can identify any of the women. If requested, I’ll be happy to take down the image.

Maybe someone grew up with the grandmother telling stories about being on the dock at Pearl that day….

Thanks to TzeMing Mok on the APA Mavens list for the heads-up.

Denver’s Lao community suffered the tragic loss of its Buddhist temple, and needs your support to rebuild

By | | ,
Leave a comment

Firefighter at Lao Buddhist Temple of Colorado

Colorado’s Laotian community woke up yesterday to a terrible tragedy: The morning news shows kept showing breaking news footage from their helicopters circling over a raging fire in Westminster, off 108th and Wadsworth. The Lao Buddhist Temple of Colorado was burning down, the flames and smoke engulfing the building in less than half an hour as firefighters poured water from their bucket trucks in the sub-zero chill of dawn.

I have a special place in my heart for the Laotian community, so my heart broke along with theirs as I watched the coverage of their loss.

My wife Erin and I first met the Laotians because of their dedication and passion for boat racing, through our volunteer involvement with the Colorado Dragon Boat Festival. If people know about it, Laos is probably remembered most for its part in the Vietnam war.
Continue reading →