From: gwu@nujoizey.tcs.com (George Wu)
Subject: Re: Asian American Soap Opera Characters
Organization: Teknekron Communications Systems Inc.
Distribution: na
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 04:27:53 GMT

In article <1992Aug10.193503.23986@nynexst.com>, clare@nynexst.com (Clare Chu) writes:
> In article <1992Aug7.234154.3331@CSD-NewsHost.Stanford.EDU> ajh@Xenon.Stanford.EDU (Alan Hu) writes:
> >>
> >> [ A plot more twisted than any code I ever wrote deleted ]
> >
> >Entertained???!!!  My God, am I the only one out here about to puke
> >all over my keyboard?  This is one of the most popular American
> >soap operas, and here we see it all:
> >	Asian woman is a foreigner, trying to escape an evil
> >		arranged marriage to a yucky Asian guy, so she
> >		has an in-name-only marriage to a white guy (Real American)
> >		to sneakily evade US immigration law.
> >	White guy rescues her from the evil Asian guy out of pity.
> >	Of course, the slant-eye-Oriental-bitch promptly tries
> >		to seduce the Good-Galant-White-Man, preys on him
> >		when he's "vulnerable", and then, being typically
> >		cunning and sneaky as we all know all Asians are,
> >		pretends to be pregnant in order to entrap the Good
> >		White Guy.
> >	And, as usual, the black guy can't be permitted to have a
> >		love life.
> >This group really is depressing...
> 
>   Sorry...  It's only the soaps, and not too really out of line
>   considering it's a soap.  They always have to exagerrate and
>   embellish.  If you watched the soaps and thought that is how
>   white people lived, you'd be pretty much like my mom who
>   used to warn us against dating whites based on what she
>   saw on the soaps.  She also didn't like me marrying a doctor
>   because in the soaps they're constantly screwing around
>   chasing nurses, and getting tried for murder.  My sister
>   thinks whites have fertility problems, probably from watching
>   the soaps where no one who wanted a baby could ever have one,
>   or if they did, the kid invariably has a heart defect or rare
>   blood disorder which would prove that the father wasn't the
>   real father.  The only thing is that most people realize that
>   it's only the soaps when it applies to the whites, because they
>   know that it's exagerrated.  However what's curious is that
>   the poster from r.a.t.s. said that this storyline was very
>   believable (considering it's the soaps) because she didn't see
>   it as too out of the ordinary for a girl from Malaysia to have
>   an arranged marriage.  So what I'm saying is that white audiences
>   may believe the storyline of the Asian actress because they have
>   no knowledge base on reality to refute it.  Just like my Chinese
>   grandmother who watches the soaps believe that is how Americans
>   live because she has no real life experience to tell her that
>   it is exagerrated.  That is the depressing part.  Otherwise
>   if everyone took it as exagerrated and embellished, it would
>   just be entertaining.

     Clare, looks to me like you've made Alan's point, rather than
disgreed with him.  You cite no less than four people who base their
real life actions on things they "learned" in a soap opera.  I too
know people who actually find the soaps realistic.  Given I'd like
to think I hang out with a general more intelligent crowd than the
general populace (a pretty big given for some of you, no doubt :-),
and the general lack of real life contact with Asians and Asian
Americans, such media stereotypes are indeed discouraging.  Do I
even have to mention soaps aren't realistic, and there are other
programs which are alot more subtle about promoting stereotypes?

						George



----
George J Wu, Software Engineer         | gwu@tcs.com or uunet!tcs!gwu
Teknekron Communications Systems, Inc. | (510) 649-3700
2121 Allston Way, Berkeley, CA, 94704  | Never be the first to believe . . .