From: ronaldd@cbnewse.cb.att.com (ronald.h.davis)
Subject: Re: What does Arthur Hu mean to *me*
Organization: AT&T
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 20:56:13 GMT

In article <1993Jan8.140439.12779@nynexst.com> clare@nynexst.com (Clare Chu) writes:
>
>  It seems to me that the longer the Asian American's family has been in
>  America, the less prejudiced they are against Blacks and Hispanics.  Perhaps
>  your experience correlates to the fact that most of the Japanese,
>  Koreans, and Vietnamese you meet are recent immigrants.  Also, are you
>
a vietnamese person told me that vietnamese people came to hate black people
because during french colonialism africans served as soldiers in the french
army there.  he said that some of them raped and killed vietnamese people.
from my perspective, however, i see african-americans dying during the vietnam
war in disproportionate numbers only to have vietnamese refugees come here with
racist attitudes against black people.  to me it looks like *major* ingratitude.
after all, if some vietnamese would hate black people because of the actions of
some african soldiers during french colonialism, then i don't understand why
they don't hate white people more than black people.

i guess the role of black soldiers [including a cousin of mine] in vietnam makes
the thought of prejudicial attitudes from vietnamese a particularly sore point
with me.

>  sure they are Asian Americans, or Asians that are studying here.  Asian
>  Americans usually have gone to elementary school, jr. high, high school
>  here and have experienced prejudice first hand.  I don't think 3rd generation
>  Japanese-Americans are very prejudiced in my experience.  However my
>
i've been unable to spot a trend here because i've run across foreign nationals
who i thought were really reasonable, and i can say the same about some asian-
americans.  but among other asian-americans there seems to be this attempt to
be super-anything-white [or associated thereof].  thus, they try to be super-preppie,
acquire a set of interests that one might associate with being "white" [whatever
that means].  it seems that when people are *trying* to act a certain way, it comes
across as an act.  i often times have *real* problems dealing with people like
that.  i figure attempting to be super-white in their minds carries with it the
association of being super-racist even if they might possibly feel that they
might find themselves an occasional target of predjudice themselves.  i don't
know, maybe such people need to have someone or some group to which they can feel
superior.

my attitude is that after as much racist stuff [against black people] that you
see from japanese/nisei individuals and/or from japan (including government
officials) i am *totally* unsympathetic when i hear cries of racism against
japanese people by white people.  my tendency is to think:  "yeah, they're ones
to talk..."

>  Japanese roommate (from Japan) was prejudiced against almost anyone except
>  for other Japanese (of the highest caste) and whites.  She called the
>  campus police because a Black student was sitting in his car waiting for
>  his girlfriend in front of our dorm.  When the campus police called back
>  I told them to forget about it, but they still went and harrassed the guy.
>  She also said that Koreans were all stupid and deserved to be conquered.
>
well, mit has a fair number of asians and i found it interesting to observe some
of the interactions.  i came from north carolina so when i first got there a
lot of them looked the same to me so i couldn't tell one group from another.  i
think this is due to the fact that i wasn't used to queing in on the features
that distinguish asians.

anyway i noticed that koreans and chinese (especially those with roots in
the mainland) were somewhat at odds, as well as mainland chinese and taiwanese.
seemed like a lot of japanese folks kept separate and didn't interact to much
with either group.  it wasn't like guys were walking around campus tossing ninja
stars at one another but there did appear to be sources of tension among asian
groups.  what was less obvious, although there did seem to be something going on
there, was the relationship between asian-americans and foreign nations.

i was sort of aware of the fact that asian/asian-americans do not see themselves as
constituting one category and i tried to avoid lumping them all together in my
comments.

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