An Asian response to Black American criticism and prejudices about Asian Americans
By: Y. Vue
Tags: Race, Racism, BlackLivesMatter, African American, Asian American

Race Relations

An Asian response to Black American Criticism and Prejudices about Asian Americans

When it comes to combating the Model Minority Myth, being seen and heard is one of the biggest challenges for Asian Americans Y. Vue Follow Jan 7 · 10 min read

Photo by Korantin Grall on Unsplash

I once wrote a piece to my community about how systemic racism has shaped the Hmong/Asian American landscape and the similarities therein between African Americans and us. Though there were a lot of nods of agreement, the flip side of that was that Asians still felt largely invisible and abused by the African American community — in particular, the later settled Asians like the Hmong, the Karen, and other Southeast Asians whose migration stories didn’t begin until the 1970s. The overwhelming sentiment was that though they felt for the struggles of African Americans, and they were also outraged and angry about the injustices for George Floyd, Tamir Rice, Philando Castile and all the others, it was difficult to balance it with their long history of being silenced and abused by many in the African American community.

And I can’t say that I disagree with them. Even as I advocated for Black Lives Matter and the Black community, I also couldn’t ignore what I’d grown up around, what I’d been told by Black folks even as I marched side by side with them, and what Black folks have angrily commented on my articles on race relations. It was clear to me that my people were still marginalized and stereotyped into the Model Minority Myth. Both White and Black folks believed it, but today, because I’ve spent so much energy trying to dispel Black stereotypes in my community, I think it’s also important I try to dispel some of the most popular prejudices I’ve heard from the Black community.

I’m not here to argue the validity of Black suffering because I believe you completely. I can’t open a newspaper or turn on the TV without hearing about the injustices served to the Black community. All through high school and college history courses, there were whole chapters and weeks dedicated to it. I so believed in it that I marched with BLM in Philadelphia in 2016 at the DNC. I don’t need convincing of the pain Black people carry, but I do find it curious how my own history and the trauma of my people are quickly dismissed by a large portion of Black folks.

Let’s break down some of the most common criticisms Asians have heard from some in the Black community.

Asians consider themselves White and are White adjacent.

Sorry, Thai dude, you’re white. Photo by Amy Elting on Unsplash

There are claims that Asians are all too happy to be categorized as White. Well, all I can say is that not a single Asian person I know thinks they’re White (and I know literally hundreds). Given the brutality that many of us suffered at the hands of White people, many Asians would take great offense to that.

Additionally, “being included as White on the census” is a White man’s decision and not exactly asked of Asian diaspora if we wanted to be categorized that way. Elitism and classism exists with every culture and it is literally palpable in Asian culture. It is that layer that aligns themselves to whiteness and reinforces stereotypes; however, the majority of Asians do not belong to that class. We just rarely get asked what our opinion is.

If you understood more of the Asian immigration histories, you’d understand why being labeled as White or White adjacent is so offensive. It demeans all of the struggles that Asians have fought against, including lynchings, racism, and US abandonment of their Southeast Asian allies after the Secret War/Vietnam War. To this day, the Chinese Lynching of 1871 is still one of the largest on record in US history.

From Google Arts and Culture: The Argument Of Nationality. Excited Mob — “We don’t want any cheap-labor foreigners intruding upon us native-born citizens.” Cartoon censuring the intolerance which disguised itself as patriotism in anti-Chinese sentiments. Cartoon depicts Irish, German, Italian and African-American citizens lynching a Chinese man. Circa 1880.

Anti-Asian sentiment was rampant all throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Asians don’t have skin in the fight. The biggest race issues in America are between Blacks and Whites.

From a Blacks and Whites point of view, that is probably seen as true. From an “others” point of view, that is subjective. I think all our race issues are nuanced and prioritized differently by community. Media and social narrative largely informs what we as a society perceive. It fits a social agenda that perpetuates lines of consciousness, whether they be good or bad; and it rarely strays from those built perceptions. We’re all familiar with the stereotypes. Black folks are looting thugs. Muslims are terrorist cells waiting to blow up buildings. Asians are all East Asians, well-to-do, overachieving, unassuming white sidekicks. All Latin/Hispanic folks are Mexicans looking to cross the border and have anchor babies and leech off the US welfare system. And so on.

Truth is that the squeakiest wheel gets the most oil and not all of us have the capacity to squeak loudly. Just because we don’t or can’t squeak loudly all the time doesn’t mean our issues are any less important. How big or small your community’s race issues are simply depends on from which angle you’re looking at it.

Asians just benefit off the work of Black people in the Civil Rights Movement. Asians have never been part of the fight.

The first time I heard this was actually at the BLM march I attended on that sweaty summer in Philadelphia at the DNC as I stood outside the Black Lives Matter bus waiting to be organized. Sadly, it’s not the last time I would hear this. It’s a myth that we Asians were never a part of the Civil Rights Movement. I even wrote about it here:

The question everyone should ask themselves is why Asians have been part of America for hundreds of years, and yet, how is it possible that you hear so very little about us and our involvement in US history? Maybe, just maybe, it’s because Asians are left out on purpose to build a narrative on who and what Asians are. Hey, it’s so convincing that even some Asians started believing it.

Screenshot via Instagram.

I find it funny that Asian/Black allyship was strong in early 20th Century America (roughly around 1930s to 1960s), yet here we are at such odds in the 21st Century. A lot of Black Americans actually have Asian in them — specifically Chinese because of the Page Act and the Chinese Exclusion Act. Many Chinese men and Black women married in that time period. Not all of society was cool with that, but it happened. And these stories aren’t told because, God forbid, we should come together and have each other’s backs.

Peter Yew beating protest in 1975. Photo by Corky Lee.

Additionally, in the 1960’s at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, there were actually several Asian Black Panthers. Asians also marched with their Black neighbors for Civil Rights. People such as Yuri Kochiyama who was there when Malcolm X was assassinated. She was the first to reach him and he died in her arms.

So when did we start falling apart? When did history start becoming erased and stereotypes like Model Minority and Black thugs start forming?

The Model Minority Myth started coming after World War II, but it really sunk in its teeth in the 1970s into the 80s, when the effort to destabilize the progress of the Civil Rights Act really started in earnest. Divide and conquer is the fastest way to winning after all.

So while the powers that be publicly looked to be appeasing the masses, lulling American society into complacency, another narrative was taking place. Reinforcement of stereotypes came back stronger than ever, dividing up neighbors by skin color with myths that would haunt us to this day. Racism never truly left America just because legislation was passed to open doors for POCs. Racism just became more stealthy in how it operated.

Now you (Asians) know how Black people feel being ignored and erased from American History.

Sorry, but I find this argument rich considering Asian American inclusion into American history books is like 2 paragraphs — sometimes, maybe a whole page or two in a 500 page text.

Aside from railroads and internment camps, majority of Americans know nothing else about Asian Americans. Most Americans can’t name one Asian American historical figure (of which there were many). And it pains me to make the comparison and I do think that yes, African American history does need more attention and visibility, but in regular American history classes, it was taught at a far more extensive level than any other minority set in America. Even Native American history isn’t taught as much and there was an all out genocide on them, both culturally and physically.

Cultural genocide: Native American children forced to attend the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania, where they were taught to reject and abandon their cultural heritage. Photo courtesy of US Army.

The Gnadenhutten Massacre, 1782. (Credit: Archive Photos/Getty Images)

Most people know about the Tuskegee Airmen, but how many people know about the 442nd Regimental Combat Team? Amidst racism, persecution, and internment, young Japanese and Japanese-American men signed up for service during WWII and would prove to be brave beyond measure and is still noted to this day as the most decorated unit in American history — yet so few Americans know who they are. Daniel Inouye is a hero of mine. He’s the very definition of service, loyalty, and bad ass.

I always say misery isn’t a competition, but I do believe more perspective and empathy is in great need in America. We’ve been buried under a tsunami of woke-ness in the last few years, but certain groups definitely get more attention than others. The Asian community has always struggled to be heard and to have our struggles be respected, but that pesky Model Minority Myth is as much an advantage for some as it is a disadvantage for others.

Ironically, on one hand, some Black folks say that they never believed in the Asian Model Minority Myth, but then in the next breath will also say “Asians think they’re white, Asians have privilege, Asians don’t understand the struggle,” aka Model Minority.

So which is it? Am I seen as a model minority or am I not? Can’t possibly be both. Regardless, nothing anyone has said about my Asian-ness is new. It’s all been said before, and yeah, it’s exhausting. Also, it proves that Asians are still unheard and unseen and that many don’t care to hear or see us.

Why is it a Black person’s responsibility for evening the playing field for other POCs? Why should we let other POCs benefit from us?

In a POC inclusive version of Regency England, so many white and black folks in this show but where is everyone else? Photo courtesy of Netflix.

Well, why is it anybody’s responsibility? This train of thought can be said for white people or Asians or Mexicans or anyone. We can all be exclusive in our decisions and only look out for our own, but then what kind of world are we building? Is it any better than the one that brought us here? This attitude then just further separates. We’re all responsible for evening out the playing field. We can either build walls or build bridges and you can only choose one when it comes to humanity.

At the end of the day, what I care about most and what I want most is equality and equity for all. I want fair representation for everyone. I also want everyone to tuck their bullshit away and see that we’re all on the same boat and as long as people still play separation politics, we won’t get anywhere. If we’re going to be inclusive, then we should really be inclusive. If we’re going to talk diversity, then let it be real diversity. And if we’re going to measure people’s actions, then it should be with the same yardstick for all.

In conclusion…

Let’s be honest. Discussions on race are exhausting for everyone, and sometimes, I feel like whole communities need collective therapy to get past their issues so that we can all work together towards healing. From an Asian perspective, even though we want to be allied with Black folks, it makes it really difficult if we’re not even allowed to voice our struggles; and even for those Asians who are wholeheartedly allies of Black folks, oftentimes, it still feels like it’s a one-way street. We see you, but it sure doesn’t feel like you see us.

You can’t demand allyship and at the same time silence those you’re demanding it from. You can’t call us all racist if you’re going to deny your own culpability in the mess of how things got to be how they are. A call for fairness, for accuracy, for sensitivity should be something we can all agree on, yet somehow, it’s still controversial.

Our roads to get here may not be the same, yet here we all are anyway, carrying with us loads of histories of pain, suffering, and struggle. The sooner we all realize that it’s not a competition for who has the bigger wound, that we are perhaps far more alike than we are different, and that an injustice for one is an injustice for all, maybe then we can finally start healing.

It’s true that being Black isn’t easy and that globally there is negativity and stereotypes attached to all skin color. Even within Asian communities, there is so much colorism (which existed long before White people came on the scene…but more on that at another time). Saying “we don’t see color” isn’t right either, because then it erases both the struggles and the richness of each of those individuals. However, what we can do is perhaps allow ourselves to listen, to digest, and to acknowledge that this fight for equity isn’t just our own and that in it, we all have our parts to play.