I am writing this letter in response to the Mar. 21 article, “Finding a place in Asian-America” by Andrew Lin. In it, Lin derides the Asian-American youth scene in Los Angeles and describes his (unsuccessful) attempt to escape it by enrolling at Georgetown. Throughout the piece, he pokes at some of trends that characterize Asian-American youth, including “fast cars” and “baggy pants and poorly applied eyeliner.”
As a firm proponent of free speech, especially on a campus where that right is constantly being threatened, I am not condemning Lin for writing the article?in fact, I found it quite amusing, and in some aspects, not entirely inaccurate. Even on the East Coast, there are plenty of Asian-American youth who spend more money on car accessories than the car itself.
However, several of Lin’s points bother me. First, what begins as a playful satire of one person’s experience with one group of Asian-American youth in one city in the United States eventually becomes a derogatory generalization of all Asian-American youth. Though he attempts to qualify his statement by writing, “Granted, all of this could be a strictly Left Coast phenomenon,” his equation of this image to Asian-American youth is undeniable?the article’s title, “Finding a Place in Asian-America” makes this clear. The fallacy becomes even more dangerous when he employs sexually demeaning images, such as “fly girls who press their breasts against the windshields,” to typify Asian girls. Sure, there may be some Asian teens who flaunt their bodies on the road, but is this an exclusively Asian phenomenon? Three words: Girls Gone Wild. And is it only Asian-American teens who spend atrocious amounts of dollars on rims and spoilers? Just turn on MTV. In a campus (and country) where an Asian-American voice has traditionally been silent, such imagery can create and reinforce dangerous stereotypes of Asian-Americans. Similarly, his negative characterization of “Asian cliques” is disturbing. Would he feel the same way about a clique of black, Hispanic or, even better, white students? If not, why single this group of Americans out?
I refer secondly to his claim that the Asian American Student Association and the Chinese Student Alliance perpetuate reverse discrimination and social exclusion. Nothing could be further from the truth. The purpose of the Asian-American Student Association is to increase awareness of cultural and political issues that Asian-Americans face. More often that not, these issues arise as a result of a white exclusion of Asian-Americans, not the other way around. For example, AASA recently showed a film documenting the murder of an Asian-American man by two white men frustrated with competition from the Japanese auto industry. Understandably, the efficacy of our organization depends on how many unaware students are educated at our events; more often than not, those who are previously unaware are usually not of Asian descent. That so few non-Asians attend our widely publicized events says less, I believe, about AASA and more about the entire Georgetown student body.
Whether or not Lin’s article is a sincere take on an identity crisis or merely his frustration at his unsatisfactory sex life (which he does admit to) is still unclear to me. Yet the stereotypes conveyed in his article are threatening to Asian-Americans and minorities everywhere, even if it may come from someone who is, in the unforgettable words of a middle school sex education video tape, merely “learning to adjust to his body.”
Of course, there are plenty more issues at play here, such as whether learning an Asian language makes one more “Asian-American.” Yet such complex topics may be less appropriate for a half-page article than a course at Georgetown. But perhaps I am already asking too much.
Jason Park, President, Asian American Student Association (CAS ‘03)
