Tripmaster Monkey has put up a potentially eyebrow-raising piece entitled, “Who’s Next, Hello Kitty?” I’m still not sure if I want to smack the author or pat him on the back. And no, it’s not because of the reasons one might think. *cough
Personally, I love the article. The delivery is fresh and hits dead center when it comes to my own feelings. But that’s a whole other blog post.
THIS WAS THE YEAR when Asian-American men shot the hell out of their own wimpy, well-behaved stereotype. We’re talking of course about the Krazy Korean Killer, Seung-Hui Cho, and Kenneth “Asian Supremacist” Eng. As with postal workers, drive-by shooters, road ragers and bullied goth kids, these things tend to come in waves. Always on the cutting edge, Tripmaster Monkey lays down the odds on who’s snapping next.
After the Virginia Tech shooting, a non-adoptee Korean friend of mine called and asked, “Why do people keep referring to him as Korean? He practically grew up in the US. That would make him American.” My friend grew up in Korea and is still a Korean citizen. I think she has a point.
Hello, Kitty: Sanrio’s depressed character, Badtz Maru is the one everyone assumes will be the one to go postal, but we disagree and nominate the do-no-wrong princess herself. Oh, Hello Kitty, sure, you’ve got lots of friends, but you’re always the quiet one in the bunch. No one sees the Hello Kitty that cries inside desperately for attention, do they? You’re always saying hello to everyone, even complete strangers. How soon before you snap? Faster, Pussycat, Kill, Kill! Odds: 4:1.
*runs to delete her WK account Oh please. Hello Kitty? Impossible.
Angry Asian Adoptees: Here’s a hint, within 10 years, rebel Maddox and Pax and the rest of Angelina’s Benetton bunch will be the least of our worries. China, Vietnam, Cambodia or Korea, take your pick, if you dare. Odds: 20:1.
Personally, I think the odds are a bit high, but that’s just me. Come on, Bryan. Don’t we have enough to worry about as TRAs? That is so stretching it.
*runs to delete all her blog posts that mention her love for guns and violent video games
Thanks for the smack-pat, Sume. 🙂
It’s an over-the-top satirical response to all of the ridiculous attempts to cast this as an Asian American/Immigrant issue, and the stereotypes that come with it.
Hilariously, it appears some people think this is a serious betting line.
I suppose I’ll feel really dumb if Hello Kitty or the Harajuku Girls really do go ballistic. Or if it’s William ‘She Bangs’ Hung, I’ll feel dumb for having missed the call on it.
But for now, I’m not going to lose any sleep over it.
What I would lose sleep over is the chicken-shit response of those who are seriously considering canceling whole festivals celebrating Asian Pacific American History Month, fearing retaliation. And those people who are saying ‘on behalf of South Korea/Korean Americans/Asian Americans etc. etc., we’re sorry.’
Because you can burn me for it, but no community should be forced to its knees to apologize like that.
After all, we all know it can easily be cast as a ‘Gun Nut’ issue. Or a ‘Pervert Loner’ or a ‘Mental Health’ issue or speak of it from any number of interesting angles, but it seems more people want to avoid complicated answers in favor of the ‘Angry Asian Boy’ story.
Where are the people saying ‘On behalf of all the bad English majors, we’re sorry…’ ? (Ok, that’s a stretch.)
I don’t hold all white people accountable for Jeffrey Dahmer when he killed the Laotian boy, nor ask for an apology from them.
Nor would I recognize anyone’s authority to speak on their culture’s behalf. So why am I seeing that in reverse?
And my stomach turns at all these ‘concerned citizens’ wringing their hands and uttering their maudlin apologies and tired pundrity with their safe, pat, responses, like something out of a diversity handbook, trotting out all the same clinical phrases and tired platitudes we use whenever something bad happens.
All vocabularies that ultimately serve to effect little widespread change.
Building a culture, building a society takes time and effort, which few people seem willing to do these days. They’re content just with shaking their heads and acting surprised, nay, shocked, always finding a new batch of people to call trouble elements.
It’s time to jar the dialogue and to call ourselves on hypocrisy and look at ourselves honestly.
Because clearly, the language we’ve been using for the last 30 years hasn’t been getting through to people, so it’s time to find words and methods that do.
Word.
On the subject of Korean adoptee, may be you can shed some light on the follwoing. Is it a coincidence or is there a reason why there are so many adopted Korean childern in some places the midwest like Minnesota?
Thanks Bryan,
As you know, I’ve had my fill of that kind of thing already. To some degree or another, I’ve been there and done already, once as a child and once as an adult. I’m sick of it.
Can we not confront this head on without having to play the game?
This may begin to sound really weird.
When I look at what’s been happening, part of me thinks, “Yo, it took decades for me to say I’m Asian. Now you think I’m going to indirectly apologize for it? Think I’m going to again hang my head because of it? For this? Well, you can just kiss my ass.”
That’s just pure TRA. Or maybe not.
I should stop now. I feel a solar flare coming on.
It occurred to me to write a blog post on it, but then I figured why bother? Someone would just come and tell me it’s all different. This time it’s about race, not religion or that this time the scale is much smaller and less far reaching, less complex than last time. There will always be someone willing the point out what makes one dissimilar and/or worse than the other. I’ve heard it all before.
Apologize, separate, show you’re different, that you’re the true face of a community so people don’t fear you, don’t hate you. Live in part fear, part defiance. In the meantime, there’s always going to be someone else claiming the same thing. In the meantime, there’ll be still someone else who’s already decided who is who.
While people jockey for position and play “toss the bad guy,” the point gets lost. The dude was a psycho.
But didn’t you know? This is not about race or prejudice or paranoia or hypocrisy. It’s about national security. Oh, wrong scenario.
There may be a lot of differences but there are enough similarities to give me flashbacks. I’m just not going to go there again.
Excuse me, am I ranting?
Eisenheim, I wish I had an answer for you, but I really have no idea. I’ll have to ask and get back to you. I remember hearing about this one before but by the life of me can’t remember what was said. :S
This post is generating a larger amount of hits than I expected. Funny, no one’s saying anything.
I just checked back and saw some of the feedback. One in particular is a totally overboard. Hopefully, people will come to their senses soon. You’d think there’d be bigger things out there to deal with than a piece of satire that smacks a few stereotypes in the face.