"Asian guys in my show? Not gonna happen!"

[Traitorfish]

I'm still not sure what you want me to say, here. Yes, taken at entirely face value, factoring in no regional, generational or ethnic variations, disregard statistics as a form of witchcraft, Asian-Americans have it pretty good. But what does that tell us about the topic of hand, namely, the representation of Asian-Americans in the entertainment industry: on screen as characters, in front of the camera as performers and behind the camera as directors, writers and producers?

It is possible to have too much context, to broaden the scope of discussion so much that the original point becomes lost in the noise, and I think that's what you're doing with this line of thought. Maybe it's a worthwhile one! I certainly think that, especially in the United States, racial inequality is often deployed so as to obscure more fundamental socioeconomic inequalities. But is it relevant to this thread?

 

[Farm Boy]

I don't know. I guess I'm just not sure. I'm torn between thinking that cultural stereotypes have the sort of massive far ranging power it often seems assumed they do. In which case, I'm having trouble finding the harm in the far-ranging American-Asian one. If stereotypes do indeed fuel success/failure, then in totality the Asian one doesn't seem much to cry about. On the other hand I'm semi inclined to the think that racial stereotypes, as typically constructed for conversation, are total crap. "Asian" is too broad to mean much of import. "White" is too broad to mean much of import. "Black" is much the same. So really, we're all just jerking off when it comes to stereotypes impacting in any meaningful sense economic and social advantage. I mean, it's understandable, sort of like the modern-enlightened-man's take on being the same tribally infatuated little monkey we've all always been.

 

[Traitorfish]

Well, remember that the original topic was the representation of Asians by and in a particular industry. In that context, concerns about stereotyping make a lot more sense: it effects what kinds of characters and stories the industry produces, what kind of roles are made available, what kind of projects are taken seriously by studios. If you zoom out to society-at-large, I agree, the impact of a lot of stereotypes is not going to be as deep. But that zooming out was never really required, it was just a rhetorical maneuver, essentially a goal-post shifting, which I didn't have the sense to call out as such at the time.

 

[Farm Boy]

That would make more sense, and I'd need to bow out. The level of disinterest I have in television/movie production is usually a cause for humor in my acquaintances. Seems about as important as arguing the racial and ethnic dynamics within the casts of our favorite soap operas. My magical dream slutty cariacature people aren't white/black/Asian/Mexican enough! Waaaah.

Sorry. That just sort of came out. My bad.

 

[jackelgull]

I think the out of contextualization of this thread is far along enough that it isn't going to come back. For what it is worth, I agree with a lot of your points TF, but ultimately, I feel that there is no film that can grasp the "Asian-American experience" in all of its nuances. That said, the "Asian American experience" is just the immigrant experience translated into a different context.

 

[Traitorfish]

That would make more sense, and I'd need to bow out. The level of disinterest I have in television/movie production is usually a cause for humor in my acquaintances. Seems about as important as arguing the racial and ethnic dynamics within the casts of our favorite soap operas. My magical dream slutty cariacature people aren't white/black/Asian/Mexican enough! Waaaah.

Sorry. That just sort of came out. My bad.

Well, I don't pay a great deal of attention to most mainstream media, either. But, I don't imagine that this places me somehow above or outside the culture in which these films exist. They do matter, to at least some extent, whether or not they impact on me directly, because they play a powerful if not always clear or direct role in setting the tone for society.

I think the out of contextualization of this thread is far along enough that it isn't going to come back. For what it is worth, I agree with a lot of your points TF, but ultimately, I feel that there is no film that can grasp the "Asian-American experience" in all of its nuances. That said, the "Asian American experience" is just the immigrant experience translated into a different context.

Well, I don't know if any one film should attempt to represent "the" Asian-American experience. The reality is always fractured and individualised, dependent on place and time and origin and generation, and is always cut across with experiences of gender, class, sexuality, and so on. And, as you say, there are commonalities which cut across racial lines; it's quite likely that first generation Chinese and Jewish immigrants in 1890 have in a lot of important respects more in common with each other than either do with their great-great-grandchildren, who in turn have more in common with each other. I think what we should hope for is the representation of Asian-American experiences in their diversity, which at a practical level means more Asian-Americans actors in major roles and more Asian-Americans in creative positions.

And, for that matter, Asian-Britons, Asian-Australians, Asian-everyones. And equally, African-Americans, gay Britons, trans Australians. Everyone-everyones, basically, is what we should hope to see.

 

[Farm Boy]

Well, I don't pay a great deal of attention to most mainstream media, either. But, I don't imagine that this places me somehow above or outside the culture in which these films exist. They do matter, to at least some extent, whether or not they impact on me directly, because they play a powerful if not always clear or direct role in setting the tone for society.

Oh I don't think I'm above TV/movie aficionados. But if "Asian" stereotypes are playing a powerful yet nebulous role in the tone of my society: so what? They're doing fine. More than fine, holistically, on the numbers. If we pull out subgroups of "Asian" that are disadvantaged, then sure, you've got me on board: I think support and aid through programs, such as they are, should be doled out on the basis of economic and educational/vocational need, not who somebody's parents were.

 

[Traitorfish]

That's an awfully low bar, I think, "they're doing fine". "My behaviour has not yet destroyed them, so I should feel no obligation to change my ways". Pretty basically wonked philosophy, that, if you ask me.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

That's an awfully low bar, I think, "they're doing fine". "My behaviour has not yet destroyed them, so I should feel no obligation to change my ways". Pretty basically wonked philosophy, that, if you ask me.

Given that they have, on average, the highest standard of living of any ethnic group in the US the "haven't destroyed them yet" is hyperbole to the point of absurdity.

 

[Traitorfish]

But that's the substance of it. Not "do no harm", just "do no harm beyond an arbitrarily defined point".

I take the point, that whatever burden stereotyping places on Asians, enough of them succeed that it is evidently not crippling. But that's no sort of justification; it's barely an excuse.

 

[Farm Boy]

We either guess that stereotypes are strong and decisive, in which case they're probably beneficial, or they're of negligible impact, in which case it's a case of the delicate feel feels of the tend to be richer and more powerful than anyone else. Either way, I can't figure out why I should be impressed beyond, "Poor little white boy stereotyped that he can't dance." You know, other than to dismiss the whole thing as the "empathic" equivalent of rubbing one out.

Edit: I'm coming off more hostile than I mean to. I am mostly confused. This seems like something I should care about. And I guess there is probably an amount which I do. I'm posting after all. But the harder I think about it the more it seems like the rationale for this being a significant problem is crap along the lines of Republican-Party-Economic-Freedom-For-The-Little-Man-Double-Talk is total crap. There's a principle that's resonating, but it's been corrupted.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Whatever burden stereotyping puts on Asian Americans, it is apparently less crippling than the average burden shared by all the other Americans, whatever the source of that burden might be.

 

[Traitorfish]

We either guess that stereotypes are strong and decisive, in which case they're probably beneficial, or they're of negligible impact, in which case it's a case of the delicate feel feels of the tend to be richer and more powerful than anyone else. Either way, I can't figure out why I should be impressed beyond, "Poor little white boy stereotyped that he can't dance." You know, other than to dismiss the whole thing as the "empathic" equivalent of rubbing one out.

Edit: I'm coming off more hostile than I mean to. I am mostly confused. This seems like something I should care about. And I guess there is probably an amount which I do. I'm posting after all. But the harder I think about it the more it seems like the rationale for this being a significant problem is crap along the lines of Republican-Party-Economic-Freedom-For-The-Little-Man-Double-Talk is total crap. There's a principle that's resonating, but it's been corrupted.

You've got to distinguish between Asian-Americans as individuals and "Asian-Americans" as a statistical aggregate. The issue isn't whether the averages turn out this way or that, it's how this falls on actual, meat-and-jelly human beings. You've got to consider whether the petty luxury of stereotyping people is worth the harm this does to individual Asian-American people. In some cases, that harm may be considerable, may make their entire career and uphill climb against stereotype; in others, it might be nothing more than an irritation, but the question in either case is: is it worth it? Can this be justified? And there's no clear reason to think that it should be.

Yes, of all the racial issues in America, this is not the most sombre, or the most dramatic, and it's certainly not the most fatal. But that doesn't mean that it doesn't exist, or that it isn't worthy of consideration.

Whatever burden stereotyping puts on Asian Americans, it is apparently less crippling than the average burden shared by all the other Americans, whatever the source of that burden might be.

The term you are looking for is "capitalism", and I can assure you, I am unreservedly in favour of its removal.

 

[jackelgull]

I'd say that the stereotyping of Asian Americans by other Americans is more than matched by the counter stereotyping of Americans by Asian Americans.

 

[Farm Boy]

TF, if you want me to be sympathetic to anecdotes of the Asian American stereotype hindering good, honest, Asian girls and boys, you've already got it. Heartfelt and solid. I'm still really unsold on action to combat this though. Assuming this stereotype has the power to generate anecdotes in any significant number then it also has the power to be partially responsible for an ethic correlation in wealth and power; at best we'd be encouraging dragging a minority down from it's (possibly just as biased) economic pedestal.

 

[aelf]

No, your definitions.

In that you choose to view "marginalization" from the standpoint of a condition rather than a process. I clearly stated that I view marginalization and demarginalization as movement on a spectrum, so being movement in opposite directions they cannot occur at the same time.

And I said that that's not how the term is typically used. Wikipedia, for example, equates marginalization with social exclusion, which encompasses "individual exclusion", "community exclusion" and "professional exclusion". Seeing that individuals can be socially excluded/marginalized, even if the entire community that the individual belongs to is being de-marginalized, individuals can still be experiencing marginalization by being socially excluded (for example, black people in certain states in America still being denied entry to some establishments after the Civil Rights Movement had begun). And if many individuals are still experiencing that, does it make sense to say that that community is no longer experiencing marginalization/social exclusion?

I mean, let's apply the same line of reasoning to black people. The process of their de-marginalization has begun for a long time, no? Does it really strike you as reasonable to say that black people have no longer experienced marginalization since the 1960s?

TF, if you want me to be sympathetic to anecdotes of the Asian American stereotype hindering good, honest, Asian girls and boys, you've already got it. Heartfelt and solid. I'm still really unsold on action to combat this though. Assuming this stereotype has the power to generate anecdotes in any significant number then it also has the power to be partially responsible for an ethic correlation in wealth and power; at best we'd be encouraging dragging a minority down from it's (possibly just as biased) economic pedestal.

Much of the discussion has been focused on the film industry. So how about taking action in certain areas where the stereotypes have done harm, such as certain industries or in terms of social influence?

 

[Hygro]

The remaining six of you in this thread frequently make many of my favorite posts, making it a cross between so awesome and yet so discomforting that you're arguing.

 

[jackelgull]

Whose the sixth? I only count five:
TF
Farmboy
Aelf
Timsup2nothing
Sommerswerd

 

[Farm Boy]

I think he posted right above me.

 

[jackelgull]

I find that I can usually discount myself from most lists automatically.