Asian Americans: Who Do You Want to Be?

To be Asian, to be American, to be Chinese:

From a sociological perspective and as an outsider, I find the group that is identified as Asian Americans as a complex group with an identity crisis. I mean no offense when I list these observations and opinions, because as an outsider with no attachments to either my American or Philippine heritage, the values of this group vary as one narrows down to specifics.

What I talk about here is how Asian Americans, compared with other ethnic groups in America, are marginalized due to a lack of awareness of cultural diversity outside of the community, and as a means for security within the community. For many I have come across, one is Asian based on the color of his or her skin, the ability to use chopsticks and read Chinese characters (or some variant), or some other stereotype.

The problem with that assumption is that it would decidedly not categorize many Southeast Asians or South Asians as what makes one Asian in the North American context, but in Britain the term usually refers to those of South Asian and Middle Eastern ancestry. An even bigger problem is the term itself is Eurocentric in that Asia specifically refers to all the lands East of Europe. In the North American context, however, the problem lies in the fact that it ignores the diversity of the community and each of their different cultures, histories, languages, and traditions.

What I specifically find interesting is how the larger group itself is one of convenience in terms of buying into the lie of marginalization superimposed upon them by the occidentals.

Let me illustrate in the example of someone I will call "Eric":

When Eric claims proudly that he is Asian American, does he emphasize he Asian ancestry or his American birth privilege?

Why does he fight to be recognized as an American, yet criticizes the society for having a hard time as recognizing his place as a fellow citizen (or in this case, denizen)?

Why does he boast about how proud he is to be Asian, yet when immigrants from Korea come, he does not see them with empathy, but with an air of inferiority for not being American or accusing him of not honoring his ethnic heritage in favor of the American dream?

Moreover, if Eric wants equal rights when he complains about how unfair it is for Asian Americans to always be treated as "forever foreigners", then why is it he does not feel any special passion for the achievements or the sufferings of close communities such as the Japanese Americans for their imprisonment in America during World War II, yet was proud when Gary Locke becomes the first Asian American state governor in the American mainland?

It is disillusioning when I run into individuals like these who represent the extreme case, but I will clarify now are NOT the majority or the norm amongst Asian Americans. Rather, it is subtle characteristics and some of these more obvious than others that appear in people I have observed in the sociological context.

In another example, I ask more questions about a girl named "Ashley":

When she is amongst peers in the academic setting, why does she highlight the struggles and achievements of the community that she believes others virtually ignore, yet feels no special passion (or knowledge, for that matter) for Chicano or African American communities, preferring to superimpose her?

When she talks about how culturally sensitive and diverse her background is, why does she do in a manner that flaunts her ethnicity and culture as more of a fashion statement than an expression of her individual being?

It's the marriage of the American and Asian culture(s) that creates a very vague culture that many of the ethnic groups within the community agree upon unites them:

1) that they come from a region with a few cultural similarities but have similar values based on familial relations,

2) that they are marginalized as one group by an outside group,

3) that their experience as immigrants or children of immigrants who try to hold on strongly to their mother cultures creates brotherhood through shared experience, and

4) that there is strength in numbers for representation of the group as a whole rather than each group trying to fend for themselves.

Those are only a few pillars I have observed, but none of what I say should be taken as absolute. These are, as I stress for the sake of avoiding offense and misunderstanding me, observations from an outsider. From an anthropological and political perspective, yes, there is strength in numbers and people have traditionally gone into bigger groups for security, but the big criticism I have of the homogenization of these different groups into Asian Americans, coupled with the homogenizing nature of American culture (or the melting pot as they say), is that their values and identities don't become absorbed into one collective voice and consciousness that fosters solidarity in the community, but rather a loose confederacy that is unable to meet all the individual needs of each ethnic community as a whole, whereas the individual communities within the group do not have the numbers to meet their needs, especially for smaller ethnic communities like the Hmong and Laotians versus the larger groups like the Chinese and Filipinos.

It's the damned if you are, damned if you aren't dilemma I see here, which is what makes me admire the activists who mean to contribute to the community, yet know that it is a losing battle because it is difficult to please all the sub-communities within the Asian American community. In a nutshell, it's hard to please everyone all the time, and that's what makes me admire the few activists out there, and also helps me empathize with them when it all comes down to them choosing individual gain when giving to the community goes unappreciated and underappreciated, especially with free riders.