Asian American Empowerment - A Newfangled Version of Suzie Wong?

American Neo-Asian Eugenics

©2004 Rev. Sequoyah Ade
August 2004

In 1993 mainstream American news periodical TIME published what many considered a groundbreaking special issue entitled “America’s Immigrant Challenge.” The cover showcased an image of a woman that would come to represent in the eyes of most U.S. residents a vision of what is to come in regards to the ever-increasing mix of multi-racial relationships within an unrestricted multi-ethnic environment. Utilising the revolutionary Morph 2.0 imaging program, the “experts” developed an ethno-racial collage from a selection of diverse subjects, (American Aboriginals, or Indians if you prefer were noticeably but not surprisingly left out of this selection) arriving at what readers could reasonably assume is the face of the near future: an Amer-Asian female with exotically tanned like skin.

As the e-mails and calls to TIME’s editorial offices flooded in, many within their self-described sophisticated readership hailed the issue as a milestone in American race relations signaling the effective end to the “race problem” and the heralding of a new age. Perhaps, as many openly and gleefully suggested, a new race of people was on the horizon. Combined with the American ideals of justice and fair play they argued, America has graciously opened the door to a one-race nation leading an increasingly globalised planet as the sole benevolent superpower. One people, one race, one ideal. What the responses to TIME’s issue on the whole did not query however was the concept of “ideal”. Exactly what standard is being utilized in this melding of peoples and why is the range of qualifying factors so limited given the immense diversity of the human species in terms of not only race and ethnicity, but in regards to cultural and spiritual paradigms as well? What I intend to argue in this essay will not sit well with most people who regard themselves as colourblind and accepting of all peoples and cultures. I present a challenge to these folk to examine their choices and positions in regards to the American racial politic and how those decisions effect the development of common social relations as well as the entire framework of economical, militarial, theological and political convention that defines and dictates how power is distributed here in the U.S. and around the world. I will also delve into the role Asia, Asian cultural and philosophical mores and Asian women in particular factor into this concept of one-racial idealism.

To understand the historic continuums behind American racialism it is necessary to examine the role of Western European colonialism and imperialism and the social implications such systems have manifested in their wake. The United States analogous to other much older Euro-colonial nation-states has created a myth of moral antiquity that serves to buffer its collective conscience and to formulate an idealistic internal as well as external impression. Most Americans and especially Euro-Americans have been loathe to accept that in the course of two short centuries their country has been profoundly guilty of excessive cruelty and violence towards entire populations in the quasi-religious quest for territorial, cultural, political and economic power. The first victims were Aboriginals as they represented and continue to represent a direct challenge to the European concept of land ownership and secondarily as a threat to Anglo-Saxon theories of racial and cultural superiority. The next to suffer the insecurities of European self-identity were Africans forcibly imported to North America to labour in the burgeoning agricultural systems that eventually enabled a former British colonial outpost to mature into a cohesive nation that in turn imposed similar imperialistic controls over other, in many cases hopelessly defenseless populations. Under the rubric of Manifest Destiny, America has defended its brand of racism as natural, logical and in accordance with Judeo-Christian theological law. To oppose American imposition it was, and is, reasoned is to oppose God and civilization. To this day dissenters, no matter where they reside within the narrow spectrums that purport to encompass the whole of U.S. political thought, are labeled as enemies of civil society and personifications of a Luciferian evil on earth. And despite overtly simplistic social definitions and the constrained concision that comprises the standard of debate in the U.S., a public that still chooses to deny its own national realities readily accepts such glaring contradictions.

America, as a living example of freedom, benevolence and ethnically blind fair play does not exist and for that matter has never existed. It’s aggressive acquisitive territorial aspirations aside for a moment; the U.S. has successfully cloaked its history, its internal contradictions and its unique brand of racism through a veneer of genteel respectability. Under the rationale of bringing civilization to formerly uncivilized populations, the U.S. has used genocide, forced internment, theological zeal and outright brute force to shape events and situations that offend its sense of self-identity as an ideologically perfect, morally unambiguous colonial empire. It is this aggrandizing pro-European egotism that has shaped the modern concept of race and racism that defines much the 20th century. Former British colonies such as Australia, South Africa, Israel and Canada have all enacted laws and social structures designed to defend and solidify White racial power over native populations. Through conversion schools, enforced separatism of public accommodations and police-state tactics, natives and the individual Europeans that questioned such polices were kept in line by use of force and the continual threat of violent reprisal.

In every country European expansionism has entered, ethno-cultural differences and the diametrically opposite European conceptionalism of race became the primary factors supporting and legitimising colonial imposition and domination of subject peoples. As expressed by American presidents William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt, non-White, non-English speaking and non-Christian peoples “needed” American intervention to rescue them from their own backwardness. Regrettably, few then and few today question that assumption with any real seriousness. This is not to say that there has not been consistent and dedicated resistance to colonially imposed racism, but it to suggest that such resistance has been in and of itself jaundiced by a psychology that still struggles to free itself from generations of colonial European mental conditioning.

Indeed, anti-colonial, anti-racialist liberation movements since the post World War Two era have wrestled with the problem of what political philosophy or system of social justice they should adopt to effectively counteract decades of European rule. Many have openly adopted Marxian political models in an effort to wrest themselves from the obvious capitalistic elements of Western Colonial domination. However it needs to be said that such an ideology is in and of itself culled from a thoroughly European paradigm. Karl Marx and his collaborator Frederick Engels were Germans who themselves had internalized the concept of a Teutonic philosophical and cultural superiority over other European societies and traditions. Marx’s main inspirations were Hegel, Heine, Feuerbach and Kant and they undoubtedly represent a decidedly German, arguably pro-European cultural list of thinkers. It must also be noted that their political goals were in direct opposition primarily to the effects of the European industrial revolution on economical class aspects rather than liberation from the racialist effects of European colonialism. This is not to say that Marxian thought is totally without merit, but I question the relativity of such a philosophy in regards to racial politics in Euro-colonial nations imposing clear and unjustified stratifications on subject peoples identified as ethnological undesirables. In other words, I question the validity of the general modus operandi prevalent in many liberation theologies that do not, or choose not to recognize that European, i.e., White conceptions of social justice have shaped their understanding of and opposition to European racial oppression and subsequent social controls.

The staggered history of effective resistance to ethnic stratification has demonstrated that it is virtually impossible to dissolve such authority by adopting the ideological formulas of the dominating power structure. The American Civil Rights movement is a perfect example of the inherent failures of such engagements. In the late 50’s to mid 70’s the movement had accomplished much in addressing the contradictions and falsehoods of the Constitutional American promise of equality amongst all men. It has also inadvertently perpetuated varying forms of the very same discriminatory practices found within the racialist systems in which they engaged in direct conflict.

American Indians, Hawaiians, Asians and peoples immigrating from former Spanish colonial nations like Puerto Rico and Mexico were not only unobserved in their rhetoric, but subject to similar ethnic intolerances by many within the mainstream movement. This was readily apparent once the goals of federal legislative support for affirmative action in employment and anti-discrimination policies in housing and education were finally enacted. Despite enduring generations of involuntary servitude, institutional segregation and randomly subjected systematic violence, African victims began to psychologically identify with their oppressors. Many began to openly advocate expressly Anglo-zied forms of ethnic and cultural bias against other ethnic groups deemed by Whites as alien and in some distinct instances as in the case with Native Americans, inhuman. This direct mirroring of White racial and cultural beliefs can fairly be attributed to the colonialist practice of divide and conquer, but another quietly insidious element factored into this development. The unique trauma of existing under the consistent stresses of being non-European within an overwhelmingly White environment naturally resulted in compellingly detrimental modes of re-characterisation. The constant pressure to redefine the African identity into a form that would relieve the pain of racial discrimination led to the adoption of White racial pathologies. Although they themselves were not of purely European descent nor fully accepted on their own human merits, they had through years of emotional, and physical isolation from the African continent began to view themselves as American. In due course of accepting their less than equivalent social value when compared with European Whites but by chance of birth upon U.S. soil, many individuals felt superior to other ethnic groups just as marginalised by White ethnic prejudices.

Only radical, more revolutionary philosophical political entities such as Malcolm X and the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense earnestly rejected these eugenic notions and unlike the conventional primarily middle-class anti-racism movement included equally marginalised groups such as homosexuals and women’s rights into their programmes. This is an incontrovertible fact that has seldom been discussed when the history of the Civil Rights movement is explored. In hindsight this is partly due to an embarrassingly high level of subjective and selective ignorance with emotionally uncomfortable and highly competitive economic issues. But the roots of these paradoxical points of view amongst individuals and organisations theoretically committed to invalidating historical ethnic biases reside squarely within the ardently contradictory European concepts of cultural hierarchies and their relationship to social constructions of human identity.

This brings us back to TIME’s special race issue and the model used on its magazine cover. After the dust had settled following the overwhelmingly glowing response from the public over the seemingly optimistic view the issue presented, voices from the periphery asked a immediately pertinent and insightful question: why did the cover model look so European? Other dissenters within the Asian community went further by insisting that the Amer-Asian features of the model and the fact that a female was used instead of say, a male and female set merely exhibits centuries of White male fetishism associated with Asian women as the spoils of Western and in this case, American involvement in Asian nations. In my opinion this is not a radical analysis but a reasonable charge that deserves an equally reasonable answer.

TIME magazine’s editors were eventually compelled to admit after much prodding that the resulting computer hypothesis and imaging mock-up of the future face of America could have looked much different, (and much darker) than what was suggested by their cover. On the other hand what they were not willing to concede was that obviously racialist Euro-friendly generalisations and assumptions of beauty and social standing were used in developing its prototype. The producers deliberately chose decidedly muted, Europeanised representations of America’s non-European ethnic populations. Filipino, but not so Filipino; Arab, but with lighter, more Caucasian characteristics; Latino, but with blond hair and hazel eyes as opposed to the darker features commonly associated with South American natives and lighter-skinned Africans that reflected generations of rape and sexual servitude to White males. These were the more acceptable racial phenotypes rather than realistic depictions of actual subjects reflecting the broad ethnic reality of the U.S. Then there were the non-racial but no less significant American class factors such as how and why people choose their partners according to economic status, education and religious belief. Virtually every facet of the subject surrounding interracial mixing and the resulting progeny of such mating clearly reflected not the reality of America’s ethnic diversities, but the desired end results of such ethno-biological transformations. What TIME actually did was boldly present a thoroughly eugenic, non-conflicting and acceptably exotic phenotype that does not directly counter or offend long-standing Anglo racial sensitivities. So in the long run, TIME magazine has made an unambiguous attempt at redefining, within Euro-centric racial paradigms, a suggested template for how the “new face of America” should look.

This is not an isolated incident of racial insensitivity on the part of the magazine. In an earlier issue, TIME earned the well-deserved ire of anti-racialist activists with another cover story that involved race, racism and the incessant fears within the American psyche towards African males. Both TIME and its main competitor, NEWSWEEK rushed to be the first news publication to hit the stands with the newly released arrest photos of O.J. Simpson who was officially charged with the grisly murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown and her friend Ron Goldman. NEWSWEEK published the photograph straight, TIME however decided to visibly alter its copy by darkening Mr. Simpson’s skin and features making him, and all other African men in the U.S. by fiat, appear much more sinister and frightening by adding to the already tense racial factors surrounding the case. When questioned as to why TIME would stoop to such blatant levels of anti-African male propaganda, apologists accused a sensationalist press and African activists in particular for exacerbating racial hatred and playing the “race” card. Despite their claims to the contrary, TIME played on White insecurities and prejudices by presenting an image that accurately articulated at least one consistent social reality, America’s inherently deep set fear of Black males. For all intents and purposes, TIME conveniently sidestepped any responsibility for demonizing the African community by openly utilizing racism as a factor in their journalism.

So when we re-examine the aforementioned “New American” issue, the exotic Amer-Asian female phenotype cover girl choice becomes crystal clear. What TIME and other mainstream advertising endeavors are suggesting is a watering down or “Whitening” of the American Asian population. I have explored similar social engineering themes in a previous work entitled “SUZIE WONG REVISITED” where I detailed the history and methods used by Spanish and Portuguese colonialists to “de-Indianize” or, breed-out of visible existence the native Aboriginal populations of Brazil and most of Latin America through aggressive programmes of enforced interbreeding with European males. I compared these methods with what I see as the current eugenic drive in the U.S. to “de-Asianize” its Asian population by way of soft but persistent insistence on White male/Asian female pairings rather than the old-style methods of forceful intermarriage and outright rape.

Given the history of belligerent American intervention in Asia, (the Philippines, China, Korea and Japan respectively) and the fact that Asians as an ethnological and diverse demographic drastically outnumber Europeans in substantial numbers; the potential threat posed by a unified Asian identity presents for Euro-supremacists and multinational corporations a significant dilemma. As the world becomes increasingly globalised, the former methods of imperialism typified by direct militarism can no longer be deemed workable. Modern imperialism has had to redefine itself by utilizing a variety of new techniques most notably the science of American propaganda through the use of modern media and advertising. By projecting a seemingly endless compendium of long established stereotypes harvested from White male fantasies, the caricature of the demure but sexually alluring and immediately available Asian female is displayed by mainstream media in the U.S. and abroad virtually unchallenged.

Reminiscent of 19th century French paintings that routinely depicted Middle Eastern and North African females in erotic harem environments as little more than sexual possessions of Arab sheiks and European adventurers, American media accomplishes similar results by showcasing the quiet acquiescence of Asian women to their White male consorts. In all but a very few examples the Asian female stands or sits discernibly lower than the White male and rarely speaks for herself. She quietly smiles and looks upwards in approval and resignation at her White male partner unequivocally suggesting servitude, compliance and a total lack of any real sense of individualism. Moreover her first and last name is usually of European origin immediately suggesting her “Americaness” and ability to thoroughly integrate into the U.S. cultural fabric. This pattern is pervasively expressed in major and minor cinema, television, print ads and even commercially available children’s cereal boxes. Nearly every mode of popular communication is inscribed with this racist motif. The implications these images represent to the Asian community are monumental. The precedence given to White male dominance in Asian-interracial relationships and the direct albeit subtle suggestion of Asian female insignificance indicated by such propaganda deeply interrupt and injure the structure of Asian familial, cultural and ethnic cohesiveness and identity. This is without a doubt the intended long-term result.

So it is incontrovertible that Asian women today as in the past present a viable and visible example of White male supremacy and domination. Asians as a group represent a contradictory marginalised but wholly acceptable “model minority” status provided of course they remain within their respective places. America touts William Hung and comedic films like “Harold and Kumar” as diversity in action while denying home ownership in all White communities to second and third generation American Asian families. But on the other hand White male/Asian female couples and families are adorned on banners in Seattle and New York City advertising exclusive condominiums and hip upscale restaurants. Americans flock to see love stories such as “Snow Falling on Cedars” Jet Li never got the chance to kiss the girl he fought an entire ghetto for in “Romeo Must Die.” Asian males are represented in Western media as either sexless,intellectually modern coolie stereotypes or criminal masterminds brutally oppressing other Asians until confronted by the all-powerful White male Buddhist super-killer seeking justice.

It would be absurd to dispute that such overt symbolisms have no empirical effect on socio-ethnic relations or for that matter racial stereotyping. It is equally absurd to suggest that challenges to such racialist illustrations are merely examples of reverse-racism or purely anti-White prejudices. If anything, such overwhelming and pervasive patterns thoroughly solidify the arguments of dissenters that assert these examples brazenly display a contemporary, although familiar manifestation of eugenic racial categorizations. Ethnic narratives in the United States will always exist as a problematic and symbolic thorn in the side of an error-ridden American mythology of racial impartiality. And since White males cannot seem to restrain their sexual urges despite their claims of racial superiority and repulsion to non-White populations, progenies of mixed-ethnicities will continue to proliferate and compel Whites to construct new, more innovative classifications that effectively attempt to preserve Euro-centric, or at least proto-European control over existing social entities even within a vast multicultural social setting.

As deplorable and despicable as these contentions are, they are genuine in terms of actual social dynamics as they relate to racial constructions and prejudices. Asian males have been metaphorically castrated in the United States and this has consequently classified them as non-essential non-entities within the general American social complex. A comparable context was affably expressed by Confederate leader Jefferson Davis when he theorized that the practise of African slavery dignified and exalted all White men by providing a yardstick by which to measure their own pre-eminence. In the process of diminishing and dehumanising the Asian identity and the Asian male in particular, the European has therefore assumed for himself the role of a superior in every conceivable circumstance. Be it cultural, racial or sexual, Whites have historically measured their own self worth by the degree to which they control other, non-European populations. By subjugating other races through coercion and by violence when coercion fails, the European ego is thusly assuaged and afforded value. Whether in the form of early anti-Asian exclusionary acts limiting immigration; or State of California edicts outlawing Chinese customs and dress; Japanese internment or the even less talked about enforced servitude and eventual abandonment of Filipinos by railway firms in the U.S. Midlands not to mention the invasion of many Southeast Asian nations by American military forces, White America has measured itself against the Asian and other non-European groups over and over again and without quarter. And in each of these cases, no matter what the ethnicity or the expressed aversion to the supposed inhuman aspects of those chosen to be subjected, you can count on White male libidos imposing themselves on the women of those groups and the utilization of conversion modalities to reshape the offspring of these contacts as close as is humanly possible into a Euro-centric paradigm that will ultimately serve White interests. And the Asian female as well as the direction of the Asian identity in the U.S. and abroad regrettably resides at the crux of this latest attempt at eugenic ethnological social engineering.