How come no one told me about The Guild?

Besides the fact that it's funny and entertaining, there are four Asian-American characters, including two love interests! How cool is that?! Hooray for diversity in media!

Still haven't seen any black people on screen, though . . . :|


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I don't like trail mix,

but I do like this Target commercial. Hooray for more diversity in media and for M&Ms!

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Like Hello Kitty,

no Asian or Asian-American women were allowed to speak on camera in The Slanted Screen. (Thanks, Margaret Cho!)

Other than actively not acknowledging half of the population, I enjoyed the film. It featured Asian and Asian-American actors talking about how Asian men have been portrayed in American media. I do understand that the film was about Asian men. However, at the end of the film, the actors talked about how change is on the horizon, and how (at the time shooting) Bobby Lee, John Cho and Margaret Cho had studio deals, so things would get better. Considering I can count five Asian characters of any gender on the upcoming fall primetime lineup, and maybe five more on cable, I do not agree that things will get better quickly at all. But if things were to get better, it would help if the film had mentioned the stereotypes that actresses of Asian descent face in television and movies. Their struggles are related and come from similar sources of prejudice and discrimination. So it would have been nice to include the women, too.

I would have been content if the film had even one Asian or Asian-American actress sitting on camera talking about anything. But the three women that were allowed to speak on camera in the film were all white, and not actors. The three women did share insightful studies of how media affects children and the problems surrounding casting and writing. One study showed that children want to see representations of themselves in their media so that they can have role models. In another study, the children expected that white people in television and movies would have roles of authority, black people and Latino people would have subservient roles, and Asian people would not be on the screen at all.

In the film, Bobby Lee told the camera, "My nickname was 'Long Duk Dong' in high school because of that character, and I think every Asian guy that ever went to an American school earned the nickname Long Duk Dong because of that character." I never thought about that when I was growing up, because I didn't have any Asian classmates until seventh grade. And then he left after eighth grade. But now, that is what I think about when some of my contemporaries laud the accomplishments of the recently departed John Hughes. They make statements like "Sixteen Candles changed my life. That's my story. I love Jake Ryan!" I don't know what a racist Asian stereotype, Molly Ringwald's panties and some naked teenage girl taking a shower had to do with your empowerment as a woman, but to each her own.

In conclusion, watch The Slanted Screen, available on Netflix. It might change your life. Probably not, but it's still good.

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"Well, there's not a lot of elections in China."

Texas lawmaker suggests Asians adopt easier names, by R.G. Ratcliffe, Houston & Texas News.

A North Texas legislator during House testimony on voter identification legislation said Asian-descent voters should adopt names that are "easier for Americans to deal with."

The comments caused the Texas Democratic Party on Wednesday to demand an apology from state Rep. Betty Brown, R-Terrell. But a spokesman for Brown said her comments were only an attempt to overcome problems with identifying Asian names for voting purposes.

The exchange occurred late Tuesday as the House Elections Committee heard testimony from Ramey Ko, a representative of the Organization of Chinese Americans.

Ko told the committee that people of Chinese, Japanese and Korean descent often have problems voting and other forms of identification because they may have a legal transliterated name and then a common English name that is used on their driver’s license on school registrations.

Brown suggested that Asian-Americans should find a way to make their names more accessible.

"Rather than everyone here having to learn Chinese — I understand it’s a rather difficult language — do you think that it would behoove you and your citizens to adopt a name that we could deal with more readily here?" Brown said.

Brown later told Ko: "Can't you see that this is something that would make it a lot easier for you and the people who are poll workers if you could adopt a name just for identification purposes that's easier for Americans to deal with?"

Well my peace. "You and your citizens"? Isn't she talking about Americans? Whose citizens does she think these people are?

Here are two comments that explain some of my thoughts on the situation, sic implied:

By suggesting that Asian-Americans adopt names that are easier for "Americans" to deal with, she implies that Asian-Americans are not "American" by separating the terms. While that may not have been her intent, it was the consequence she should have expected, assuming she is adequately educated of course.

- danieln92000

[ . . . ] that women is keep saying, "You and your people", "easier for us". so it's You vs. US? that woman has already set her mind that Asian-Americans are not part of Americans.

- sangjai90

Also, Toby is an easy-to-pronounce American name, dating back to the good old colonial days of the United States. I'd bet Representative Brown finds it much easier to deal with than Kunta Kinte.

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