ASA2 A02
Week 2 Blog
After reading the material for week two, my most profound feeling is that before appealing for action, we still have an essential step that doesn’t complete to flight against Asian American discrimination, which is to realize that discrimination exists.
In the book “Fight the Tower”, Shirley Hune mentions in the prologue that Asian Americans are “stereotyped as hard workers, high achievers, and economically successful.” (Hune, 2) As a result, some Americans take it for granted that Asian American does not need to take up so many educational resources and expected Asian Americans to perform with a higher standard, or else they will be viewed negatively. I heard so many similar words in my life about Asians. For example, “Asians are all good at math,” or “Asians work hard without complaining.” However, my schoolmates or I realized these are misguided stereotypes that would harm us. Instead, we took those words as praise and jokes, and even joke back, “then I may be a fake Asian because I’m not good at math at all!” Sadly, many of us know those comments on us are false stereotypes; we weren’t aware that those stereotypes could bring us unjustified resources contribution and unfair standards. Many Asians were not aware they are being discriminated against!
Meanwhile, some people don’t realize or pretend they don’t realize we are discriminating against others. They use the phrase “unconscious bias” to justify their unjustified treatment on color people (Hune, 12), excusing “there’re some inherent ideas in my subconscious mind that I can’t control, so it isn’t my fault.” That is not true. People should be aware that they are discriminating against others and rectify the bias at once.
I think that is why the book “Fight the Tower” is so meaningful. It can wake up some Asian Americans that don’t know they’re in injustice and also wake up some Americans that their bias cannot be excused with “unconsciousness”. Therefore, I think this is a book worth reading for both Asian Americans and Americans. So my question is there any corresponding statistics on how much of this book’s sales are purchased by non-Asians?
Reference
Valverde, K.-L. C., & Dariotis, W. M. (2020). Fight the tower: Asian American women scholars resistance and renewal in the academy, 2.
Valverde, K.-L. C., & Dariotis, W. M. (2020). Fight the tower: Asian American women scholars resistance and renewal in the academy, 12-13.
Chang, Y. (2017). Asian Americans, Disability, and the Model Minority Myth. Flashpoints for Asian American Studies. https://www.michigandaily.com/section/mic/model-minority-myth
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