Emery Nguyen ASA 002 001 Week One

Coronavirus has showed the United States what late stage capitalism looks like. It has showed us that a world centered on corporations will not work. This profit-centralized system emphasizes profit over the livelihoods of humans. A system like that shouldn't exist. It puts the powerful elites, including the wealthy, at the very top of the hierarchy. It increases income inequality and makes it harder for people of color to be able to advance. It has shown that Asian Americans are "others." We went from the "model minority" to the yellow peril very quickly. In reality, we were never accepted as Americans since we are not white. We are the buffers between African Americans and white Americans. We do not have the white skin of white Americans and are not African Americans so they decided to use us as a buffer. Many Asian Americans found out the hard way that they don't belong. Many of us think we're doing great since we're doing well academically as well as career-wise. That couldn't be further from the truth. From microaggressions to straight-on racism, we found out that we don't belong and never will in this racial hierarchy that favors white people at the top, Asian Americans in the middle, and dark-skinned people at the bottom.

This course has already started to seem interesting. I really like courses that have discussions between students and teachers and tell the truth for what it is without sugarcoating things. I expect to do well in a course that is geared towards pointing out what we Asian Americans are facing right now. 

References: https://time.com/5797836/coronavirus-racism-stereotypes-attacks/

Questions from Zamora

Among the readings this week, Reuben Zamora’s five questions in the paper “Five Propositions and Three Reorientations for the Popular Movement” were the most intriguing for me, so I will be responding to them in this week’s reflection. In order to mobilize people for a movement that attempts to counter globalization, the Internet could be used as a powerful for advocacy. TED talks, for example, shed light on global issues that otherwise go unnoticed via YouTube videos. In order to convey the message that the exploitation of resources by first world countries often comes at the expense of living standards of third world countries, small movements would first be initiated to scrutinize injustices over the world—movements such as hashtag campaigns over Twitter could be the spark to the flame of a revolution. This third question, inspired by a quote by Ghandi, requires quite a bit of personal effort to answer. I suppose a good first step would be to first create a pact among friends to forgo a simple luxury—such as eating out on the weekends—and use that money spent and give it away to the less fortunate. The last question seems bizarre to me. Even though many people in Southern America feel like America often interferes with other countries’ issues not relevant to the US, the death of many innocent people during 9/11 cannot be justified in any matter.

Sean Guntvedt A02