Bigot Watch: "Ragin' Asians!" by Erika Hobart

As some of you probably heard, recently the Seattle Weekly posted a trashy stereotypical article on the Asian nightlife scene called "Seattle's Ragin' Asians" by Erika Hobart (who is Asian American just FYI). In about four pages, Erika does nothing but portray Asians in a "exotic" light for things that are relatively common while slipping in numerous stereotypes while at it. The Asian American community is pissed, but quiet a few people are baffled why. And in this lovely post, I will explain why this article is offensive and why this should not be acceptable.

Pham is Vietnamese. He's invited several friends to his Tukwila townhome that Friday to pre-funk before going out to one of their favorite Seattle clubs: Venom. All the 20-somethings pre-funking at his house are also Asian—most of them Vietnamese or Cambodian.

Now there is nothing wrong with this part but I would like to note that the group Erika is portraying are southeast Asians. Outside of the whole "What about the other guys?!" issue, I also find this just reinforces some nasty stereotypes on this group. Unlike east Asians (Chinese, Japanese, Korean) which generally have the stereotype of being lame mathematicians, southeastern Asians have more of the stereotype for being wild and lose. Blame this on the sex tourism within southeast Asia and the dominance of this group in pornos.

The gaggle of girls at his house could easily pass for sisters—sorority sisters, anyway. They're wearing strikingly similar dresses from Forever 21. Two of them—identical twins—look like they're in middle school, but are actually 20. They plan to get into Venom by waiting outside the club for a friend who's already gained entry to return with the IDs of those inside. (It can get so crowded at the rope that the bouncer won't notice an ID is being used twice.)

Nightlife photographer Luis Ongpin of streetpaparazzi.com, a local Web site devoted to photos of club-goers, often witnesses the operation go down while shooting at clubs like Venom and the War Room. "One Asian girl brings 10 with her. And to people that don't know them, they look similar enough to pull it off," he says.

First of all, what the hell is Erika thinking when writing this? Does she want these people to get in trouble? This is just irresponsible. If you read the comments in the article, Luis Ongpin actually comments and is not very happy. Second, what is with this whole "they all look young!" and "all look alike!" crap?

. The 22-year-old, whose cousin is married to the ukulele-strumming Nguyen, dons high heels and a skimpy purple get-up that stretches down to her mid-thighs, which she admits is actually just a long shirt. Mom just graduated from Seattle University, and is putting her job search on hold so she can enjoy one last responsibility-free summer.

Why is Erika sexualizing all the girls here? Is this to attract the white male audience or something?

"I have some white friends who won't even go [to Venom]," Mom says, laughing. "It's too Asian for them. For us, it's like family. Everybody knows each other there."

What the hell is "too Asian"? Do people run around eating kimchi by the gallons? Are there giant mecha robots as decoration? Are there posters dedicated to Ho Chi Minh? No seriously, I don't get it.

"Asians are like neon tetra fish—they travel in schools," Truong says. "You always see masses of them together. Once you get the group leader to come, you get the entire group. Then you get the friends of people in that group, and so forth."

... What the fuck?! Yes, I know Asians do generally travel in groups but then again so does everybody else. There is nothing unique or Asian here. Not to mention it just reinforces the whole "Asians have a group mentality!" stereotype.

"A lot of Asian-Americans that you see out there don't go to a four-year university or have a scene they really fit into," Ho explains. "They aren't going to frat parties or dive bars or sports bars. But many of them have been born and raised here, so they're incredibly in tune to the city. The club is a good comfort zone for them to go out with other Asian-Americans."

Really? I guess the explains the numerous Asian fraternities and sororities around UW. Or why I see several in places like Earl's on numerous occasions. Not to mention, clubs are not the only "Asian" night places they like to go too. I know several nightplaces around the Ave where the Asian population generally goes too that are not clubs. Why don't we talk about BBQ Chicken instead?

The girls begin sucking on Blow-Pops the bartender gave them, and then get up and start dancing with the sticks hanging out of their mouths. It's like a weird fetish-porn video.

If someone showed me this article without giving me any information on the author, I'd swear it be some white guy with an Asian fetish. Seriously, why is everything these Asian girls do being so hypersexualized?

Sab, like a majority of the clientele, hits up Venom on weekends because she's seeking the company of other Asians—not the people who fetishize them. Pham's circle arrives at and leaves the club together. It's like the Asian version of No Child Left Behind.

First of all, what the hell does Erika mean by NCLB? Is this another point about Asians looking young or something? Or is she thinking about "No Man Left Behind"? Second of all, has Erika actually been clubbing before? This is not an "Asian" thing. Its a universal rule among club goers. Everyone stick together, dance in a circle and leave together. Its a basic safety rule to make sure your drunk female cadre is not getting raped in the bathroom.

The patrons, most of whom are Filipino or Vietnamese, crowd the understaffed bar or thrash about on the dance floor.

Erika, "thrash dancing" is a type of moshing done at hardcore concerts. I doubt these people are listening to hardcore metal. Please be careful with your use of wording from now on.

And dear god, why is this article so long? Why did we have to go through that one page of how they drink and whine about people wearing similar clothes? Why didn't the editor make sure this article had a point?

many of them possessing that telling red-faced glow as they kneel over family-sized portions of greasy Chinese fare to soak up the booze in their bodies.

Oh god, now she brings up the "greasy Chinese food" stereotype. Chinese food is not anymore greasy then any other food; that Panda Express crap is not Chinese food. I seriously feel bad for these places mentioned in the article, especially the Purple Dot. I've been to the Purple Dot and none of the food is "greasy" and is actually fairly high quality. They serve Peking Duck for god sakes.


Of course, I could have saved all you and me the trouble of this by simply linking to this article from the Stranger that pretty much sums up the major issue we have with this article. And I do not care about what race Erika is, I don't believe in privilege politics and it does not change this article is garbage.

Bigot Watch: David Staples and ANCC

All forms of bigotry should not be tolerated and should be taken on publicly. One of the goals of this blog is to try to point out acts of bigotry within our community and confront it. For our first installment, we shall focus on the All Nations Community Church and its recent sermon by David Staples called "Chauvinist or Feminist? Which is Jesus?" on July 17th, 2009.

ANCC is a Korean ethnic church that is the English ministry to the Onnuri Church (not affiliated with the Onnuri Church in Seoul). The church currently is part of the Southern Baptist Convention but was non-denominational for a long time before hand (the website does not even mention its connection). Like alot of Korean churches, there is a strong emphasis on piety and most sermons are based around Bible reading. Last week, they covered 1 Corinthians 11:2-16, a infamous text that can have sexist readings. I respect the ANCC for trying to cover this and their emphasis on biblical reading as part of sermons, but there are some major issues here. Fortunately, they have all their sermons online for you to listen to.

After discussing the problems the early Church was facing, David goes onto this little explanation around 9 minutes in...

They are being influenced by the Corinthian culture.. and with that came sin... one of the movements that was happening was a feminist movement. Females they were oppressed for a long time.. they still are oppressed today...

Does not seem to bad right now, and he argues that the Christian church actually lifted many women from oppression. After this, David begins talking about "God's view of women" which he does not bother to elaborate at this point (about 12 minutes in)..

Women though at this time begin to go on further... it wasn't just good enough to say men and women were equal.. they wanted to say women were better then men... they were allowing some of these feminists beliefs to rule over the church...

Oh boy, this is not looking good. Nevermind that there were many cults around this time who were claiming to be "Christian" were doing incredibly immoral things by any standard; or that there were numerous churches who had heterodox beliefs and often had their own canons that was a problem during the early days. Blame the feminists!

After a while, David makes these statement when describing the issue of women wearing coverings in Church 33 minutes in...

These women went so far to go and cut their hair off because they wanted to look like a guy... you know what these women did? These women were lesbians...

Oh boy, here we go. Singling out the lesbians (apparently men weren't bad enough to get mentioned this time). As pointed out before, there was alot of things that people would consider "sexually immoral" going on back then; including stuff that had little to do with the gender of your partner. But just like the case of Sodom, queers get singled out as the ones sending us to hell.

Seriously, are people aware that back then there were numerous groups that were committing sexual rituals? That there were rumors of pedophile, necrophilia and all other crazy stuff? Is homosexuality really the biggest sin here?

Four minutes later, it gets even worse...

Some people say "what is the Corinth culture like?"... its like Seattle!... Whole bunch of sexual immorality, lesbians, gays. Its not like Lake Forest Part, but is like Capital Hill..

Are you kidding me here? Out of all the acts of sexual immortality you have to bash on the queer community as if they are a crime itself? Do you seriously have to demonize Capital Hill, and ignore other areas of high "sexual immorality" in Seattle? You telling me sexual immorality does not exist in the U-District or Belltown? Oh wait, they are straight so it is not that bad. But those queer folk? They are going to hell.

This stuff disturbs me on so many levels. Not only does this just spread homophobia, but it creates a false impression on the people listening. By focusing on such narrow things, they are making other "immoral" acts seem less dangerous and more acceptable. Personally, I find adultery and sleeping around much more dangerous then what gender someone decides to be with. Of course many of these young people will have no problem with this because the only thing they hear is homophobia; its ok as long as you are not gay or lesbian.

And this is how good "Christian families" end up having pregnant teenagers; its not that bad because they are straight! Seriously, I know godless queer people who live a more "Christian" love life then some of these people. Wanna know why? Because its this focus bashing queers over producing decent moral human beings.

Paul is saying this.. that women ought to act and look like women and men ought to act and look like men... (49 minutes in)

Yes, because we all know there has been a strong consistent definition of masculine and femininity in history. Those terms have never change. Ironically, this point was made indirectly earlier.