(via K. Ramos)

Glad to see that someone as young as she is already conscious of gender normative marketing.

The other day, there was a little boy at the mall who kept asking his mom if she would buy him a Batgirl doll, and I kept smiling at that. Like the YouTube commenter said, there may be hope for the future yet...

I so want this API Civil Rights calendar from the Korematsu Institute. What an awesome idea! Sadly, for now it's only given as a gift for a $100 donation. Fingers crossed that it'll be available for individual purchase soon.

After taking Ethnic Studies courses in college, it was like a veil had been lifted from my eyes. I started seeing (and questioning) everything differently. Things that were once innocuous were revealed to be insidious. And it's hard because it's things you grew up on and were taught to be the norm your whole life, so it's going to take more than just a few years to break down a lifetime of inoculation. And once your eyes have been open, you can't unsee them anymore. So here are some things I think twice about now:

-Disney princesses/Disney movies
-feathers (I can't look at feathers anymore that are out of an indigenous context without thinking about cultural appropriation)
-the use of "woman," "history," "you guys"
-shopping at brands that use sweatshop labor (e.g. Forever 21)
-the Twilight series
-American holidays (e.g., 4th of July, Thanksgiving, Christmas)
-Barbie

And when I say that I think twice about these things, it's not that I've completely rejected them from my life. I'm still a consumer sometimes. I still watch Disney movies w/ friends and half of my closet is from Forever 21. I just try to/can't help but be more conscious about these things now.

This topic came to mind yesterday when I was shopping for a Barbie as a Christmas present, and the whole time that I was walking up and down the aisles of Toys"R"Us, I kept thinking of how I was a traitor to my feminist values, and also really scared at some of the toys that are marketed at children, especially for girls. I probably had an aghast look on my face most of the time as I perused the examples of what a female is supposed to look like and the jobs/roles she's supposed to have.

So why was I contributing my consumer dollars to a corporate institution that I take offense at? Well, the last time I was shopping w/ a friend, she mentioned that she never had a Barbie growing up, and when she was talking about it, she sounded like she had missed out on an important childhood experience for American girls. So I made a note in my mind that I would get her a Barbie for Christmas (and yes, we are nearing our mid-20s). When I think about my childhood, playing w/ Barbies figured prominently in it.

Barbie options nowadays are more diverse than when I was kid, but not by much. Body types/proportions haven't changed from what I can see, unless you count the other kind of dolls that are supposed to be more cartoonish/plush-like or the ones w/ deliberately exaggerated features. And dolls of color are still very much lacking. In an ideal world, I would have loved to pick the doll with the deep skin tone rocking the afro, but I was on a mission to get the classic, white, blond Barbie in a pretty pink dress, because she's supposed to be the icon, right? In the end, that's what I bought: a Barbie with long, straight blond hair. And as she sits in my room waiting to be wrapped, every time my eyes fall on her, the back of my mind is thinking about the kind of toys I would want my children to play with, and the ones that I would buy for my friends' kids when the time comes.

API Talk

I took one of those personality assessment quizzes via StrengthsFinder 2.0 for work and it gave me my top five strengths: Empathy, Connectedness, Input, Developer, and Intellection. Overall, it was very much on point with how I see the world and how I interact with others. So, along with a report that expands on those strengths, it also gives a list of action plans for each of them, ways in which you can continue to nurture those traits the best. And most of them were actually goals that I've been wanting to work on in general but haven't started yet. For Intellection (i.e., introspective and appreciate intellectual discussions), one of the ideas was,"Find people who like to talk about the same issues you do. Organize a discussion group that addresses your subjects of interest."

I found that super interesting because that's actually something I've been wanting to do for a while, especially now that I'm not in the college atmosphere and discussions about activism are harder to come by. I'd really love to have a discussion group about API issues and news, just an open space for people to bring up anything they wanted to talk about. I thought of doing it through Meetup.com, but I wasn't sure if there would be people in my area interested in this, plus I'm not sure how I'd mediate disputes if they came up.

Just when I think there might not be much in the news to talk about, something always comes up. There has already been a lot to discuss this year (but isn't there always?). Amy Chua/Tiger Mom at the beginning of the year, which I never did get around to writing my opinion on. And now all the things happening at UC Davis and the Occupy movement. I definitely think about all these things, and try to keep up w/ articles online, but I find myself having a difficult time condensing my thoughts into words here. Part of it is my fear that I don't have the background knowledge to backup my opinion, because I'm definitely still learning and absorbing, but that was one of my missions w/ this blog: chronicling my journey through social consciousness. Maybe that'll be my second goal for next month (along w/ sleeping earlier), being more analytical and not worrying so much about sounding like an authority on the subject. Isn't discussion half of the learning process?

SEA - What's Your Story?

One of the submissions for the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders “What’s Your Story?” video challenge. This video highlights the deportation issues of Southeast Asian Americans.

"The challenge aims to explore the personal stories of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs) across the country who have impacted their community through their dreams, experiences, and dedication to a cause."

Phil Yu x MYX TV

If you still don't know the man behind Angry Asian Man, here's a great intro interview with Phil Yu, the blogger of the go-to site for API news.



I had the opportunity to interview Phil almost two years ago at the San Diego Asian Film Festival through work. I completely and embarrassingly fangirl-ed in front of him, but I didn't care because I was so damn excited to meet one of my heroes. I owe a lot to his site for opening up my API/social consciousness.

Saw this at the JANM gift shop in Little Tokyo this weekend and wanted to get it. From the Angry Little Girls line. It would have come in handy a few times.

Happy (first!) Fred Korematsu Day!

First time that a day is named after an Asian American. How awesome is that?

Short bio from Korematsu Institute:

Fred T. Korematsu was a national civil rights hero. In 1942, at the age of 23, he refused to go to the government’s incarceration camps for Japanese Americans. After he was arrested and convicted of defying the government’s order, he appealed his case all the way to the Supreme Court. In 1944, the Supreme Court ruled against him, arguing that the incarceration was justified due to military necessity.

In 1983, Prof. Peter Irons, a legal historian, discovered key documents that government intelligence agencies had hidden from the Supreme Court in 1944. The documents consistently showed that Japanese Americans had committed no acts of treason to justify mass incarceration. With this new evidence, a legal team of mostly Japanese American attorneys re-opened Korematsu’s 40 year-old case on the basis of government misconduct. On November 10, 1983, Korematsu’s conviction was overturned in a federal court in San Francisco. It was a pivotal moment in civil rights history. Korematsu remained an activist throughout his life.

I am so over this woman, but I just had to post this because I lol'd in real life. Let's hope Henry is right when he says her 15 mins. are up, but check out the Tiger Mom Says meme if you want to see more.

What's Your Ethnic Makeup?

A short film interpretation by Karen Lum of Adriel Luis' spoken word poem, "Slip of the Tongue."

Born Asian

I was flipping channels last week and came upon this episode of "Good Times" in which Michael gets suspended because he calls George Washington a racist for having slaves and he goes on about how school doesn't teach him the kind of history he wants to learn. You can watch it here for the main storyline (4:05-8:15).

The most interesting line to me was this:

Michael: Mama, I’m ready to take my punishment. I knew when I was born Black, life wasn’t gonna be easy.
Florida: When you were born, you didn’t know you were Black.

Which was one of those revelation moments to me. When I was born, I didn't know I was Asian. I grew up being taught what it means to be Asian, from my family, from my friends, my community, school, society. I wasn't "born Asian," Asian is merely a category from the government. And I am still constantly learning/shifting what it means to be "Asian" and "American."

Oh another note, this was just my second episode of "Good Times" that I've seen, but if a lot of the episodes deals w/ issues like these, I definitely want to catch the rest of the series, especially to watch the Michael character, who is on his way to be quite the future activist. He goes to the library to learn about all the history stuff that his textbooks don't teach him. If only all high schoolers did this. But, isn't that supposed to be our education's job?