Posted on 08/06/2022 10:37:40 PM PDT by nickcarraway
While I love the movie Crazy Rich Asians, not all Asians come from wealth and privilege. I was dumbfounded by a recent statement made by a school superintendent where I live, where she alluded that Asians get good grades because we come from rich families.
“Asians” is a collective noun that represents a plethora of nations with different backgrounds and experiences. In fact, the largest wealth gap within any racial group in America is among Asian Americans, according to a 2018 study by the Pew Research Center.
I don’t come from a rich Asian family. Far from it. My parents, originally from China, were living in Hanoi, Vietnam. They were among the almost 2 million people who fled the country in boats at the end of the Vietnam War in the late 70s and early 80s. They braved pirate attacks, hunger, exposure, and storms. My parents made it to a refugee camp in Hong Kong, where I was born.
We had the good fortune to be sponsored by an organization that helped us immigrate to a hamlet outside Syracuse, New York. We eventually made our way to Los Angeles and settled in the Highland Park neighborhood in East Los Angeles. It is now known for its hipster culture, but things were different when I was growing up. I was surrounded by English and Spanish-speaking people and understood neither.
It’s impossible to overstate my parents’ obsession with education and hard work. These qualities were going to be our ticket to a better future. I was taught to work twice as hard, keep my head down, and never rock the boat. That’s what I did–and what so many Asians in America have done. Education and a strong work ethic did help me build a more prosperous life–but it came at a cost.
The cost of staying quiet American culture lacks a clear, reality-based picture of Asian Americans. By staying quiet and keeping our heads down, we have let others define us. Where we have been silent, stereotypes have filled the void.
For years I never addressed micro-aggressions, even when a stranger commented on my “great English.” My silence was not intentional. I just never felt I had the forum to speak up.
Traditionally, Asians are not seen as activists or actively participating in political dialogue. When they are, it’s not highlighted in the media.
American mass culture has mistaken our silence for passivity. It has stereotyped Asians and Asian Americans–particularly women–as meek and unassertive, as hard workers, not leaders. These assumptions impede professional advancement. A 2022 study by LAAUNCH an Asian American advocate group found that Asians, while overrepresented in the professional workforce compared with the general population, are severely underrepresented in America’s executive ranks. The disparity is especially glaring for Asian women, who are among the least likely professionals to be executives.
This bamboo ceiling is obviously a problem for individual Asian employees, who may be passed over because of myths rather than lack of merit. It’s also a missed opportunity for employers, who may lose out on promoting some of their best people and getting the most out of their workforce.
Redefining success Asian Americans need to be better self-advocates. We must define ourselves rather than allow others to define us.
The increase in hate crimes and outward hate toward Asians and Asian Americans doesn’t make this any easier. The Center for Study of Hate and Extremism published a compilation of hate crime data, which showed a 339% increase in anti-Asian hate crime from 2020 to 2021. As a result, more Asian Americans are standing in solidarity and bringing our voices together to create change.
Although I was taught that working hard and focusing on education were the keys to success, I now define success not just in economic terms, but also in terms of equality. I define success as being seen as American, having equal rights to feel safe in our communities, and not being marginalized or pitted against other minorities.
Employers can help by providing a safe space for authentic conversations where we can learn and celebrate both our similarities and differences. This can happen in formal channels, like an employee resource group, or through informal discussions which cost nothing to the business.
I initially shared the school superintendent’s words and my feelings about them with members of Intuit’s Asia Pacific Islander group. Our global leader and other members encouraged me to broadcast my perspective more broadly. You’re reading the result.
Employers can cultivate dialogue across their industries as well. No one has it all figured out. The more we share across teams, companies, and communities, the more progress we can make. We must create a safe and inclusive workplace and a better world for everyone.
Rosie Hoa is a senior marketing manager at Intuit, the global technology platform that makes QuickBooks, TurboTax, Mint, Credit Karma, and Mailchimp.
Asians need to become and vote Republican. Anything else is just self-delusion and self-harm.
Sorry, not included.
And there it is - an Asian, promoting a stereotype of Asians. And yet she whines about "microaggressions" (to your point, SoConPubbie).
This bamboo ceiling is obviously a problem for individual Asian employees
And yet ANOTHER microaggression. The Inuit don't have bamboo, and Indians could not relate to this stereotype. Let's keep going, shall we?
who may be passed over because of myths rather than lack of merit. It’s also a missed opportunity for employers, who may lose out on promoting some of their best people and getting the most out of their workforce.
Sure - employers are too stupid to figure out who their best, most productive workers are. That's why the people two levels above me are both white English ancestry Americans (no, actually they're Asian).
This witch with a capital B apparently just cut and pasted every whiny, "We don't get the credit we deserve article" about Asians that I've ever read for the past 30 years.
You nailed it.
I never addressed micro-aggressions, even when a stranger commented on my “great English.”
...............
SJWs’ heads are so far up their backsides they twist compliments into something evil.
Andy Ngo and his reporting on leftist extremist totalitarian is an example of the great contributions made by Asians to American freedom. Ngo has been living in Europe to escape American leftists. He will eventually be hounded by the leftist fascists that are now crawling over Europe and attacking farmers wnd their equipment.
Crazy Asian lady was after me for a while. Kept sending pictures of her Ferrari,house in LA, her at the golf course, her horse. She ate lunch every day at a fancy restaurant. It quite frankly was boring.
...”micro-aggressions”...
_____________________
I am Silent Generation Jewish and much of what this woman wrote could apply to my generation of non-wealthy, immigrant Eastern European Jews.
My late mother-in-law, bless her heart, would comment on my spending too much for something as: “Huh! I’m a better Jew than you are.”
That is a micro-aggression that implies Judaism is defined by being cheap.
From childhood friends to the Amish to the woke, liberal newcomers to my former community all would ask:”Where are you from?” When I innocently said; “Milwaukee”, they would ALL reply, “No, I mean where are you _really_ from?”
That is a micro-aggression implying I was not an American and could only be defined by my ethnic origins.
My hair is naturally curly (or was when I was younger). I have experienced people laying their hand on my hair without asking, and saying:”Oh, it’s soft.”
The micro-aggression is here was likely more personal, but I truly understand the black preoccupation with assumptions and or comments upon their hair.
The difference between my responses and those of today’s generation is they have the guts to call it out for what it is. Yes, it’s been over-emphasized and perhaps should not be the basis for social cancellations, but it is real.
No woke would include me in their victim paradigm and neither would I, but when I’ve taken those Privilege tests, I do not emerge as an oppressor.
This is not going to be a popular response. Usually, I temper my posts, but you have demonstrated something many people know:
Anyone who has long been a member of a large society in-group, especially one with &/or seen to posses the majority of default societal power; who has never had a single reason to question the larger aspects of who they are, where they belong, or their own simple normality and who takes for granted that since all they have to consider are their own personal actions and achievements/failures, cannot be expected to perceive life as anything other.
I have lived with such people and I loved them, but they are just like fish adapted to the water. No one thinks about it.
It is definitely not like that for those who are varying degrees of different or *other-than*. Such people are forced to be aware of the waters in which they swim because they stand out. Watch a school of fish and concentrate on one for several seconds and that one will sense it and weave into the school to avoid standing out.
That is as close as I can come to a description, for now.
It takes a lot of energy to survive, live a life, suceed, etc and it takes more if you have to spend it being sure not to stand out (while not disappearing).
Some might classify me at first glance as white. Others refer to ‘incipient negritude’ (sic). I have never fit in on the superficial, physical level. Everywhere in the world I have traveled, I have been taken for 1/2 of whatever the local indigenous might be. By those same indigenes, BTW. I have lived several sides of this, including being privy to relaxed and honest conversation on the topic with many types of people.
So, you know neither squat nor jack about the subject.
It also is of no consequence whether you read it or not. Others will.
Like I said, grow a thicker skin and quit letting jackasses and their lousy behavior affect how you feel.
Learn to laugh at them and be confident in the knowledge your ate making the best choices for your life.
Anything less and you are allowing the jackassesto have control over your life.
This isn’t about me on a personal level.
I mentioned the incidents because they illustrate the callous manner people treat anyone not in the societal majority.
My intent was to illustrate that now that the visibly different are calling out the insensitive and the varying degrees of bullying, it is the (still barely) societal majority who are dismissing them while at the same time according more validity to their own position in society.
It isn’t a question of control or not letting it it affect you. Every aspect of the life of those so treated is affected for their entire lifetime. At 80, I am way past the emotional responses and I had my own successes in spite of. The same people who were once bullies against the minorities are now *champions* of the protected class du jour. As always, for me, it doesn’t matter as neither side is quite sure *what* I am and that is obviously more important to most than *who* I am.
BUT: those still professing indifference are now being targeted and I thought people might be able to understand why if some anecdotes were shared.
In your case, obviously not. Just don’t complain as it comes back to bite you and yours, as it is and this time with tyrannical government covering their back. You have illustrated perfectly why non-majorities profess indifference to “white tears” (sic).
It is all going to end badly when a tad of self-awareness could perhaps mediate the outcome.
That’s all.
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