I’m going to introduce a film that won the 91st Academy Award. It was the most dazzling film in the ceremony.
The story is that Tony worked as a waiter in a nightclub. The club will be closed for a few months, but Tony had to pay the rent and living expenses, so he must find another job. At this juncture, a black pianist named Don hired Tony. Don was about to embark on an eight-week tour of the South. However, discrimination against blacks in the South was very strong at that time. Tony became Don‘s chauffeur and bodyguard. Along the way, their different personalities caused a lot of conflicts between them, at the same time, Don suffered in the south of a variety of unfair treatment also let Tony feel hatred of racial discrimination. In the process of getting along, they became close friends.
In that period, even though Don was a highly educated pianist, he was disrespected because of the color of his skin. Some people were polite to him just because of his talent. He is also struggling about his multiple identities, as they are released from the police station on a stormy night. He said, “I’m not black enough, I’m not white enough, I’m not even man enough, so who am I?” In the pub where he is beaten just because of his skin color, Dr.Shirley is in the Third Space and it seems that he also becomes the Third Space itself.Those words touched Tony deeply. Tony understood Don‘s loneliness, and why Don always drank alone at night, and what he thought when he looked in the rear view mirror. Tony, poor and happy, can eat 26 hot dogs for $50, while Don sits on a luxurious throne at the top of the castle, with no one to speak of.
But Dr.Shirley, who epitomized the black people of his time, was one of the luckier ones. There are so many black people behind him, in the eyes of discrimination and prejudice, quiet live the suffering but ordinary life. So, Don has to step up and change that. Don was willing to give up the security of the North and come to the South to endure hostile eyes. “Being genius is not enough, it takes courage to change people’s hearts,” he said. The year after the Green Book story, 250,000 people gathered in Lincoln Square in Washington, D.C., to speak out against racial discrimination. Not everyone has the ability to summon up courage, but as the film said, courage can change many things. Cultural inequity will cause unequal powers. However, in the process of such cultural hybridity, it can also provide the possibility for the relatively disadvantaged party to hear their voices and appeal for rights.
“It is often not the skin that determines who we are, but the world beneath it, made up of everything we have seen and loved.”
Zhuoer: Hello Everyone, thank you for taking time to read our podcast. My name is Zhuoer Xu.
Chenlong: Hi I’m Chenlong Li.
Zhuoer: Today we are going to talk about how racism and sexism intertwine to afflict Asian-American,especially Asian-American women.So Chenlong, did u know the shooting in Atlanta a few weeks ago?
Chenlong:Wow, of course. I’m completely shocked after hearing what happened.On March 16th, At least eight people were killed after shootings at three spas in the Atlanta
area. Seven women and one man were killed, and six of them were Asian.
Police said video evidence leads them to believe the suspect, Robert Aaron Long, was the prime
perpetrator in all three shootings. The suspect told police he was a “sex addict” and carried out the shooting at the massage parlor to “eliminate temptation”. Many said the massage parlors mostly offered illicit services, and that these Asian women were suspected of being illegal sex workers. However, the police have no evidence of illegal sex at the spas of the crime. None of the businesses involved had any previous convictions and were “legally operating”.
Zhuoer: What do you think of it?
Chenlong: For me , I think this is typically racism against Asian Americans. The definition of the racism is prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against a person or people on the basis of their membership in a particular racial or ethnic group, typically one that is a minority or marginalized. In this case, the victims are almost Asians who definitely belong to minority groups. And during the covid-19 pandemic, some people will blame Asians for the virus. That is a bias because no scientist has confirmed that the virus originated in Wuhan,China. Besides, Asian Americans have nothing to do with the spread of the virus. This way, the shooting is more likely a hate crime against Asian Americans which is definitely racism.
Zhuoer: I believe a big part of the reason there is so much animosity towards Asian is that former President Trump has been making hateful comments about China on Twitter. So there are a lot of innocent Asian-Americans who have been insulted and even hurt just because of their race. New data has revealed over the past year, the number of anti-Asian hate incidents — which can include shunning, slurs and physical attacks — is greater than previously reported. Federal hate crime data for 2020 has not yet been released, though hate crimes in 2019 were at their highest level in over a decade.
Chenlong: You are totally right. So did you face any racism during the outbreak?
Zhuoer: Yeah, I have met racism. It was a bad memory. I was shopping with friends in a supermarket. There were two young guys shooting videos at us, and suddenly they ran over and touched our shopping cart. And then they ran away shouting ‘ I got covid!’ It all happened so fast I didn’t even have time to say anything. I was really angry, and many of my female friends also had similar experiences.
Chenlong: Well, that’s really ridiculous. Do you mean that Asian women compared to men are more likely to face hate crimes?
Zhuoer: that’s what I want to say! A recent analysis by a group called Stop AAPI Hate, which collects reports of hate incidents against Asian-American and Pacific Islander communities, said that out of nearly 3,800 incidents recorded in 2020 and 2021, more than two-thirds of the reports came from women.According to the data, Asian women report hate incidents 2.3 times more than men. A further examination of the submitted reports showed that in many cases, the verbal harassment that women received reflected the very intersection of racism and sexism. The same is true of this case.
Chenlong: Wow, that is something I never think about. But why do you think this shooting case also belongs to sexism?
Zhuoer: It’s because that in this case of shooting, I found out that the discrimination is related to the stereotypes of Asian women. Many people are under the impression that any massage parlor or spa with Asian women working in, is a place where has illegal sex service. The suspect, who claims to be a sex addict, also chose these Atlanta’ spas to shoot, suggesting he had the same impression. Many Asian immigrant women do not have special skills, so they have to do relatively simple manual labor to earn money for their families. So we see a lot of Asian women working in a variety of Chinese restaurants or household service. There is no denying that some of them may be engaged in some illegal trade. Whereas, people should not discriminate against and prejudice the majority of Asian women who work hard for supporting their families. They deserve respect as much as anyone else.
Chenlong: Yeah, you are right. Stereotypes do play an important role in these crimes. The most common stereotypes of Asian women is that they are all submissive.movie portray And this submissive could actually embolden aggressors. Because aggressors will think Asian women are vulnerable. that can’t fight back.
Zhuoer: So when I heard reports that this man said these shootings to “eliminate his temptations, I feel so angry. I thought that he completely dehumanized these women, right? He labelled them as temptations that should be eliminated and killed. I mean, they are human, right? He is the one with the problem. But he treats these women as the problem? I mean, his idea is so ridiculous. And as an Asian woman, I feel it’s totally dehumanizing.
Chenlong: Now I understand why this shooting case should also be sexism. Because he holds the stereotype of Asian women that they are all submissive and can’t fight back. He treated them as objects instead of live people. And now we can conclude that those Asian women suffered from both racism and sexism. In another word, these Asian women experienced multiple marginalization, suffering from their intersection of being both Asian and women. And these multiple marginalization also make them become the subaltern. Because unlike those Asian Americans who faced discrimination can make their voice be heard through the protest, these Asian women who died in the spas can never make their voice be heard. This way, they become the other to the other. a subaltern.
Zhuoer: Like you said, actually, these situations that we’re talking about can also be related to what we’ve learned in class. Stereotypes of Asian women are also a kind of ‘single story’. Their labels are completely defined by the Western world. It’s a very narrow view. But their true label should be defined by themselves. People shouldn’t hold one opinion about them. Just like we learned in class, one should not judge a family, a clan, and a country based on a single story. As Adichie said, many stories matter.
Chenlong: For nowadays society, racism and sexism are both serious problems. For some groups, they may experience both types of discrimination, but they may not realize it. Hate crimes against Asian women are almost certainly under counted, and one reason is that those with a sexual dimension tend to be classified as sex offenses, in effect erasing the racial aspect. And only when we realize the true problems they are facing, can we have a better chance to solve them.
Zhuoer: So that’s all for today. Thank you for listening. I hope that our podcast has given you some insight into something that you might not have thought about before. See u guys, have a good day.
No matter what country or culture, women are always in a weak position. In the modern society, this weak position translates into the workplace. In fact, statistics show that there are very few women in politics. Only 5% of top management positions are women. In 2013, the proportion of female in office holders in United States is less than 20%. It makes me wonder why this is happening. After looking up relevant information, I found that a large part of the reason is the social stereotype. 63% female never thought about run for office, and 27% of them has crossed in mind. Only 10% of them thought it many times.
From this overwhelming data, it is true that, on the whole, women pay less attention and are less interested in politics and history than men. This is inseparable from childhood education. Many families and schools will guide women to read some “things that girls should see” and let women do some “things that women should do”, which naturally does not include history and politics. Most of the model women promoted by our society to women are stars and journalists, but few scholars and politicians. Many cultural works imperceptibly endow the housewife with a sacred status as a good wife and mother, which has a subtle influence on women’s thinking.
It is tacitly assumed that politics is a man’s business, not a woman’s. So when a girl is interested in politics and wants to do something related in the future, her parents won’t support her, and her friends won’t support her either. Because of the prejudice of society, her own heart also has doubts about herself, so she has no confidence. These factors influence the determination of many girls to engage in politics.
(Most Powerful Women in Politics 2019)
I think it’s a systematic injustice. We should encourage more girls to run for office.First of all, girls’ parents should educate them about politics’ knowledge from a young age. So when they grow up, they can choose whether or not they want to work, rather than just encouraging their sons to run for office. Secondly, High school and college years are a very important part of cultivating a person. So girls to join more sports clubs and students’ union to exercise their ability. Most college community leaders are men, but girls also need to get involved and know that they deserve to be candidates.
During Iran-Iraq War, there are around 500,000 Iraqi and Iranian soldiers died over the course of the war, in addition to an estimated 100,000 civilians. In Persepolis, it mentions about the brainwashing of young low-income boys in schools during the Iran-Iraq war. The school told them it was a great honor to fight for their country. Furthermore, they would say that the world after death was like heaven, with countless gold, gems, wine and women. Each boy was given a small key and told that if they died with it, they would go to heaven. In this way, they tricked many untrained boys into the war. There is no doubt that these young students can only wait to be slaughtered when faced with well-trained soldiers.
In fact, it’s common for the military to tend to recruit low-income young men to serve in the military or to fight in wars, not only in the Iran-Iraq war. The Seattle Times reported in 2005 that “nearly half” of new recruits came “from lower-middle-class to poor households, according to new Pentagon data based on ZIP codes and census estimates of mean household income.” The same data showed that nearly two-thirds of Army recruits in 2004 “came from countries in which median household income is below the U.S. median.”
The reason of this group of young people are targeted is that, in the absence of options, they can easily be pushed or lured to join the armed forces. The term “poverty draft” came about in the early 1980s to describe “the belief that the enlisted ranks of the military were made up of young people with limited economic opportunities,” They lack access to jobs, income, and educational alternatives in their communities, so they improve their life or get the chance to go to college by joining the army. Therefore, it is not difficult to imagine that in the context of war, those young men without power and background are more likely to join the army for various reasons, while others from better families may have more chances to avoid the draft. In the Iran-Iraq war, Iran was ruled by extreme religionism, which was very inhumane.That causes many young men who are sent to war in such a deceitful way.
Martin, Nick. “The Military Views Poor Kids as Fodder for Its Forever Wars.” The New Republic, 7 Jan. 2020, newrepublic.com/article/156131/military-views-poor-kids-fodder-forever-wars.
Asoni, Andrea and Sanandaj, Tino. “Rich Man’s War, Poor Man’s Fight? Socioeconomic Representativeness in the Modern Military” Research Institute of Industrial Economics, 23 Dec. 2014, papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2542143
(Most Powerful Women in Politics 2019)