Updates

My essay on “South Pacific” in “Bigotry on Broadway,” an anthology edited by the noted author Ishmael Reed and his wife Carla Blank, officially launches this week. “South Pacific” was how Asians appeared on Broadway in the 1940s and 1950s, but it wasn’t nearly the condemnation of bigotry people like

It’s Shang-Chi’s world. So why don’t I feel better, especially after seeing the Emmys? This is the year Asian Americans got the Marvel superhero treatment, and from all accounts, the spell is working at the box-office. In its third weekend, “Shang-Chi” is the top movie in the nation bringing in $21

“Recall Repulsed Convincingly in California.” That would have been my election night headline. Gov. Gavin Newsom, elected three years ago by the largest margin in nearly 70 years, can now stay in office to lead the state with the most Asian Americans in the nation. Out of 17 percent of eligible As

“Get vaccinated,” President Joe Biden said in a kind of tough love, aggressive whisper, as he ended his speech on Thursday. It’s the speech that could get us over this nasty Covid surge gripping the nation. All the numbers from new cases, to hospitalizations, to deaths, show America still hasn’t le

On the weekend that Asian Americans are given the full Hollywood treatment–not just “Crazy Rich Asians,” but crazy super-empowered Asians, Marvel style–America could really use an Asian American hero. When I feel comfortable in a movie theater again, I’ll catch “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten R

There are times when being Asian American matters. And then there are times when we are just plain Americans. This is one of those times. When our country loses a war, we become “we.” We weren’t going to get a countdown. Or a ball drop. Surely, there would be no crowds cheering at Time Square to

If you’re thinking about making remarks about an Asian American with a dash of that secret sauce—racism—I’m going to give you a way to think about the apology you will undoubtedly be forced to give. Think of it as a model apology. I realize society needs one of those after listening to the b.s. ap

Javed Rezayee is what I’d call an Asian American Afghan. An AAA. A triple-A. So, he’s one of us. An Asian American brother. He came to the U.S. more than a dozen years ago as a student, and now he’s an American citizen. He voted for Biden. But he told me the president was wrong to abandon Afghanist

I have been waiting for this moment since I first heard of the phrase “diversity,” or the idea of “minorities becoming the majority” in the 1980s. And now according to the Census, we are here about eight years sooner than demographers expected. Our population is up by 24 million people, to more tha

In this column, I shall talk one last time about the Olympics, and then declare the post-Olympic Suni Lee the most watchable Asian American in the world. But first things first. If you’ve seen the word “Cuomosexual” in print suddenly, or showing up on women’s T-shirts protesting Governor Andrew Cu

Teenage phenom Suni Lee, the first Asian American, first Hmong American to win an Olympic gold medal in the marquee gymnastics event—the all-around–was sitting on the Today Show couch in Tokyo on Tuesday this week. Simone Biles had just finished her comeback performance and won bronze in the indivi

What did Suni Lee really do last week at the 2020 in 2021 Summer Olympics? She just smashed the biggest stereotypes that have burdened Asian Americans for generations. But first she had to jump around in a Tokyo arena. And that was something special too. The eighteen-year-old Lee made every Asian

Here’s the takeaway message to all Asian Americans when violent acts against us aren’t treated as hate crimes. We don’t count. Justice doesn’t apply to us. We’re not seen, again. You just need to remember Vincent Chin (I explain later) to understand the difficulty in getting justice for the six A

An Asian American Filipina, Lee Kiefer, from Lexington, Kentucky, made history at this year’s Olympics in Tokyo. You couldn’t tell at first because she wore a mask—a fencer’s mask—with the American flag on the grill. But when she took it off, you could see her big smile when she won the Gold–one of

Yes, I am still talking about ESPN’s Stephen A.Smith’s remarks about an Asian being the biggest star in baseball, America’s national pastime. Hate needs to be called out. Listen to my show No. 94 on www.amok.com to hear the audio tape, where Smith singles out Los Angeles Angels star Shohei Ohtani

Stephen A. Smith? If you’re not a sports fan and don’t know Smith, get to know him. He’s the most ignorant anti-Asian, xenophobic man currently employed by ESPN and Disney at a reported $12 million a year. He’s the African American Tucker Carlson of sports. Or maybe, if you are of a certain age, he

It was just a coincidence, but for me, the date helped put things in perspective. On July 11, 2021, Virgin Galactic’s Richard Branson went a little more than 50 miles into the sky and made a bit of history. The democratization of space? Oh, please. It’s just the commercialization of space. And the

When the U.S. realized that a premier democracy with its own colony was a tad hypocritical, it finally gave the Philippines independence in 1946–on July 4th. But it was kind of a backhanded independence. To have it on that day was itself an oppressive symbol, an extended form of “psychological” col

On my retreat, I went through all my old Chin related interviews, including one with Chin estate executor Helen Zia. For those who want a real mind jog, I suggest you watch AALDEF’s screening of Christine Choy’s film, “Who Killed Vincent Chin?” If you haven’t seen this 1987 Academy Award-nominated

What do Juneteenth and Vincent Chin have to do with each other? Both represent cries for social justice that have gone unabated far too long. In the case of Vincent Chin–perhaps the most infamous individual hate crime in Asian American history—we have a known killer, Ronald Ebens, who has never ser