Fred Korematsu would have been 96 on Friday, January 30, and if you don’t know him, you should know why he’s important. Even if you do know Korematsu’s basic story, you might be surprised by some details here. There was nothing easy about what he did.
It’s been just four years since the inaugural F...
If you’re an Asian American like me, you may be watching movies and media for any presence of Asian or Asian American anything.
It’s like our “AA-dar.”
Among the Oscar-nominated movies of note, mine went off in “Boyhood,” when Mason crashes at his sister’s University of Texas dorm with his girlfri...
More than Jennifer Lopez’s dress, it was Margaret Cho on the Golden Globes that made me do a double-take last week. And she was in that sexy North Korean military drag.
At first glance, I just wasn’t sure it was her. If you’ve seen Cho’s stand-up shows on cable, you know she’s outrageously tatted...
I always wondered whether I could create a ruckus by getting a voting membership in the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, by virtue of my column “Emil Amok” appearing in a Philippines publication. You know, as the second coming of dictator Ferdinand Marcos of the movies, I could vote for more Fil...
Je suis Charlie. Nous sommes Charlie. Can you tell I was a Francophile in high school? (The man can conjugate an irregular verb!) My French high school teachers were teachers’ union radicals who had an impact. I loved everything French for many years. I even lived in France–in Paris, but also on a f...
I won’t waste your time. Here’s the problem with that “Saturday Night Live” Asian American Doll sketch right up front: It’s so self-consciously aware of pandering to diversity that it’s really a blatant attack on remedies for equality, fairness, and civil rights.
These are principles we should all ...
And to think we’d heard it all when the Senate report on CIA torture gave us that memorable headline phrase, “rectal rehydration.”
With hummus and pine nuts, it may be the gift that keeps on giving. But there’s so much more in the stocking stuffer as we head into the holidays, beginning with…
SERI...
Turns out I have more in common with Eric Garner than just the initials E.G.
Earlier this year, I wrote about how I was confronted at a car rental facility near a major airport in Kentucky.
I simply wanted an upgrade on my car. And while I admit to being slightly aggressive with the manager, I did...
Asian Americans aren’t immune to this feeling.
If you are person of color in our society and have experienced the loss of a family member or loved one to a gun death, as I have, then you know the feeling well.
It’s one of complete helplessness, like you and your family don’t matter. Justice just...
Immigration reform? By executive action? The thing Asian Americans have talked about for nearly a year now?
Yes, yes, yes.
According to media reports, the plan would provide deportation relief for up to 5 million people. It would expand Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), the program fo...
The national midterm narrative so far has been about how voters repudiated President Obama and his policies.
But this isn’t the Asian American narrative.
Neither is it Elaine Chao standing next to her husband, the presumptive new Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
No, the Asian American na...
Pardon my October. I’ve been busy being American Filipino during Filipino American History Month. And in the moments that remain, I’ve been nervously watching the San Francisco Giants break and unbreak my heart, until they finally decided to win the World Series and give back my life.
(Pablo Sand...
I was too busy watching baseball this week to catch Bill O’Reilly on “The Daily Show,” where he defended his belief in the Model Minority myth and how it’s evolved into a sense of “Asian American Privilege.”
Who needs that bunk when there was a very special Asian American event happening at the San...
These days, in the internet era when Bush’s NSA policies continue under Obama, it must be presumed that everyone is under some kind of surveillance.
Even innocent Asian Americans.
And given the global nature of things, it would take a real leap of faith to believe foreign governments of our ancest...
October means new TV shows, the best baseball, and my favorite ethnic heritage month–Filipino American History Month.
Or, as I like to call it, “American Filipino” History Month.
I flip it. On purpose. It’s my linguistic revolution to force others to see the community with new eyes and get beyond ...
I’m a big believer in art when justice fails. I’m doing an excerpt of my solo performance show, “Emil Amok,” at the San Francisco Public Library on Oct. 9 at 6 pm. It’s part of “Compositions,” the Alvarado photo exhibit that is the anchor of the library’s Filipino American History Month activities.
...
Forty-seven tomahawk cruise missiles in fighter bombers were sent to bomb 14 targets in Syria, the Department of Defense told NBC and other news media, which this morning released a DOD tape of some of the action.
And now you can go about your business. Everyone else seems to be.
Members of Cong...
Thirteen years later, we all have learned at least this key lesson: Al-Qaeda is not Iraq.
But after President Bush’s faulty logic used the terror attacks of 9/11 to justify war in Iraq, it seems President Obama is willing to make a similar mistake again.
By announcing to the nation on the eve of t...
I found this in my hamper today.
It was a reminder of an event I covered on one of the coldest days I’ve ever experienced–January 20, 2009.
That’s when “Hope and Change” supposedly had come to Washington.
Five years later and we’re still out in the cold–especially this weekend when President Ob...
Andrew Peng, 20, looked like any other Asian American student. Only deep in his heart, he knew he was a chicken.
Especially with his special virtual reality goggles on.
At UC Berkeley, one of the most Asian American campuses in the nation, students were lined up for a unique demonstration–to exp...
