Asian-American Men and Looks
Sooner or later every Asian-American male blogger makes a post about
race and gender and the American mass media. (This post defines
"Asian-American" as Americans from East Asia, of course, because
Asian-Americans from South Asia have a similar though separate set of
concerns and issues.) Obviously, I've touched upon it over and over in
a series of posts, but I don't know if I've ever dealt with it
directly, perhaps because I've been focusing on poetry as opposed to
television or film.
I've been thinking. I'm going to use American Idol's William Hung as
an example for this post, since I've talked about him before, and
there's a better than average chance that readers of this blog will
know who he is. Most Asian-Americans don't like William Hung. But why?
What's bad about William Hung?
One response may relate to the fact that he's basically one of the few
Asian-American male figures in popular entertainment out there. He
serves as a symbol for all Asian-American men in the United States,
because there are so few represented in mass media. I like this
answer. Under-representation is bad, and Asian-American men are
underrepresented in all forms of media -- be it television, film,
magazines, or even poetry, though the poetry world has been changing
rapidly in poetry over the past two decades. As discussed before, I
predict the continued rise of Asian-American poetry.
More questionable, to me, is the answer that William Hung embodies
negative stereotypes. I mean, what does that mean? My concern is that
Asian-Americans are bashing the "William Hungs" of the world at least
partly for being physically ugly. That is, "ugly" by the superficial
standards of mass media. But lots of Asian-Americans look like William
Hung. Many of us are not all that good-looking by the standards that
many corporations have defined beauty. On average, Asian-Americans
tend to have rounder faces, smaller eyes, less facial hair than
Americans of other races. Asian-Americans also tend to be shorter and
have a different complexion than Americans of other races.
Equally questionable, to me, is the answer that the William Hungs of
the world are bad because of the way they "act" -- as if the way
someone acts can ever be completely separated from the way someone
looks. On American Idol and afterwards, Hung acted polite, naive,
straightforward, reserved, and calm. His attire was acceptable but
could be improved upon. His English was ok but not perfect. In short,
he acted the way that a lot of Asian-Americans, and a lot of people,
act in general. Very common and not decked out with bling.
My fear is that Asian-Americans' critique of William Hung also
reflects a self-hating desire to look and act more like Gap,
Abercombie and Fitch, Old Navy models, etc. That's not going to
happen. William Hung will never look that way, no matter how many
stylists or voice coaches the entertainment world gives him before
they abandon him to oblivion once the fad wears off, if it hasn't
already. Nor should it happen, one could argue. We should be happy
with the way we look and accept ourselves for who we are.
Asian-Americans should not try to simply imitate the look, attire, and
behavior of any other race -- some imitation can be good, but it
should be an adaptation into what may become ours, not a refutation of
what is there.
Lots of Asian-Americans are children of immigrants or immigrants
themselves. For some Asian-American men, I think that the William Hung
issue may reflect an anxiety to separate ourselves from the identities
of our parents and grandparents. If an Asian-American man happens to
be an immigrant himself, he may want to break away from the whole
identity of the Asian past as well. There's a tension there, which the
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