Hey all! This is former co-editor David back from the dead.

This week, I started the Microaggressions tumblr with former Blaaager Vivian. We originally wanted to collect the little incidents and anecdotes in our lives that make our Asian American and intersected experiences marginalized. Then we had the idea to put it up on tumblr and collect submissions.

An email and a Twitter account later, this was born. We've had shoutouts on Jezebel and Racialicious. And now, our very own Asian American Alliance blog.

Please send it to your friends and loved ones! Submit posts you have encountered yourself!

Are you wondering why we haven't talked about J.J. Abrams' Star Trek, despite our obvious excitement about it? That's because we haven't seen it (see: finals). Boo hoo. So don't talk about it until after Wednesday, when we've seen it in IMAX!

Margaret Cho, one of my perennial favorites, is starring in a new Lifetime show, Drop Dead Diva, this summer. Airing on July 12th, the show will also star Broadway actress, Brooke Elliott, according to Theater Mania. The show is about a shallow model reborn as a brilliant plus-size attorney, played by Elliott. Cho's role in the show is the attorney's assistant, serving as a comedic foil to Elliott's character.

See below for her first interview with CNN below, where she also talks about Asian Americans in the media, Betty Brown, her new term "Asian adjacent," her new music album, as well as her role in the queer community.

While watching Brillante Mendoza’s film Serbis, viewers may only take a slippery hold on the many secrets that linger inside the campy porn movie theater (appropriately called “Family” Theater), that doubles as an underground hotspot for gay prostitution. The latter point seems to be the more arresting aspect of the film, but Mendoza isn’t interested in the men who engage in pleasure-for-profit. They consistently remain nameless and faceless. Mendoza is instead interested in the family that runs the theater, whose own disarray parallels the crumbling of the theater itself, as prostitutes and customers run rampant under blind eyes.

That the story circulates around a movie theater is significant, because there are times when watching certain individual’s activities feels like an act of voyeurism. There is the opening scene, in which a nude Jewel boldly applies lipstick and, while observing her self in the mirror, puts on a sexual display with a series of gestures and endless mouthings of “I love you”. Whatever and whomever she is doing it for remains unclear, but there is a blatant sexuality, vanity, and privacy to her act, and those qualities are broken when Jewel realizes that, in fact, her nephew has been watching all along. This is one of many moments in which characters (and viewers) are put in the uncomfortable position of feeling unwelcome as they open doors, seeing what probably shouldn’t be seen. Yet, despite all appearances, that which is seen can no longer be erased from the mind.

The quality of voyeurism has much to do with the notion that each character has a particular position and place in this microcosm, and while crossing certain places may be unallowable, it is also unavoidable. The people running in and out of the theater are many, but there remains an unspoken agreement of where each one belongs. Through an observable series of everyday routines, one is trained to understand that Ronald runs projections (while masturbating) in the reel room; Alan trades projection reels and paints posters (while bedding his girlfriend Merly in between); Nayda stands in as the married theater matriarch (while fighting an attraction to her cousin Ronald); and so on. No mention is made of how this pattern came to be; it just seems to have been this way for as long as anyone could remember. Here it becomes clear that the family operates under the illusion that people can run by pure mechanics, can automatically stabilize their selves, and can be free of wrongdoing or mistake. Even the movie theater itself, a porn house, is maintained under the illusion that sex can be distilled and rendered immobile, resting as paintings on the theater walls or as a picture on screen for the price of a movie ticket. In fact, much more is brewing under the surface. Whether anyone knows, or wishes, to acknowledge this, remains unclear.

This droning routine, rendering even sex stagnant, makes one look to smaller, more quotidian gestures to find any hint of disruption or untidiness. Mendoza sets everything up so that seeing a man being sucked off by a boy for a modest fee is no longer shocking; but catching Ronald looking one moment too long at Nayda is. The losing principle of Serbis, it seems, is that life should be anything but messy. If things do get messy, then clean up the mess, pure and simple. As Nanay Flor, the aging mother, says, “There’s a lot to fix in this movie house”, but she fails to recognize that perhaps some things, like her divorce, can’t really be fixed. Near the end of the film, Mendoza withdraws from the family and leaves the theater. The final scene rests on two complete strangers, men who briefly converse about nothing in particular, and the film reel burns up, leaving a gaping hole in the screen. The gesture reads like a "fuck you" to this concept of social mechanization to which the family--and on another level, the audience--so desperately adheres. With people, there is no smooth running or compartmentalizations to be had, so let them remain confusing and opaque, even in the movies.

So I came across this FML post. I was in a really weird mood; I swear that I usually don't spend time on moany, angsty-teen-ish sites like this.

Today, I saw an old Caucasian lady drop her purse. Out of kind intention, I ran to pick it up for her. She hit me with a wooden cane she was holding in her right hand. Multiple times. I gave her the purse back. She hit me again and said "Fuck You Yellow Rat," before she walked off. I'm Asian. FML.

What?! Yellow Rat? First of all, I don't even know where this racial slur came from. Second of all, it's instances like this that remind us how real racism still is. Despite its altered form in today's overly politically correct society, the underlying sentiments clearly have not changed. Granted, this woman is old and probably grew up in a very different world, so perhaps this particular instance is not such a grave indicator of the state of society today. Still, it makes me sad and angry. WTF? Get over yourself old lady; that "yellow rat" is probably paying your social security bills!

Top story in the New York Daily News:

New Jersey-born actor Kal Penn, who played a stoner Guantanamo Bay escapee in the movies and a doctor on TV's "House," has scored a job in the White House. Way to go, dude!

Penn, 31, will become associate director in the White House Office of Public Liaison, administration officials confirmed Tuesday. The Indian-American film star will be an emissary to the Asian-American and Pacific Islander communities, along with arts and entertainment groups.

Penn campaigned extensively throughout the country for President Obama last year and was a hit on college campuses.

WHAT! Does this mean that we'll expect Kal Penn vlogs from the White House? Or some Presidential grass burning rituals? Also, there's a spoiler for House, and it's related to this news, but I won't tell it, because I don't watch House.

Yesterday, a Vietnamese immigrant named Jiverly Wong entered the American Civic Association, an immigration services center in downtown Binghamton, New York, and murdered thirteen individuals in a citizenship class. For those who are not familiar with the situation, you can read about it here.

As I read the updated news reports, attempting to process the event and understand the motivations, I increasingly become more upset. An immigrant, a daughter of immigrants who struggled to learn English and gain American citizenship, and someone who seeks to work with immigrant communities now as a student and in the future professionally, I am simultaneously connected to and detached from what happened. I say detached because I have the privilege as someone not directly involved to read, express dismay/shock/sympathy, and move on. But personally, I cannot, and feel the responsibility to recognize the implications of this event. What happened involves many factors, among them the issue of mental health in Asian and Asian American communities and immigrant communities at large and ideas that Asian immigrants are “successful” and “models” when they, too, share common struggles with other immigrants. This is why I am frustrated when I see influential Asian American commentators like Phil Yu write things like this on his blog:

So he decided to kill as many people as possible, before shooting himself? That's the act of a coward. Look, I am sympathetic to those who are going through tough times. Maybe you're not happy with the way your life has turned out. It seems like you're alone, and things don't look like they're going to get better.

But there are a lot of people getting through tough times, and they're not strapping on bulletproof vests and shooting up crowds. There's something seriously wrong with this condition -- and no, it's not just an Asian thing, or an immigrant thing. Don't try to turn it into that. People need to deal, and we need to help each other deal.

Indeed, Phil Yu is right when he says it is not just “an Asian thing” and “an immigrant thing.” There is more to it; all situations involve multiplicities. But to move forward, take care of our communities, and seek justice for those murdered, we must take proactive steps beyond blame and anger. The crime was cowardly, yes. Murder is senseless. But to deconstruct his, to see broader implications, requires sensitivity and thoughtfulness. What provoked this man to vent his frustration in such a way? And, further, upon members of his own community? And how may we better understand this situation so that it does not happen again? I don’t know the answers to these questions, but thinking about the event as more than an “act of a coward” will eventually be more fruitful.

Oh, Diana and Jen, will you ever stop being hilarious?

And we walked, feeling the ground

We'd someday own, not alone

And I knew there was something different

And I feel us growing stronger

Building something new...

I knew there was something different about me today

I blogged about this movie a while back. Then I finally watched it at NAASCon '08, and now, thanks to the powers of APAAM, it's coming to hang out at Columbia/Barnard. If you don't know already, there's a major reason why the date of Vincent Chin's death is the date on our staff list entry. And if you don't know, then maybe this is the perfect film for you.

Check out the Facebook event here.

A video by Mixed Company of Yale, an a cappella group, released a spin on Beyonce's 'Single Ladies', entitled 'Single Asians.'

One of the verses goes something like this:


Etymology:

The phrase "me love you long time" and the accompanying "me so horny" originates from the Stanley Kubrick film Full Metal Jacket. In the movie, UK actress Papillon Soo Soo (credited as "Da Nang Hooker") speaks the lines:

Hey baby, you got girlfriend Vietnam? Me so horny. Me love you long time.

So there you have it. According to IvyGate who contacted the group, Mixed Company at Yale feels no qualms about posting this video. Full of endless (often derrogatory) sterotypes.

Remade in America is the New York Times' new "series about the newest immigrants and their impact on American institutions". Two parts have come out already - Part I: Schools, and Part II: Workplaces. There are some really weirdly uncomfortable articles, like "The Best Way to Teach Young Newcomers [English]", and then there are some interesting (but still problematic) things, like the interactive map showing how the "foreign-born" demographic has spread across the U.S., ca. 1880-2000.

Yay! Congrats, Corinne Manabat!

Christopher Wong is a California-based filmmaker who established himself by working on projects that range from independents, to shorts, to commercials. But it wasn't until Whatever It Takes that he hit it big.

Whatever It Takes follows Principal Edward Tom, who abandoned the steel and concrete of Fifth Avenue to instead monitor the hallways of the Bronx Center for Science and Mathematics. The school, which boasts only 107 students, is a place that Tom considers to be "a safe haven, amidst the violence and poverty of the south Bronx, where children can focus on a rigorous and meaningful education."

The film is co-produced by Renee Tajima-Pena (of Who Killed Vincent Chin? directing fame), and has received major funding from the Center for Asian American Media as well as the Sundance Institute. This is serious business for an Asian American film, centered around an Asian American man and the tumultuous environment in which he lives. Justin Lin's Better Luck Tomorrow, in comparison, didn't make big waves. I spoke to Chris just after the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, and he said that the reception was amazing.

During the Women Who Work It! panel, Fay Ann Lee said that the biggest problem with "Asian American" films is that it doesn't garner an audience (not in the way that Tyler Perry garners an African American audience, anyway). This makes me critique the way that I've been categorizing Chris's film since I first heard about it. Unlike Falling For Grace or Better Luck Tomorrow, Whatever It Takes is not just a chick flick, or a teenage angst film, that happens to feature Asian American players. It is a documentary that details something which looks to us like a more believable slice of reality, one which lays out issues of race, class and education, and asks the audience to piece something out of it. The film presents race as a mere node in a web of problems that have led to society's twisted failings.

Anyway, I haven't even seen the film yet, and this leaves out a lot of other AsAm documentaries that have a lot to offer to the so-called Asian American genre. I'll wait for it to hit the East Coast for Asian Cinevision's Asian American International Film Festival; until then, someone who has actually seen it (and therefore has a cohesive idea), please enlighten.

For more on Whatever It Takes, visit the film website.

INTERESTED IN VOICING YOUR OPINIONS ON SEXUAL EDUCATION?

The Asian American Alliance will be filming a short documentary regarding Asian Americans and Sexual Education. We are currently looking for Asian American students on campus to give their testimonials on camera!

Bring your funny, awkward, serious, and/or interesting stories and opinions to the table!

We will be filming student testimonials after Spring Break:

Date, time, and location to be announced.

For more information, please email Annie Tan at at2452@columbia.edu.

Or: Come to our Mochi Study Break after Spring Break to learn more!

Dear Shilpa,

This is not a spam and it is urgent. My name is Nadia Surapanpong and I am a professional, working in the films business and currently casting for a new big budget Hollywood movie. I am wondering if you and your organization at Columbia U can please post and pass along this flyer to every one you know of Asian-decent to come to my Open Casting Call this Sunday, 3/1 from 11A - 5P to be part of the new movie from M. Night Shyamalan’s new movie, The Last Airbender (in production now based on the popular series called, Avatar on Nickelodeon Channel) this Sunday, March 1st. He is the well-known director of The Six Sense, Unbreakable, Signs, The Lady in the Water, and from last year's movie called, The Happening; see his full list of credits at http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0796117/.

It is an Open Casting Call for all Asian-Americans for Night's new movie. IF by far chance you are personally interested in this as well please come to the Open Casting Call yourself, if not PLEASE tell and / or bring all of your friends who might be interested. IF they are selected, there will be paid transportation, housing and per diem for their time. It is approximately 1 – 2 weeks worth of work in Philadelphia; please read the attached flyer for all the detail info.

Any questions you can contact me directly. Thanks so much,
Nadia

A few reasons why this e-mail cracks me up:

1. THE SPELLING ERRORS ("Asian-decent")
2. M. NIGHT SHYAMALAN
3. THE MOVIE IS BASED ON A NICKELODEON CHANNEL SERIES
4. "This is not a spam and it is urgent."
   

Can someone please go to this audition?

It's amazing how much the internet loves this guy. He's shown up on my Google Reader at least five times.