Andrew Yang’s candidacy has been intensely polarizing within the Asian American community, in part because he has presented discordant views on race and identity, writes columnist Frank Shyong.
So when journalist Jeff Yang invited me to an off-the-record meeting held last week between Andrew Yang and AAPI activists, I thought it could be a valuable opportunity to clarify. I asked if the meeting, which Yang’s campaign sought, could be on the record.
And he expressed pain at the idea that some Asian Americans were ashamed at the way he’d portrayed their culture. He admitted that a campaign built on memes and social media wasn’t a great venue for discussing race. He said he didn’t believe his jokes about Asians and math and doctors were harming anyone, and if he believed he was causing harm, he’d stop. He’s trying to feel more natural on the campaign trail and not second-guess himself, he said, by way of explanation.And he asked us for the benefit of the doubt. As an Asian American outsider presidential candidate, he believes he has to make as wide an appeal as possible — even if that means cracking the occasional joke about being Asian.
I share this because though Yang has alienated many members of the progressive Asian American community with his comments, I think his missteps are inalienably Asian American too. With three Asian American candidates — Yang, Kamala Harris, and Tulsi Gabbard — all competing for the Democratic nomination, it’s more important than ever that we know what this term means.
The community, concentrated in Los Angeles and forming the majority of the Asian American population at the time, emphasized cultural traits that would impress white elites. They focused heavily on entrepreneurship, respectability and patriotism in a futile attempt to counter growing wartime perceptions of Japan as a nation of aggressive, warlike and savage people.
Today the term “model minority” dominates the way Asian Americans talk about their racial experiences, and it’s used in a lot of different ways. But historically, it has been an ultimately futile reaction to racism by the powerless and disenfranchised based on trying to earn acceptance from the powerful.
Jeff Yang, a math major, said he had made a lot of the same jokes that Andrew Yang made on the campaign trail. He thought the candidate handled Gillis thoughtfully, but he’d rather talk about Andrew Yang’s policies, and highlighted the Democracy Dollars proposal, which would give every citizen a $100 voucher to give to their favorite candidate.
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