The Enduring Invisibility of Asian Americans
By Thomas Lee
Editorial Director of “We Are Bruce Lee”
Last November, a blogger wrote on Twitter that elections don't really impact people's daily lives.
In calling out the blogger's white male privilege, author and musician Mikel Jollett responded with this message:
"As long as you're not: Black, Latino, Muslim, gay, Native American, a woman, a veteran, a person with a pre-existing condition, a disabled person, an immigrant, a farmer, a laborer, a person who makes less than $150,000 or someone who gives a shit about ANY of these people."
Wow. Jollett literally named everyone EXCEPT Asian Americans.
Jollett's point is well taken and I don't doubt his motives. But that he tried really hard to brainstorm every vulnerable population he could think of and still leave out Asian Americans testifies to this sobering reality for people of Asian descent:
Nearly 50 years after Bruce Lee's death, APIs are still invisible to American society.
Oh, we have had a few successes along the way. Andrew Yang ran for president. Crazy Rich Asians made a bunch of money. Jeremy Lin once played for the Knicks. Daniel Dae Kim finally scored his first lead in a TV series.
But these are mostly individual achievements, scattered throughout the American timeline without any sort of collective force or cohesion. It's an odd paradox. If Asian Americans are supposed to be such high achievers, why isn't anyone taking notice?
Take the Biden Administration. Although President-elect Joe Biden boasts his Cabinet is the most diverse ever, he has the exact number of Asian Americans on his team as Donald Trump: one. (Yes, I know incoming Vice President Kamala Harris is part South Indian but I'd argue Americans tend to see her as Black.)
In case you're curious, Biden appointed Katherine Chi Tai as U.S. Trade Representative. While the office is an important one, you can reasonably argue that it's a downgrade of sorts. Chi will oversee an office with a budget of $70 million and 284 employees. Elaine Chao, who ran the U.S. Department of Transportation under Trump, managed a budget of $80 billion and a workforce of 60,000 people.
This group will do critical work on behalf of every American.
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) December 10, 2020
Their jobs are where rubber meets the road — where governance can make a meaningful difference in people’s lives, advancing prosperity for all Americans. https://t.co/fcKQ7kXQuR
Most often, the invisibility of APIs is more subtle. When Collin Morikawa won the PGA Championship last August, news articles noted that Morikawa was the third youngest golfer to win the major. Nothing about Morikawa being the second Asian American to win the championship. Who was the first? A guy named Tiger Woods, who is part-Asian but mostly known as African American.
If you don't think Morikawa’s Asian American heritage is a big deal, then why do people pay so much attention to Woods' Blackness? Why is Woods' racial identity relevant to the game but not Morikawa’s? They both won major championships in a sport long dominated by white people.
If an openly gay or another Black golfer wins the U.S. Open, we'd be all over that, I guarantee you.
I also can't tell you how many times I've seen polls that list white, Black, Hispanic, and "other." Guess who the other is.
I googled "polls lack of Asian Americans in results" and two articles pop up. One is a piece from the Pew Research Center that explains Asian Americans, who only make up 6 percent of the population, offer too small of a sample size to measure.
"Pew Research Center is committed to surveying people of all demographic backgrounds, but we only feel comfortable reporting the views of Asian Americans and other smaller groups when we are confident that the data paints an accurate picture," the group said.
Okay.
The next article in my results is a New York Times article with the headline: "Asian-American Voters Can Help Decide Elections. But for Which Party?"
Seems to me that Pew better figure it out and figure it out fast.
Bruce Lee had to fight through this invisibility for most of his career. It was only when he moved to Hong Kong when he finally found success and stardom, which eventually traveled across the Pacific to America.
If Lee had not passed away in 1973, would the API community enjoy more visibility in today's society?
Photo courtesy of Bruce Lee Enterprises
Lee probably would have continued to make and star in films. Maybe Lee would have risen to become the head of a major Hollywood studio or perhaps launch his own successful online streaming service. He could have ventured outside the movie business and go into fashion, comics, or sports.
Lee was not overtly political but maybe that would have changed over time. President Bruce Lee, the first Asian American president? Hell, if Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump could do it, why not Bruce?
But sadly, we will never know. Bruce Lee died young and the API community is much diminished for it.
Our invisibility continues, sometimes interrupted but mostly unabated.