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Let It Be Some Other 'Asian'
As the country waited to learn the identity of the killer at
Virginia Tech, Vietnamese-American writer Andrew Lam says all ethnic
Americans held their breath, waiting to see if they would shoulder the
spillover of blame for the acts of an individual.
New America Media, News Analysis, Andrew Lam,
Posted: Apr 17, 2007
SAN FRANCISCO – All across America, no doubt, non-Korean
Asian-Americans are now heaving a sigh of relief. “Asian,” after all,
was the four-alarm-fire word we saw throughout the day after the
shootings that took the lives of 33 people at Virginia Tech. The shooter
was “Asian,” the news reports said. But who was this “Asian” exactly?
Before the news identified the killer as Cho Seung-hui, a 23-year-old
English major from South Korea, all ethnic backgrounds were up for
grabs. A Chinese friend from a small college town on the East Coast
called to say: “Please, please let it be some other Asian. We’ll be in
deep if it’s Chinese.”
In a popular Vietnamese chatroom, Vietnamese college students were
writing to each other to speculate. One said, “I have a bad feeling. It
might be Mi’t (Vietnamese slang for Vietnamese).” Others wrote in
advising each other on what to do if it was.
The blogosphere buzzed with speculation on the identity of the killer.
The waiting game was as tense as waiting to find out who the next
American Idol might be. On another blog, debbieschlussel.com, Schlussel
speculated that the shooter could be a Muslim Pakistani. “Why am I
speculating that the ‘Asian’ gunman is a Pakistani Muslim? Because law
enforcement and the media strangely won’t tell us more specifically who
the gunman is.”
A Muslim Pakistani friend, an engineer who refused to have his name
mentioned, emailed me to say, “If he’s a Paki and Muslim, we might all
just as well pack up and go home. I’m praying that he is some other
Asian.”
Let it be some other Asian! This was the prayer among so many
Asian-American communities. And not just Asians.
“Every time there’s an incident like this, every ethnic group is on pins
and needles,” said Khalil Abdullah, an African-American colleague. An
Anglo shooter may be an individual, a loner, but God forbid if a person
of color goes on a shooting rampage. His whole tribe would be
implicated. “I still recall my aunts when President Kennedy was
assassinated. They were praying that it wasn’t a Negro.” Many ethnic
communities do not feel that they belong to the core of the American
fabric, Abdullah added. “The action of an individual can cancel out the
good image of an entire group.”
Case in point: A Virginia Tech student and Chinese-American blogger was
initially thought by many to be the culprit. He was reputed to have a
penchant for guns and many photos of himself posing with his rifles.
More than 200,000 people have visited his sites since the shootings and
many left angry, racist epithets against Chinese. He told ABC News,
"Right now, pretty much the Internet thinks it is me… I am just
interested in trying to clear my name.”
As a Vietnamese-American, I have always found the word “Asian” to be too
generic to be a useful identifier. Asia is the largest continent with
the most diverse population in the world. In Asia, people identify
themselves by their national or ethnic origin, not as “Asian.”
Yet, in the aftermath of the Virginia Tech massacre, many of us –
including myself – used the word to refer to any other “Asian” besides
us.
In the end it wouldn’t have worked for very long. To be a minority in
America, even in the 21st century, is to be always on trial. An evil act
by one indicts the entire community. Whoever doubts this need only look
at the spike in hate crimes against Muslims and South Asian communities
after 9/11.
After the shootings, before the identity of the killer was revealed, my
best friend, a Korean-American lawyer in Washington, D.C., felt in his
bones, and he didn't know why, that somehow a Korean was responsible.
But, “one thing’s for sure now,” he said through a sigh, “we can safely
lay the model minority theme to rest.”
Other Readings of Interest
Lam is a writer and editor with New America Media and author of
"Perfume Dreams: Reflections on the Vietnamese Diaspora". |
