Here is a very cute commercial depicting an Asian male and Asian female, which is very rare to see these days on American television or film.  I heard this was shown in various parts of North America, and I hope to see more AF/AM pairs in entertainment.

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The finale for MTV’s America’s Best Dance Crew was last night, and surprise surprise, the Jabbawockeez took home the top prize, in a decision where a record 38 million people voted for the winner!!  They dominated the entire season with something new and creative every week, on top of their world class talent, style, and technique.  While accepting they were sure to give props to Status Quo, a deserving opponent, who they said they considered as family.  Judge comments for the Jabbawockeez included, ‘You guys are the sickest group I’ve seen in my life’…‘You all set the standard for the next 10 seasons’.  In the final episode, the judges mentioned how the Jabbawockeez have inspired a new culture, a hybrid genre of dance which mixes hip hop and theater.  In fact, here is a Youtube clip of an eight-year old imitating them, even the mask!  Additionally, this victory was even more emotional, considering they overcame the loss of one of their crew members (Gary).

America’s Best Dance Crew was ground-breaking in its representation of Asian Americans, featuring two amazing AA teams (Jabbawockeez and Kaba Modern) who proved, week after week, that Asian Americans not only can dance, but have style and personalities.  Far too often in media, Asian Americans as a group are stereotyped as stiff model minority types (engineers, scientists, geeks), or accented foreigners.  America got to see another side, letting people know Asian Americans are American too, and can have endearing personalities and artistic creativity and talent in dance.  Who knows, maybe this will also influence Asian American youth, into not being afraid of expressing themselves and pursuing dance or other creative pursuits.  Additionally, this show should be commended for showing stories of all the dance crews from different parts of the country, of all kinds of ethnic, cultural, and socioeconomic backgrounds.  It showed how the fabric of America is a lot more multicultural than we are used to seeing.

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…it’s about time! If you look at the picture, it looks like mostly males who showed up to the rally, kind of an interesting note.

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TOKYO (Reuters) - Thousands of Okinawans rallied on Sunday to protest crimes by U.S. troops and demand a smaller U.S. military presence on the southern Japanese island after last month’s arrest of a Marine on suspicion of raping a schoolgirl…

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I think Tibet is similar in a lot of ways to Palestine. I don’t get how some Jews can be so against China on Tibet, when Israel/Palestine is a very similar situation. Tibet hasn’t been an independent nation for centuries, and before WWII, the Dalai Lama and the monks enslaved 95% of the Tibetan people as serfs until, ironically, Mao was the one who freed them. Look it up, I know it sounds crazy.

Also, imagine a similarly ridiculous opposite scenario, if China started a global propaganda campaign to ‘Free California and Texas’ from the Patriot Act, and saying the LA Riots were proof that Blacks, Latinos, and Asians were being oppressed by Whites in California. After all, it wasn’t too long ago that Texas was its own independent region, and both areas were part of Mexico.

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She confirms the original team was mostly Asian American men, with one White blond girl (herself).

So here’s a chronology recap of events:

The original team…

Boston Globe: “Willis, 38, who grew up in Mount Vernon, Ill., had never played blackjack when she joined the team in the early 1990s. Then a student at Harvard Law School, Willis and her boyfriend were both “math geeks.” They were also friends with Jeff Ma, an MIT student who was one of the ringleaders of the school’s clandestine blackjack club. “Jeff would occasionally have an expensive bottle of wine or champagne, and it didn’t make a whole lot of sense. Then he told us about Vegas,” Willis says. “I think it dawned on him that we could play blackjack and also give the team, which was mostly Asian and male, a little diversity.”

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This is more news about the upcoming ‘21’ blackjack movie, with racist casting.  Not only were ‘Ben Campbell’ and ‘Steve Fisher’ real-life Asian Americans Jeff Ma and Mike Aponte, but the teacher/professor ‘Mickey Rosa’ was also Asian American John Chang (scroll to the bottom). 

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San Francisco Public Defender Jeff Adachi wrote, produced and directed an independent documentary called “The Slanted Screen,” which examines the history of Asian American men in American cinema. Adachi covers Hollywood’s stereotypical portrayals of Asian men as either an evil “Fu Manchu’’ character or as an asexual nerd. The movie was shown at a previous San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival. The movie features interviews with Mako, James Shigeta and Dustin Nguyen.

Here is a link to the documentary website and a news article:

There was a segment on NPR awhile ago, and I took some notes of the interview below.

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This is what Gringey said:

“Wariness over bringing in foreign talent reflects a number of concerns. Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-Ga.) expressed unease that “Asian and Indian names” increasingly dominate newspaper lists of top SAT scores in his Marietta district, and asked Gates whether “youngsters who look like me”- the congressman is white - might find the influx of skilled foreign workers to be a deterrent in pursuing careers in technology and engineering.”

This is Bill Gates’ response, saying that trying to slow immigration screws America and forces outsourcing directly to those countries. This congressman needs to be blasted for the xenophobic, racist thinking that people with Asian last names aren’t American.

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This month’s issue of ESPN The Magazine is its Special 10th Anniversary Issue, and it features Ichiro on the cover with the text: “For Making Singles Sexy and Taking Baseball Global, Ichiro is a Perfect 10”. Here is a link to a previous 8-page ESPN special feature on Ichiro. He is one of only a few people in all of sports who uses his first name on the back of his uniform, and why not? The man is simply amazing, a baseball living legend in Japan and in the United States. Here is a breakdown of some of his greatest feats since entering the league.

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One of the best things I love about the internet, and especially Youtube, is that it is tearing down the walls and influence of mainstream media.  Asian Americans are benefitting from changing media platforms as much as, if not more, than any other minority group in America.  One star I want to highlight is KevJumba, who is the #2 all-time subscribed comedian on Youtube, and #4 all-time subscribed blogger of any poster on Youtube:

http://youtube.com/user/kevjumba?ob=1

KevJumba is a high school student who lives in Houston, TX, and

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