On The Ineffectual Nature of Rioting

"...colonialism is not a machine capable of thinking, a body endowed with reason. It is a naked violence and only gives in when confronted with greater violence."

"The colonized man liberates himself in and through violence. This praxis enlightens the militant because it shows him the means and the end."

- Frantz Fanon

Fanon argued that violence allowed for true liberation because the colonized, through means of violent resistance, can achieve both the removal of the colonizer and the liberation of the colonized subject. He goes on to argue that the process of decolonization is "the immobility to which the colonized subject is condemned can be challenged only if he decides to put an end to the history of colonization and the history of despoliation in order to bring to life the history of the nation, the history of decolonization." Ultimately, Fanon simply puts that decolonization is the constructive process of a new human being.

In regards to rioting

No doubt, rioting can be an inspiring spectacle, sparking the imagination of the people to what destruction of the current system can look like:
We must understand, however, that rioting can only take resistance so far. The large question that Fanon poses is this, "But how do we get from the atmosphere of violence to setting violence in motion?"

In rioting we see a sort of hibernation therapy - actions that put pressure on the power system and allow the oppressed to let off steam but quickly dissipates and is easily co-opted and pacified by the system. It is no surprise to see countless riots happening all across the globe and yet not one government is overthrown and no real concessions are made - in fact, the G8 and the G20 still met and operated - business as usual. Even the inspiring Greek Anarchist riots last December yielded no fruitful results. What ends up happening at riots is that hundreds of people are arrested and countless others are brutalized by the State -so essentially, instead of the collapse of a system, we see the expansion of the prison industrial complex and an almost unrelenting method of organized violence against the people, by the State.

In rioting, there is no real goal in mind and riots are often reactionary and destructive at best. We must remember that true liberation also involves construction - most importantly, construction of a new human being. This is key. Powerful movements such as the Black Panther Party, did not strictly involve resistance, but also implemented constructive aspects. The Black Panther Party ran extensive Serve The People Programs which ranged from free breakfast programs, free medical clinics, to political education as well as true Black history classes. In fact, armed resistance against police occupation of their communities, while a crucial aspect of the Party, was only a small aspect of the operation of the Party in relation to all the other activities they carried out. Same with the Viet Cong movement.

What differentiates a movement aimed at decolonization and liberation as opposed to a colonizing movement is that decolonizing movements aim to also construct a new human being and to replace the colonizing force - not simply repeat and continue colonizing tendencies of blind brutality and oppression. Therefore, if we want to see a movement aimed truly at the liberation of humanity from the oppression of humans by other humans, we must see a movement that has the means to actually liberate itself (through violence and forceful resistance) while at the same time, through liberation, see the construction of a new era of human beings.

The shortcomings of liberation movements, such as the Viet Cong movement or the Bolshevik movement, was that there was a failure to implement the construction of the new human being. What we see in history is that these 'socialist experiments' failed because there was never a true material implementation of the construction of a new human, rather, it fell short to nothing more than cheap political rhetoric, therefore, we see these otherwise inspiring experiments repeating the same colonizing practices they were originally fighting against.

We must remember that colonization involves the construction of the colonized subject by the colonizer and therefore, to completely decolonize, we must undo our construction in light of colonization and replace it with our own liberated constructed human being.

So in conclusion, rioting is more detrimental than positive to any movement. Rioting subjects otherwise useful comrades to being jailed, or killed by the hands of the bloodthirsty pigs without true cause. What is needed is organized resistance so that when we fall to the hands of the pigs, we do so while in the process of constructing a movement and ultimately, our own liberation at any costs.

Mao and Physical Health

Excerpts of Mao Tse-tung's "A Study of Physical Education":

"It is the body that contains knowledge and houses virtue."

"Physical education really occupies the first place in our lives. When the body is strong, then one can advance speedily in Knowledge and morality, and reap far-reaching advantages."

"As far as we, students are concerned, the installation of a school and the instruction given by its teachers are only the external and objective aspect. We also have the internal, the subjective aspect. When one's decision is made in his heart, then all parts of the body obey its orders. Fortune and misfortune are of our own seeking. 'I wish to be virtuous, and lo, virtue is at hand.' [From the Confucian Analects.] How much more this is true of physical education! If we do not have the will to act, then even though the exterior and the objective are perfect, they still cannot benefit us. Hence, when we speak of physical education, we should begin with individual initiative. "

"Physical education not only strengthens the body but also enhances our knowledge. There is a saying: Civilize the mind and make savage the body. This is an apt saying. In order to civilize the mind one must first make savage the body. If the body is made savage, then the civilized mind will follow. Knowledge consists in knowing the things in the world, and in discerning their laws. In this matter we must rely on our body, because direct observation depends on the ears and eyes, and reflection depends on the brain. The ears and eyes, as well as the brain, may be considered parts of the body. When the body is perfect, then knowledge is also perfect. Hence one can say that knowledge is acquired indirectly through physical education. Physical strength is required to undertake the study of the numerous modern sciences, whether in school or through independent study. He who is equal to this is the man with a strong body; he who is not equal to it is the man with a weak body. The division between the strong and the weak determines the area of responsibilities each can assume."

Thoughts on these excerpts to come later.

Stop Dying for My Sins

What we want are allies, not saviors.

Allies stand along side each other as equals in their own regard while saviors stand up for people.

If we as people of color really want to achieve liberation from oppression under a white supremacist society, we need to learn to stand on our own two feet and fight for our own liberation. We need to do this ourselves. If we continue to ask and rely on the white man for our own liberation, all we're going to get is bureaucratic red tape and hand-outs. We'll never achieve liberation on our terms because the white man can't see liberation on our terms, but can see liberation only on his terms and as long as we're playing by the white man's rules, we'll always be fighting an uphill, bound-for-watered-down-failure struggle.

White liberals who don't check their privilege, in my opinion, are worse than the white person who is out-right racist. As people of color, we have to understand that white liberals aren't doing us a favor with their single-issue non-profits going to save Africa bullshit. They're crippling us because they're confining us to single-issue non-profit crutch reform in lieu of real revolution - once again, this is liberation on their terms which translates to our continual oppression.

Real liberation means divesting from whiteness. This means revolution - not reform - because the system itself is the problem. The system serves the interest of the White capitalist, therefore, we need to do away with the current system and as a community - white allies included, envision a society that we want to see that serves the specific needs of the community where everyone has an active say and everyone has access to visibility.

On Dependence on the State to Solve Problems

So my car window got smashed last Tuesday night while I was in Irvine (of all places, right?), and we ended up calling the pigs, not necessarily because my car window was smashed, but because a line of other cars also got their windows smashed

When the cop showed up, he did the usual run-down, collecting my ID, contact information, where I lived, etc. In regards to filing a police report, he said the function of a police report is to 'get the guy who did this'. First, I don't want to send the person who broke my car window to jail or to face any sort of run-in with the 'justice' system/court. I want to dialogue with the person. I have no desire to fucking punish the person. The cop also told me I wouldn't get to meet the person or nothing - they were going to deal with the suspect directly. The cops didn't do shit about my window - they didn't offer to fix it or give me money - no, they were solely fixated on getting the suspect who did this. Clearly, their job wasn't to help me out with the window, but rather, to find some way to expand and serve the prison industrial complex.

There are no alternatives and police presence in community affairs is hyper-polarizing and operates on a strict dichotomy. It's their way or the highway. What's fucked up is that either I don't get any help, or I let them do it their way which often lands people in jail who didn't do anything wrong at all. Who are they going to target when they look for the suspect that broke these car windows? Poor people of color.

Relying on the justice system to distinguish between 'guilty' and 'innocent' is bullshit too. A study by Northwestern University estimated that around 25% of jury sentences wrongly convict innocent people and that 37% of rulings by judges wrongly convict innocent people. I wonder how many of these incorrect rulings were done to people of color? Why do we have to go to court to prove our innocence in the face of racial profiling and to be judged by predominantly white juries? They are not our peers. The community and our peers should be involved in conflict resolution, not some self-righteous motherfucker with a shiny JD degree who doesn't know shit about community problems but is more than fucking trigger happy to help in the expansion of the prison industrial complex at the expense of people of color. Not some motherfucking pig in a uniform and badge who doesn't know who I am, where I come from, or my fucking story but whose job is to serve and protect through forceful brutality of the people in order to protect the rich.

The problem is that we as a community no longer are self-empowered or have the means to solve our own problems. They eliminated programs that did that. Black Panther Party, Brown Berets, I Wor Kuen, etc. Now we have 'reform' based non-profits who don't relate to the community and the State. In fact, I don't see too much of a difference between the State and the non-profit industrial complex - only difference is that white yuppies are mad in love with the latter. Why was it that I couldn't fucking solve my own issue about who broke my window?

The deeper issue is also that we've been so fucking colonized into allowing ourselves to be reliant on the same State that brutalizes us to solve our problems. We need to rid ourselves of the knee-jerk reaction to call 9-1-1 when shit goes down. Fuck a police report. We need to band together as a community to lay the groundwork for community conflict resolution which has the welfare of every individual of the community in mind, not the welfare of the prison industrial complex. Only by doing this do we materially and mentally divest ourselves from the State and the prison industrial complex as well as challenge ourselves as a community to envision a society where justice doesn't involve prison time, but rather, constructive dialogue and growth.

Thoughts on Love

This is mainly food for thought (haven't had time to really think about it yet, but I will soon):

1) What does it mean to give love?

2) What does it mean to receive love?

3) What kind of work does love require?

4) What are the intricacies of power dynamics in love? Especially in relation to patriarchy? How do these power dynamics keep us from love?

5) How does one use love as a tool for liberation and personal transformation instead of a passive drug?

Hey, we are all swimming in this soup. Remember, you're brave!

Sweet, reassuring words that kept me going through the night. That plus a few drinks too many accompanied by far too many incoherent conversations and dialogues.

Genuine love is rarely an emotional space where needs are instantly gratified. To know love we have to invest time and commitment... 'dreaming that love will save us, solve all our problems or provide a steady state of bliss or security only keeps us stuck in wishful fantasy, undermining the real power of the love -- which is to transform us.' Many people want love to function like a drug, giving them an immediate and sustained high. They want to do nothing, just passively receive the good feeling.


I couldn't have said it better myself. Love, I've concluded, is the process in which people become mutually committed to building a meaningful and critical relationship - to be invested and accountable to the welfare and growth of your partner and of your fellow human beings. This means maintaining commitment even in the presence of hardships and tribulations rather than severing ties. This means allowing room for individual differences but uniting over commonalities to foster the growth of something mutual - the two don't have to be exclusive and shouldn't be.

Until this is achieved and understood, there can be no room for revolution. In order to combat our socialization and institutions of oppression, we must first master how to love one another and how to love ourselves.

Love must become the language of growth for revolutionaries with militancy and self-defense as the language of resistance. The two cannot be mutually exclusive - it is through love of yourself, of others, and of community that must compel one to use any means necessary prevent harm or further oppression of that which you love, and you must use love to simultaneously create a better world and to prevent yourself from being stuck in a cycle of constant resistance and destruction as opposed to construction.

How do we combine the two to create a comprehensive language of revolution?

Off the motherfucking Pig!

I was just shown these videos today during SEAC (Southeast Asian Collective) and seriously, it pissed me the fuck off. Pigs (police) piss me the fuck off in general, but seriously, emerging new material of blatant police brutality piss me off to no end.

Basically, what happened was that Phuong Ho, a 20 year-old exchange student from Việt Nam, got into a scuffle with his roommate who called the cops on him, resulting in Phuong getting beat with batons and tasered while handcuffed face-first on the floor with a cop sitting on him. Motherfuckers.

The first video is the actual documentation of the crime, while the second video is Phuong Ho's testimony.

In the second video, in which Phuong describes what happened, he says that while he bent over to pick up his glasses, after asking the cop for permission they took a night stick to his back. What a bunch of fucking cowards. The man was bent the fuck over you assholes. The interview is on point to a large degree. If you're getting the shit kicked out of you, in a tiny ass hallway, it's goddamn near impossible to comply to every command on whim. It's a fucking cruel Catch 22 because the pigs are beating his ass for 'resisting arrest' but he can't comply because they're beating his ass, handcuffed on the fucking floor in a cramped corridor.

There is absolutely no excuse for pigs being given the ability to use any force - especially force to this degree on anyone.

What's even more sickening is that the police department claims this couldn't possibly be a race related crime because "In addition to the fact that we have a number of Vietnamese officers who actually are a part of our department. If anything, we're trying to do more recruiting from within that community." (San Jose Police Chief Rob Davis). Fucking pigs ass motherfuckers. I am so pissed. Way to fucking objectify token people of color you asshole. And trying to recruit more from the community?! Those are just recycled colonialist tactics to divide the community and to create inter-community conflict! Bullshit! These are the same tactics that the French colonialists used against the Vietnamese because there's no better way to split a community than to turn its members on each other and giving some members special badges and uniforms is a sure way to destroy any trust in the community.

The fact is, people of color communities are fucking hounded on by the pigs. No doubt. But what must be learned is that we cannot rely on the justice system because it's fucking reactionary at best. Justice is hardly ever 'served' by the State to victims - look at Rodney King or Trinh Ly. The justice system has failed the people time and time again. And even if they do 'fire' a cop (which means they just move the fucker to another city), this happens in retrospect of the crime and the justice system does nothing to address the root problems that cause these crimes in the first place - the very existence of a uniformed, badged, and armed pigs. The only real justice is getting the pigs off the fucking block and letting communities solve their own shit.

We don't need any colonialist pigs terrorizing communities. If the government wants to address issues of 'crime' then address poverty and all the intricacies of it. If the government wants to address the 'drug' problem then address the oppressive nature of global capitalism that fuels drug production in Third World nations. The government makes as killing off of 'crime' and 'drugs'. They are invested in it. They aren't invested in solving these issues. They aren't invested in the community. Look at the expanding prison industrial complex - more than three times more money is spent on building jails than on education in California and despite a budget crisis, police presence never decreases in communities, and if anything, it increases because the State makes money off of the crimes the police 'reports'.

I don't care what color you are, the fact that these atrocious crimes happen on a daily basis is more than enough reason to get the pigs off the block. If the justice system fails us, it's our duty to take it upon ourselves to defend the community - we absolutely cannot allow the State to continue its unabashed use of violence and terror against our communities. If they don't respond to non-violence, then speak in the only language left that they'll heed: self-defense by the use of any means necessary, force or otherwise.

Here Comes the Sun...

Some more high's and low's:

+ Ryan Lue must have been an interior designer in another life. His ideas for a cafe-esque dining area are pure genius.

+ Most of my belongings are in my car, only my bed, dining room table, bike, and one box are left. I'm almost out!

+ One more midterm left! At least I'm taking it pass/no pass.

+ I'm eating solid foods... though not really enjoying much of it. My fecal matter is okay... not too solid yet.

+ I talked to Dorothy's/Grace's mother last night. She is amazing and it made my day to talk to her. She's hanging out with my mother on Friday apparently.

+ I really like it when Dorothy is happy.

+ I really like playing guitar. It feels nice to try and play again.

+ It's almost already 6th week! Dorothy is coming soon! Super excited!23 more days!



- I dropped my desk on my shin yesterday. It hurts and there is quite a bit of localized edema.

- I'm screwed for my midterm on Friday

- The vacuum in the apartment sucks... so the floor is still dirty. Agh.

- It's only the beginning of 6th week next week...

- My Korean lab partner dropped the class. She was really fun... =[ I hate that english is the 'standardized' language in scientific publishing. Lame.

- I am lonely.

Nekked

Today I showered in the gym completely naked!

It was the first time I've ever been that exposed in such a hyper-masculine environment in my entire life, granted I was scared shitless to undress all the way. I sort of justified it by saying that at least I kind of have a cute butt, and could work with that if nothing else.

So ha! Take that society! I won't cover my body in shame! I am proud!

Sort of...

I want to be comfortable in my own skin.

In all my times in gym showers, it seems that I've only seen white men parading around nude, whilst people of color, especially asian men, are always clothed. Maybe it's just me, maybe it's coincidental, but society dictates otherwise. Gym showers are where all my insecurities about myself get amplified - I feel so small it hurts. Take that whatever way you want.

I'm afraid of being nude, not because it's taboo, but rather, because I have been conditioned to be ashamed of my body. This body, according to society, is not what an ideal man's body is supposed to look like. I've been told this since elementary school when a kid named Brandon told me I looked like a girl because I had boobies when I was changing. That only got worse in middle school and high school - especially in high school where white kids were especially cruel to asian kids.

Today was a liberating first step.

Up's and Down's

Just some down time - finished my molecular biology midterm! Definitely one of those 'goddamnit, I knew I shouldn't have skimmed over that section' kind of tests. Agh.

Anyways, just woke up from a nap, feeling good but worried that it's going to rain today.

Some high's and low's.

High's:
+ I love naps, so freaking much. There are a few things that are guaranteed to get me in a good mood. Those things are naps, good food, and good company.

+ Last night I decided that I'm pretty good looking for a person who isn't super active/involved in my own personal appearance, though I could use a shave and shower. Yay for skinny jeans?

+ I like being done with midterms.

+ I like sex. I hope I'm not a sex addict, but at the same time, I don't want to be ashamed of sex. I'd like to ponder more on what it means to be sex-positive.

+ I really like instrumental music much more than vocal music.

+ I like firm and cold purple grapes.

Low's
- I don't like rain when I'm unprepared. I don't like wet clothing. I don't like going outside when it rains. I don't like it when all the snails and worms come out because I don't want to step on them and squish them.

- I don't like tricky midterms that involve trying to memorize notes word-for-word.

- I don't like when my hair gets oily from not showering. Ugh.

I'm really enjoying life right now, with the small exception of the potentially bad weather that is coming. Yay! Week should be going downhill from here.

Politics of Sex... Revisted

While eating lunch with a friend today, we had an interesting conversation on the politics of sex. This post is more of an attempt to spark and promote curiosity and questioning rather than providing answers.

I think that it is undeniable that sex, especially in America, has become extremely commodified and hyper-fetishized. Consequences include increased objectification of the human body as an entity from which one could derive pleasure. With upwards of 10% of Americans identified as sex addicts,

Sex has interestingly been used as a tool to perpetuate forms of oppression, such as patriarchy and racism. What I am particularly interested in is if sex is also a tool which attacks social relationships between people - especially romantic relationships.

According to my friend, it seems that unlike most other regions in the world, American romantic relationships are heavily based on the premise of sexual relations. So the question is, how does one know that the relationship one is in is based on mutual love and affection as opposed to physical lust?

The only way to really find out is to see if eliminating sexual relations from the relationship destroys the relationship or not. In my case, it was unwillingly done because of geographic distance (long-distance relationship). Another way would be to be in a sexually open relationship. If the crux of the relationship is not sex, then it would follow that the relationship wouldn't suffer if it were sexually open.

At the same time, however, the previous statements are overly simplistic because sex can be regarded as forms of building trust or intimacy. It is important, however, to question even these assumptions because of the way we treat sex. What does it mean to be intimate? Can intimacy be expressed in other ways other than sex? Is sex intimate?

To me it seems like it's based on personal perspective. Sex can be viewed as an intimate matter, depending on the goal. If your goal is physical pleasure, then it doesn't have to be intimate, but if your goal is to give yourself intimately to someone, then it has the possibility of becoming intimate.

But once again, the main question is, how does one know that one's relationship isn't based purely on sex, and given the nature of sex in this country, is sex a tool of oppression?

I think Americans spend a lot of time thinking about sex or ideas related to sex because we've been arguably hypersexualized (given the nature of advertisements and such), so is sex a drug? The basis of drugs and sex can be seen as being very similar - physical pleasure. There is a considerable amount of money that one has to spend on sex, just like drugs. If we assume that you're not going out and looking to spend time with a sex-worker, think of the 'orthodox' courting rituals. Dressing up to look sexy. That costs money. According to popular media, a good place to go are bars, which cost money. Alcohol costs money. Looking sexy could cost money in the form of possibly gym memberships or exercise equipment. The pharmaceutical industry also has a stake with products such as Viagra or Cialis.

Both sex and drugs can be argued as ways to keep the masses down and out. There are more identified sex addicts in this country than cocaine and heroin addicts. Sexual addiction is defined as conditions in which individuals spend a detrimental amount of time dedicated to sex, in which relationships and personal well-being begin to deteriorate.

Sex is obviously no longer just about procreation. The role of sex is increasingly recreational in today's society. So I guess the question becomes, is it okay to feel good?

I think so. But to what end? How much effort in one's sex life is too much? Fuck if I know.

I'm not sure what my conclusion is. Is sex bad? I think sex could be seen as mutual aid... but I could also see how sex is keeping us down. Is moderation the key?

I guess the main questions for me is whether or not my relationship is premised on sex, and if so, is that a good or bad thing. Furthermore, is sex, in the context of today, a mechanism that perpetuates capitalism and more specific forms of oppression?

Main Questions:
1) Are relationships (mine included) premised on sex, and if so, is it a bad or a good thing? Or neither? What does it mean if one's relationship is premised on sex in terms of relating to institutions of oppression?

2) Is sex, especially in today's society, a mechanism that perpetuates capitalism and more specific forms of oppression (racism, sexism)?

3) How does sex affect a person's relationship with others around them? Does sex play a huge role in how we treat others? If so, what are some of the impacts (objectification?)?

Serve the Individual Well-being Program

Perhaps one of the greatest challenges in trying reevaluate power dynamics while advocating for a radical redistribution of privilege within a capitalist society is to maintain a balance between individual well-being and collective welfare.

In a society where rugged individualism is revered, it is easy for anti-capitalists to become reactionary - placing the collective, or 'good of the people' above individual interests. This highlights a profound lack of understanding of collective theory among the Left which is both historical and contemporary.

Historically, communist and socialist experiments, such as Cuba, USSR, Socialist Republic of Việt Nam, have failed to materialize either theories effectively, and have either crumbled or withered away into State Capitalism.

In more recent events, we see a shift from grassroots to the non-profit industrial complex, a system and institution which is inherently un-democratic, let alone consensus based. You cannot preach about social equity while failing to practice equity in your organization. It is crucial to realize that it is not a dichotomy of either focusing on the means or the ends, but rather, one must synthesize the means into the ends. In other words, you must see your means as also your ends.

Consensus based practice, in theory, focuses on addressing the issue of balancing individual welfare in a collective situation.

Why do I bring this up?

I have realized a personal tendency to place more emphasis on collective relationships while ignoring my own personal needs and wants. As Dorothy (for those who don't know, she is my girlfriend) has pointed out that when I express my needs or wants, it is usually in the context of a collective relationship, and not individual.

I recognize that this is not only detrimental to myself, but also to all collective relationships in which I participate. In an effort to take action and change this, I have decided that one measure to take is to list out individual likes/desires/wants on a regular basis. I suppose I'll call this the 'Serve the Individual Well-Being Program'. (I like writing things down so I can come back later and ponder - I suppose this could be an attempt to map out my personhood?)

Along the way, I will try to further analyze martyrdom of the individual that is prevalent in collective situations as well as how to promote the growth of individuals within collective relationships without being detrimental to the collective as a whole.

So the first list of my likes/desires/wants:
1) I like Marvin Gaye, especially the song 'Sexual Healing'. I listened to it on repeat this morning when I opened at the Food Co-op.

2) I like to sing when no one is around.

3) I like to dance when no one is around.

(I guess I'm shy?)

4) I want to be comfortable/confident enough to be able to sing and dance in public? Maybe?

Okay, that's it for today. Nap time.

Chiều Một Mình Qua Phố

What are the politics of sex?

Anarchists have quite the optimistic view. According to many schools of anarchist thought, sex is liberation. Sex is mutual aid.

Then you have the Catholic church. They're quite the opposite. Sex is temptation. Only the holiest of people devote themselves to a life of celibacy.

I don't know what I believe, in fact, I've only really begun to think about the politics of sex, not just in abstract, but in personal context only fairly recently.

Sex has historically been used by the colonizer to dominate communities. Take an example such a colonized Việt Nam. The French colonialists often raped women, not just as a way to terrorize a community, but to feminize the men as well as turn the community against each other. The children of the French colonizers obviously enjoyed far more privileges than the full-blooded Vietnamese children. This was repeated over and over again throughout history. Sex has historically been the weapon of the oppressor.

Where does sex come from? Where does this idea of rape come from? Proponents of Howard Zinn argue that it came from the white man. The colonizer. Where did the white man get the idea of rape?

What does it mean for me to be a heterosexual male and desire sex? Is it really because of some drive to procreate or is it just another system to keep me stupid and down? How many times do I think about sex a day when I could be thinking of a way to free myself?

What does it mean in regards to social division of labor? Language is so telling. Women get fucked. Men do the fucking. Sex usually stops when the man comes. Why is it that men are pimps but women are sluts?

What does it mean to get jealous? Is it some capitalist mind-set/fetish to own something that drives jealousy?

Is sex at the core of objectification?

Are humans naturally monogamous? What the fuck does it mean to be natural, anyways...

I wonder how many a great human being have died because of sex...

My Inner Whitey

I've been pondering a lot about my own internalized colonization lately, and I've decided to try and document the progression/development of my inner whitey, or just overall inner-colonization.

When I was growing up, my family really liked (and still likes) showcases of Vietnamese pop music such as Paris By Night. Consequently, one of my biggest idols when I was a wee-little kid was Đon Hồ:
But that didn't last very long. No one thought Paris By Night was cool even though I went to a school with so many Vietnamese kids the school celebrated Tết(Vietnamese New Years). Instead, my next idol (as well as every kid at my elementary school) was Red Ranger:

He was the first of many white people that I'd secretly idolize growing up. To speed things up, from elementary school to middle school, I was really interested in the military and grew fond of war movies - particularly movies about the Việt Nam War. The games I played growing up always involved killing VC's, not as a member of the ARVN, but rather, I always wanted to be Johnson, the white guy who jumped out of cool helicopters, blowing up villages and gunning down hordes of VC's with my M-16 rifle like Rambo.
Also, during this period of my life, I was first exposed to the annual April 25th protests in Westminster, where people lined the streets and set fire to Hồ Chí Minh pictures and Vietnamese flags (not that pro-colonizer yellow with red strips flag, I'm talking about the yellow star flag). I find it interesting that the only internationally reknown or historically recognized Vietnamese person I was ever taught about while growing up was someone who my community considered a fuck-up and traitor. No one ever made an effort to actually teach me about a Vietnamese figure I could be proud of and look up to, instead, they talked about how America was so great for letting us flee and take refuge in our Little Saigon.

Onwards to high school. It was in high school that I started developing my own musical tastes that branched out from what my parents exposed me to. My parents provided the foundation of my musical appreciation with bands such as The Beatles, Carlos Santana, and the Eagles. It was my friend named Cody Pettrow who really had an impact on the music I listened to as well as my decision to pick up playing guitar. He really got me hooked on Weezer, and we shared a deep love of Rivers Cuomo (bordering creepy fan-boy status):
Rivers Cuomo basically taught me that it was okay to be a loser - if you're white.

Next, I got into the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and for a while my idols were Anthony Kiedis and John Frusciante (who is still arguably one of my biggest musical influences as well as idols):











I don't think I cannot emphasize enough how much I really liked John Frusciante (picture on the right). It was a sort of affinity that lasted throughout high school and through much of college. I still have a folder with pictures of him on my laptop and I used to go on youtube just to watch live performances of him. I wanted tattoos because of him. I thought smoking was cool because of him. Yeah, kind of sad, I know. I had a small Frusciante hiatus when I really got into the Beatles and Nirvana and started looking up to John Lennon and Kurt Cobain.

Basically, I spent most of my life looking to the white heterosexual man for someone to look up to and idolize next, resulting in me spending a lot of time lamenting that I wasn't white and that my daydreams never actually involved the real me because no asian boy fits the mold of cool lead singer of a rock band or village-bombing figher pilot.

It wasn't until high school that I started having non-white idols again. I hung out with the group of asian kids who adored Korean, Japanese, and Taiwanese (specifically, Taiwanese since the girl who had a thing for me was Taiwanese and she made an effort to distinguish the difference between Taiwanese and Mainland Chinese dramas). The girl who had a crush on me sort of projected her idols onto me such as Jun Matsumoto (left) and Van Ness Wu (right):


Basically, you couldn't be asian and cool unless you strove to be either Japanese, Korean, or from the Taiwanese boy band, F4. I remember Vietnamese friends trying to learn Japanese, Korean, or Chinese, but never once bothered to learn Vietnamese despite being unable to speak their parents' language. It wasn't cool to be Vietnamese, but I had the advantage of having long hair and not too many 'Vietnamese' features and could somewhat pass as an ambiguous asian, but seriously, despite going to a school with lots of Vietnamese kids, I associated with a predominantly Taiwanese and Japanese crowd. Hell, even I tried to learn how to speak Japanese at one point. Learning Vietnamese was called fobby while learning Japanese, Korean, or Chinese made you cool. Whenever we went out to eat, we'd drive far distances to eat Japanese or Korean food, but despite being only minutes from Westminster, I never once ate Vietnamese food with my friends in high school. The only time I remembered having Vietnamese pride as a kid was in middle school, not because I was proud of who I was, but because we had to stick together to fight back against violence from the Latino and white kids (which makes me question, where the hell did all the Taiwanese kids that I knew in high school go to middle school?!)

As an asian male in high school, I quickly learned what Yellow Fever meant before Wongfu made it cool and popularized. The girls I knew outside of the Japanese-worshipping clique, liked white boys. As a Vietnamese kid, I wasn't white enough for those asian girls and not Japanese enough for the other asian-asian girls. Fuck. It sucked hanging out with girls and have to listen to them talk about how hot white guys were and how lame asian boys were because we're so timid and lanky. I remember me and a bunch of guy-friends had huge bouts of 'fuck girls, they're stupid' phases.

I also remember that high school was when I first learned how to masturbate and first watched porn. This was significant because before this I was always teased about my penis size for being asian, but actually seeing another man's penis - and not just any type of man, but a white man - really fucked with me. When I realized that I actually wasn't as big as the guys in the porn I saw, it made me realize that all the things the white kids were saying to me in middle school could actually be right.

Anyways, I'll save college for later because I have to get back to studying, but yeah, I still carry a lot of this colonization with me today. I'm still insecure as fuck about my penis size. I get pissed, but also really sad, when I see an asian girl dating a white guy. I still can't imagine an asian guy as front person of a band. My concept of what it means to be a man is still all sorts of white. Regardless, the first step to fighting back against a colonized mindset is to know what the fuck went wrong.

The Law of Households

While reading for my history class (which is not nearly as exciting as I'd hoped), I came across an interesting passage:

" The seven grounds for divorce of a wife by her husband are: 1) if she is childless (without a male child); 2) if she commits adultery; 3) if she disobeys her parents-in-law; 4) if she talks to much; 5) if she steals; 6) if she is jealous; 7) if she has a bad disease. In all cases the husband must write a notice of divorce which must be signed jointly by the parents and near relatives. Those who cannot write must make their mark."

Wow.

When I read that, I laughed out loud in my lab class. If she talks to much?! Seriously?!

What loons!

Anyways, I don't know if other people will find it funny, but I found it mildly amusing because of the potential commentary the passage serves on the people living during the times.

Meh, back to work.

San Diego Asian Film Festival

I recently went to the San Diego Asian Film Festival to watch "A Village Called Versailles", and upon entering the theatre to find a seat, I was handed multiple coupons, some of which being for local casinos - namely Barona and Harrah's.

I find this extremely troubling. On www.sdaff.org, the proclaimed mission statement of SDAFF is "to connect audiences with the human experience through the Pan Asian media arts." and one of their methods of fulfilling this mission statement is "Engaging the public in meaningful discourse and positive social change through our programs".

There's no positive social change happening if gambling casinos are being advertised at an ASIAN film festival. Perhaps the organizers of the event are disconnected from issues affecting 'Asian-Americans', but casinos specifically target Asians who have one of the highest rates of gambling problems.

It's a sick cycle that keeps people in poverty and destroys families. People lose their jobs and go into debt because of gambling and being unemployed only further encourages gambling because of the false hope that you can 'win it big'. It's especially problematic in Asians who are not very open about addictions or traditionally mentally-based problems and language barriers only make getting help even harder. The whole gambling issue also perpetuates youth gang violence in the community.

It also doesn't help that now Asians are getting a reputation for being good at gambling ever since Vietnamese players started winning Poker tournaments. At least in my family, people like John Phan are regarded as heroes because he represents the Vietnamese community. These aren't good role models. They're one-in-a-million. Gambling is very much like capitalism. There are the rare, but exceptional rags-to-riches stories that get shoved down the throats of the masses to keep everyone hooked on the prospect of making it big while in reality, people are getting screwed left and right while feeding into the machine.

If SDAFF wants to enact positive social change, I think they should address the gambling issue. Don't give casinos another venue to target Asians more than they already do. Fight back - help empower the community to resist the gambling industry. Casinos already go to great lengths to get people hooked on gambling through tactics such as bussing people to casinos free of charge and offering vouchers and free lunches. A study done by NICOS Chinese Health Coalition reported that gambling is viewed by the community as the biggest issue and that more than a fifth of the community are self-proclaimed gambling addicts.

This is a real problem and SDAFF needs to address this. It's unacceptable for the organization to feed into the hands of the system that is fucking their community for monetary sponsorship.

Race Mixing is for Commies!

http://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d83451c45669e20120a5edb6f1970c

http://www.racialicious.com/2009/10/13/%E2%80%9Crace-mixing-is-communism/

On point. Socialism, Communism, or whatever society we want to envision after Capitalism, must encompass more than redistribution of wealth, but must also include radical redistribution of privilege.

On Self-Defense

'An eye for an eye makes the world blind'...

There are a lot of problems I have with non-violence and any movement that confines itself to just non-violent tactics.

Just by studying history, it is very clear that in any situation where there is a disparity between power, where one group is oppressing another, the people in power will do anything to defend their power - by any means necessary.

In fact, it is absurd to believe that the oppressor will not consider completely annihilating a population to keep power. We have seen evidence of that in situations such as Nazi Germany with the holocaust, or even in Việt Nam where Kennedy believed that the only way to win the war was to send the Vietnamese back to barbarism.

I believe that Malcolm X said it best when he stated that the language of the oppressor is violence and that unless we speak to the oppressor in the same language, the oppressor will not be able to understand our demands.

Unless people rise up to defend themselves they will be wiped out, either by force or by mental and social colonization.

What about the glorified heroes of non-violence?

Let's start with Jesus.



The son of God's most famous contribution to non-violence was the whole turn the other cheek deal, however, I think it is obvious to anyone that not all of us have the luxury of being resurrected after we die. While people may praise Jesus for being a champion of non-violence, I see him as the greatest deterrent. The lesson I learn from Jesus is as follows: turn the other cheek, and get crucified (I'm being real, I don't mean to be offensive). I don't know about everyone else, but being crucified isn't my idea of liberation.

Let's take another example: Thích Quảng Đức.



Many know him as the burning monk on the cover of the Rage Against the Machine CD cover. He immolated himself to protest the unjust Diệm regime. Many people champion Thích Quảng Đức as a shining example of aggressive non-violence and that he and other self-immolating monks contributed to the downfall of Diệm.

I disagree. Diệm was recording saying that he enjoyed watching the Buddhists monks kill themselves and compared it to a human barbecue. It is clear that Diệm had no intent on changing his oppressive policies towards the Buddhists just because they took their own lives in noble ways, and if anything, they made Diệm's job easier, since he was already out to kill the Buddhists anyways. It is important to note that Diệm was overthrown by a bloody coup that resulted Diệm's death. It is arguable that had it not been for the coup, Diệm would never have been overthrown, especially since he had American backing.

These are two very specific examples, however, the history of non-violent movements have proven to be ineffective. To me, the non-violent movements in the Civil Rights Era were failures and only resulted in excessive physical violence towards blacks and did nothing but get ineffectual legislation passed. As Malcolm X said, "Nothing has changed". Police brutality of blacks hasn't stopped. Rodney King was far after the Civil Rights movement. Professor Gates and the incident with the racist pigs was just a few months ago. Having a half-black president doesn't mean shit.

Especially in contemporary left-wing organizations, the non-violence movement is dominated by people with privilege. It is easy to advocate non-violence when you have the luxury of being able to wait for liberation and especially for whites because they are less likely to be brutalized by the oppressor than people of color. It is easy to advocate for non-violence when your community is not being physically attacked. It is absurd to advocate non-violence when the only thing the oppressor has ever been is violent.

I believe that movements based on self-defense are the only ones who have actually achieved the overthrow of an oppressive regime. History tells us that this is the most effective tactic. From the Bolshevik Revolution, to the Vietnamese Revolution - these are all examples of an oppressed mass organizing to defend themselves against an oppressive regime and ultimately overthrowing the regime. Even failed attempts such as the Black Panther Party have shown us the effectiveness of self-defense in empowering a community to control their own destiny and not ask for hand outs from the powers that be. Self defense is key in self-realization that people can stand on their own two feet and liberate themselves without being reliant on the oppressor.

It is important to understand that the oppressor's attacks on the community are not always physical, but are largely psychological. When society teaches you to hate yourself and have a distorted standard of beauty, that is an attack on the community, and is far more effective at destroying unity than any bomb ever can.

Once we understand that we're under attack in our every day lives, we can begin to understand that the problem is deep rooted in the system itself and that revolution is the only way to liberation. We must uproot evil, not just chop it off at the stem.

The goal of self-defense isn't to make the world blind, but rather, the goal is that if the oppressor threatens to smack your cheek, you chop of the hand so that it can no longer threaten not just your welfare, but the welfare of the entire community.

I am NOT an American

I despise the label 'Asian-American'.

To me, it denotes ownership, more specifically, a nationalist ownership of generalized Asians by Americans. Just the very notion of adding a hyphenated term to my so-called ethnic identification signals being thrust into limbo - I am obviously not American otherwise they would just call me American but there's a need for the colonialist to have a sense of ownership over me, otherwise I'd be called asian.

Asian is what the colonist labels me. I had no say in my identity. The term Asian doesn't take into account my own personal narrative - a son of Vietnamese refugees. It doesn't take into account where I come from, where my parents come from, what language I speak, what food I eat, but rather, the label is a way for the colonialist to signify that I am not white - that I am different and therefore don't belong.

I sure as hell don't identify with the title 'American'. To be American, you must be a citizen of America. Being a citizen, to me, signifies a certain attachment to the country of America - a certain loyalty, but more importantly, it signifies someone who shares in the fruits of the country and shares a common language, culture, and practice. I don't share in the fruits of a country that was made for whites and is still run for whites. My community, the Vietnamese peoples obviously didn't share in the fruits of this country when it dropped more than 6.7 million tons of explosives and sprayed more than 40 million gallons of Agent Orange on our homeland, displacing millions of people. Don't let those numbers escape you. A 1-ton bomb is more than capable of killing 130 people and the amount of Agent Orange sprayed on Việt Nam has destroyed 1/4 of the arable land that was available before the war.

It is obvious that I am not a citizen because other citizens don't recognize me as such. Laws are all talk about equality but when I am still called gook and chink by white racists and when the pigs on the block condescendingly ask me if I speak english before threatening to arrest me, it is made painfully clear to me that nothing has actively been done to achieve any sense of equality.

Unfortunately, however, I'm certainly not Asian, or more accurately, Vietnamese, because America's social colonialism has made it so that I don't know how to fluently speak the tongue of my parents. I no longer know my parent's culture as my own, but rather, the culture I am faced with is a sad compromise in which, unless something is done to resist colonization, the culture of my parents will eventually be lost throughout generations as was done with blacks or more assimilated peoples such as the Japanese in America.

So fuck Asian-American, call it what it is: I am a colonized person. Every day American society tries to rid me of my culture and the culture from of my parents. Every day the generation gap widens between the colonized youth and the colonized adults and elders. We of the colonized youth hardly speak our language (in fact, we're told that our parents speak funny english!), know our customs, or can eat our own food. We look to the white person for a standard of beauty (or specifically for Vietnamese, we sometimes look to more 'higher' asians such as Japanese and Koreans). We've been taught not only to hate ourselves, but to hate our community.

So it's time to fight back against this continual colonialist take-over of our every day lives. Every time someone speaks Vietnamese, tries to cook Vietnamese food, questions where and why Vietnamese people practice certain customs - these are all forms of active resistance to dominant colonialism. We must be proud of who we are (and I'm talking about all colonized people - not just Vietnamese) because if we are not, this racist society will be quick to brainwash us into hating ourselves.

UC San Diego and the Myth of 'Mis-Prioritization'

Today I read a report titled 'Retention and Graduation Rates 2008-2009', a study done by UC San Diego's Office of Student Research and Information regarding, well, retention and graduation rates of students at UCSD.

It's kind of shocking and there are a lot of problems with the research.

1) The 4-year graduation rate is a shocking 57% for the total student body. 5 year graduation rate is 80% and 6-years (holy cow, some people stay six years?!) 85%. Wow. The average time to degree for the total student body is 4.2 years and 12.7 quarters.

Why is this problematic?

It further illustrates how access to higher education is a complete myth - especially if students are staying more than four years, thus paying more for tuition. This isn't the fault of students, but rather, the problem is found in the budget cuts. Cutting classes translates to a longer graduation time and thus more tuition, which is exactly what UC students are currently facing.

Furthermore, UC Regents have proposed measures such as increasing tuition for students who stay more than four years as an incentive to get them to graduate sooner. This is insane especially when the four year graduation rate is so low. Barely half of UC San Diego students graduate within four years, which means that such a proposal to increase the tuition for people staying more than four years affects a huge proportion of students.

2) Data regarding retention rates only covers 1 and 2-years. There's no data for 3,4,5, or even 6-year retention rates. The data provided are as follows: 1-year retention rate: 94% and 2-year retention rate: 88%.

Another problem is that the study doesn't clearly define the terminology used in the research. For example, does retention rate refer to the percentage of students from the original class that make it past 1 year and then 2 years or does it mean the percentage from the class already surviving? In other words, if the total entering class of year X is 1,000 and the 1-year retention rate of that class is 90% so 900 students make it to the first year, does a 2-year retention rate of say, 80% refer to 80% of 900, or 80% of 1,000. In terms of raw data, it would be more beneficial to administration to use 80% of 1,000, but once again, these terms aren't defined.

What little data regarding retention rate is heavily political in motive because the trend is clear that the retention rate decreases exponentially with years and why would the university exclude 3 and 4-year retention data? Especially if they're already including 4,5, and 6-year graduation rates. My guess is that the 4-year retention rate at UC San Diego is appalling given the cost of tuition and lack of concern for student well-being at this campus.

3) The study does not address class. It includes data regarding race and gender, but does not show data illustrating the graduation and retention rates of students from different socioeconomic backgrounds.

Why does this matter?

Because you can be a person of color and still have a high income. In terms of addressing intersectionality, it is important not to exclude class. The university, if they want to publish a fully comprehensive report, should be addressing class and whether or not being poor affects the likelihood of a student graduating.

This study leaves out some crucial data and isn't widely publicized, but what data it does show, the university makes a very obvious attempt to frame in a positive light. Instead of addressing issues that may contribute to a 94% 1-year retention rate, the study instead chooses to state that this retention rate is one of the best amongst all the UC's. It still doesn't change the fact that 6% of students don't even make it past year 1. Why?

It is important with data such as this, to question and ask why. To me, this data clearly shows inaccessibility of higher education - through low 4-year graduation rates which are much lower amongst students of color than whites and exponentially decreasing retention rates - also lower among students of color than whites. What this shows is the presence of institutional racism which, unlike racism in the 60's, is very concealed. It no longer takes the form of a 'whites only' sign, but rather, takes the form of making institutions that empower communities inaccessible to oppressed communities. Education empowers communities and yet the presence of oppressed communities - people of color, working class, and LGBTQIA are very low and coupled with retention rate figures, the numbers for people in these communities to even graduate college is even lower.

What we are facing is not mis-prioritization, but rather, a clear illustration of the true intent and priorities of the ruling class within the framework of capitalism. There is no mis-prioritization when the UC Regents have been increasing student fees for decades while increasing Regent salaries exponentially - that's a clear illustration of their priorities, which is profit before people by any means necessary. We need to stop being sympathetic and stop framing budget cuts as mis-prioritization. Call it what it is. It's profiteering and extortion of the poor by the rich - something that's been going on for centuries.

Let's put this into the bigger picture. They're cutting education and making education inaccessible while increasing police presence in oppressed communities and increasing military spending. Once again, it's important to note that education empowers communities. Education allows us to think critically, to question the powers that be, and to know our history. Education allows us to become conscious of our situation and how to we liberate ourselves. These are things that the ruling class is intentionally preventing oppressed communities from having. Instead, they're pouring more funds into institutions that have historically disempowered and kept communities down.

This isn't mis-prioritization. This is oppression.

Montagnards/Degar Peoples and Racism Beyond Whiteness

When I went to visit Việt Nam last winter, I was taken to visit a Montagnard village by the Catholic Bishop with whom I was staying with in Đà Lạt. It was the first time I've ever heard of the Montagnard peoples and it wasn't ever made clear to me that the Montagnard people were not Vietnamese, but rather, a separate indigenous population (I would later find out that Vietnamese is not even their native tongue). .

It is important to note that the Montagnard are not Vietnamese, but rather, are a recognized indigenous peoples. In fact, they never had contact with foreigners (Vietnamese included) until the 1800s when the French missionaries came to Việt Nam (which wasn't Việt Nam back then). The Montagnard's first contact with Vietnamese people came later when the French brought their Vietnamese servants with them to the highlands where the Montagnards lived. Also, the term Montagnard didn't exist before the French. The population refers to themselves as the Degar people. Montagnard means 'mountain people' in French and it was the term used by the French to identify the Degar people.

This complicates the narrative of Vietnamese independence and Vietnamese refugees because while Degar people are lumped into the category of Vietnamese in America, they are considered an ethnic minority in Việt Nam. In fact, Degar people do not speak Vietnamese and don't share cultural practices with the Vietnamese people. The Degar people have been trying to liberate themselves and establish a self-autonomous state recognizing Degar peoples as independent from the Vietnamese people (BAJARAKA and FULRO movements).

This brings up an important point to illustrate: Minority-Majority narratives always involve a disparity and unequal balance of power. This highlights the need to move away from glorified democracy to an actual working consensus model that takes into account all narratives and eliminates the rule of majority over minority. For example, in Việt Nam, we currently see a movement to modernize Vietnamese culture, however, this is in reference strictly to Vietnamese culture, which is the majority culture while leaving out and threatening minority narratives such as that of the Degar people. Also, the idea of Vietnamese as the national language once again leaves out Degar people who are indigenous to the Central Highlands of Việt Nam and who don't speak Vietnamese. As we can see, the minority-majority narrative extends itself beyond whiteness, just as racism extends itself beyond whiteness as well. Racism often involves the minority-majority narrative because it is often those who are the majority who have the most institutional and systematic power to oppress minorities. It is the majority that are also able to achieve hegemonic power as well. The key thing to note, however, that the majority-minority narrative that I was referring to, especially in regards to racism, applies strictly to nation-states. In the global scene, racism is still predominantly a white supremacist structure because we now live in a system of globalized capitalism where imperialism no longer limits itself to physical colonization, but also to colonization of the mind. We see examples of this through a spread of the Western standard of beauty to almost every corner of the world.

Who Am I and What This Is

Hello,

My name is Daniel, and according to society, I am a Vietnamese (or in even more general terms - Asian) male who is currently a university undergraduate.

This blog is a space to contemplate and explore who I am, where am I, where I want to go, and how I'm going to get there.

Some things I look to explore:
1. What it means to be Viet-kieu (Vietnamese displaced from Viet Nam) - especially in America (My-ly). This means contemplating anything from history and food to being a colonized person existing in a white supremacist society.

2. What it means to be a Vietnamese male (person of color male) and this social construct fits into the framework of a white patriarchal society.

3. Imagining a world after capitalism and the material ways in which to dismantle capitalism (as both a social and economic system of oppression).

4. What it means to be in a heterosexual relationship and how that fits into the framework of a hetero-normative society.

I seek to be as transparent as possible, for if not for potential readers, this blog is also for myself and my own reflection and growth.

I am not invested in just theoretical babbling, but rather, am most concerned with how to transform the theoretical into material practice.

This is an introduction and sort of an outline/organization of the purpose for the existence of this blog.