9
MICHIGAN IN COLOR
Ok, America. Prove me wrong.
At the turn of the 2010s, the
ingenious use of social media by
young activists during the Arab
Spring set the world ablaze. In
the blink of an eye, young people
transformed social media from a
prom picture party hub to an outlet
of
revolutionary
information.
Via
fledgling
platforms
like
Facebook
and
Twitter,
users
shared demonstration sites, tear
gas remedies and even tips to avoid
identification by authorities should
one choose to participate in civil
disobedience.
With
its
unprecedented
ability to deliver not only crucial
information, but also the sights,
sounds and unmistakable aura of
social upheaval to the palm of any
user’s hand, social media seemed to
be the last missing link to achieving
real global equality.
In case you missed it, the 2010s
were not quite the pax romana we
hoped they would be.
ALEXANDRA OWENS
MiC Guest Writer
COLLAGE BY HIBAH CHUGHTAI
A brief Black and A/PIA history under
white supremacy
CHERYN HONG
MiC Managing Editor
On May 25, the Minneapolis
police officers Derek Chauvin, J
Alexander Kueng, Tou Thao and
Thomas Lane arrested George
Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man
accused of buying cigarettes with a
counterfeit $20 bill. Chauvin, who
spent almost nine minutes kneeling
on Floyd’s neck, was charged with
third degree murder and second
degree manslaughter. The three
other officers who were complicit
and silent during the arrest were
fired but not arrested. As of today,
Chauvin’s charge got upgraded to
second-degree murder, and the
other three were arrested and
charges with aided and abetted
murder
While many have been protesting
Chauvin
and
the
Minneapolis
police department who have been
known to tolerate racism, Tou
Thao, the Hmong officer who also
has a history of involvement in use-
of-force incidents, has become the
symbol of Asian-American silence
in anti-Blackness sentiment in
America. Thao has resparked the
ongoing discussion of minority
Just shy of a decade after the
events of the Arab Spring, social
media’s stature as a beacon of
hope,
a
catalyst
of
universal
change has undergone quite the
reversal. As Generation Z came of
age over the course of the 2010s,
we watched in real time as the
sanctity of information found and
distributed on social media was
forever compromised. In addition
to issues with misinformation,
overwhelmingly,
the
outward
facing nature of these platforms
spawned a culture of normalized
“slacktivism,”
wherein
the
cultivation of the image of being
“woke” by privileged groups has
taken precedence over the actual
substance of the societal issues
which predicates such activism.
The issues most often co-opted
for social clout are related to the
continued extrajudicial murder of
countless Black Americans. But,
this shouldn’t come as much of a
surprise for a country which enjoys
its temporary forays into Black
culture more than Miley Cyrus.
More so than any other instance
of Black-led rebellion seen in the
previous decade, the most recent
uprisings beginning on May 26
have been characterized by a
suspiciously high amount of white
endorsement
and
participation.
But, these were not the usual
white allies — these were white
moderates. In the past week,
my
social
media
feeds
have
been flooded with the feverish
reposting of artist’s renditions of
the deceased, text posts demanding
accountability on the part of all non-
Black Americans and of course, the
black tiles. Although an increased
awareness of the horrors of police
brutality appears, superficially, to
be indicative of promising social
progress, I cannot help but shake
my suspicions that these displays —
like most things on social media —
are just a part of a facade.
While my skepticism could be
misconstrued as a selfish attempt
to “gatekeep” who can and cannot
be politically active, in reality,
this cynicism is a byproduct of
coming of age in the span of years
separating Trayvon Martin from
George Floyd, Ferguson from Flint
and Obama from Trump. Through
these years, time and time again
in school, and even in some social
situations, I was looked to by my
non-Black peers to rationalize why
“all lives” and “blue lives” did not
matter and why violence sometimes
could be the only appropriate
answer. And with each repetition of
this cycle, with every new Black life
taken prematurely, the same peers
still refused to educate themselves
any further than the information
that was already laboriously spoon-
fed to them by young Black people
like myself, just clamoring to make
their people’s humanity known.
As I observed the same people
who were once “so concerned”
with educating themselves retreat
back to the comfortability of their
privileged
existences
at
their
convenience, I began to see my
efforts to inform had not just fallen
on deaf ears, but actually replicated
the existing system of
Black subjugation to whiteness
— where still, Black labor is readily
substituted in the place of white
effort.
Although
many
white
Americans — particularly Gen Z’ers
too self-righteous to recognize
their own similarities to their
Boomer grandparents—are quick to
ridicule the glaring hypocrisies of
attempts to appear “of the people”
by a Kendall Jenner or Gal Gadot,
significantly fewer conversations
are
being
had
regarding
the
abruptness
with
which
they
themselves hop on the bandwagon
of social responsibility, only to
retreat back into the complicit
silence of their “normal” existences
once their friends stop posting
Instagram stories, hashtags stop
trending and the media moves on...
tensions and relations, especially
between the Black and Asian
community.
When Asian Americans first
began to immigrate to the United
States, they were also a large
target for white supremacy, as
the
government
passed
racist
legislation such as the Chinese
Exclusion Act, fueled the anti-
Japanese movement in the early
1900s and repeatedly refused to
grant citizenship to Asians who
don’t fit the “white” requirement.
However, as time went on, the
white supremacy transformed. As
fear that anti-Asian racism could
jeopardize the country’s world
leader status and impeded imperial
expansion, white liberals sought to
efface Asian exclusion legislation
during and after World War II. The
government believed there would
be a geopolitical payoff in return
for recognizing Asian Americans
as “model” citizens, thus a mixture
of geopolitics, the Cold War and the
civil rights movement gave birth to
the “model minority myth.”
Between 1940 and 1970, Asian
Americans
surpassed
Black
Americans in average household
earnings, and also closed the wage
gap with whites. This was because
at the beginning of the 20th century,
Asian Americans were depicted as
threatening, exotic and degenerate.
However due to the model minority
myth, newspapers glorified Asian
Americans as industrious, law-
abiding citizens who were docile
and never complained. This wasn’t
a special tactic, as many minorities
in the U.S. attempted to combat
racism by portraying themselves
as upstanding citizens capable
of assimilating themselves into
American
mainstream
culture.
Chinese Americans promoted their
obedient children and traditional
family values, Japanese Americans
referred to their wartime service
and, while Black Americans also
made similar appeals, postwar
America made it convenient for
political leaders to solely listen to
the Asian Americans and Pacific
Islanders community.
Read more at michigandaily.com
Read more at michigandaily.com
Thursday, June 4, 2020
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com