I was encouraged to post on the continuation of a previous post on the ongoing events at Bat Nha monastery in Vietnam. On the Buddhist Channel, Ven Kobutsu Malone provides a point-by-point response to Visakha Kawasaki’s response to a previous post of his. We may never know the whole story of Bat Nha monastery, a place named for wisdom.
Media
Say It Like It Is
A couple of recentposts talked about Western Buddhism without any reference to Asians… or did they? On Progressive Buddhism, Kyle discusses “urban white liberal converts”, “rural converts, who tend to be white or black” and the “traditional” Buddhists. Provided in context:
the traditional Buddhists, who have been somewhat marginalized in the mainstream community
the local traditional population, which obviously only offers its one tradition
Over on Sweep the dust, Push the dirt, Jack Daw remarks:
Western Convert Buddhists insist that they are not taken seriously by other culture-based traditions and those Culture-Based Buddhists (I have no better term) insist that they are not well-represented in the mainstream media.
The authors of both articles frame the terms traditional and culture-basedwith regard to representation within the mainstream. Perhaps coincidentally, I have only read complaints of a lack of representation within the mainstream Buddhist media specifically in terms of Asian (American) Buddhists. Indeed, I wrote most of them. Are Kyle and Jack Daw euphemistically avoiding using the word Asian to talk about Asians?
To be clear, not all Asians identify as “traditional” or “culture-based”—but how many of those “traditional” or “culture-based” Buddhists who “insist that they are not well-represented in the mainstream media” are not Asian? When it comes to the cultural affinities of their Asian writers, The BigThree prefer to publish those who are more “traditional” and “culture-based” (and dead). It is precisely the less “traditional” and “culture-based” of the Asian American Buddhist community who are speaking out on this issue.
I’m well aware that, ironically, when race is obvious, white people will go out of their way to avoid explicitly mentioning race so that they don’t appear to take race into account. This inanity only highlights their racialized judgment. Let me be explicit: I prefer to be identified as Asianthan by some inept euphemism for it.
Update: I deleted a comment I reposted here from Kyle on Progressive Buddhism. He explains more in his comments at the bottom of this post. Someone or some people have identified themselves as myself and another blogger, and harassed Kyle with personally abusive emails. His furious reaction is little different than I would have reacted in the same shoes (and probably even more restrained than I would have been). It is a very sad state when others stoop to this level of depravity—apparently some people enjoy nothing more than watching the world burn.
Raise the Profile
Amid my incessant complaining about the marginalization of Asian Americans in the mainstream Buddhist media, various bloggers will pepper me with questions along the lines of: “So what do you suggest?” It’s a valid question. There are a number of “structural” actions we can do to raise the profile of Asian American Buddhists, who are largely sidelined in the dominant media of the very community where we constitute the outright majority. I’ve already mentioned my favorite one: Educate yourself. I’m appalled by the Buddhist Americans who might freely discuss “Chinese Buddhism” and yet who couldn’t tell Teochew from Toisan or Hakka from Hokkien. But here’s the thought for today: include us in your vision of the Buddhist community. If you’re going to make a flier with faces of Buddhists, then maybe you’ll put in more Asian Americans. And while you’re at it, if you run a major Buddhist publication, you might want to set aside more bylines for Asian Americans too.
Racebending Avatar
Intrigued on by posts on Dharma Folk and on Breathe, I went to learn more about the show Avatar rooted in Asian and Buddhist/Taoist/Confucian themes. I ended up finding a whole ’nother blog spat over the whitewashing of the movie version.
Avatar has been hugely popular among kids of all races. There was no backlash against an all-Asian show. Much as those who watch anime don’t freak out at the paucity of white characters. Yet, somehow the Hollywood producers think the live action version has to be white washed. Except for the villians, of course, it’s okay for them to be brown.
Gene Yang talks about the implications for Asian Americans in a way that’s also applicable to perceptions generated by mainstream American Buddhist media.
But intentionally or not, they are adding another chapter to Hollywood’s long, sordid history of Yellowface. By giving white actors roles that are so obviously Asian – and by stating from the get-go their preference for Caucasians – they tell Asian-Americans that who we are and how we look make us inherently inadequate for American audiences, even in a movie that celebrates our culture.
The truth is, we are not a post-race society, and it isn’t just the ethnicities of African descent that are affected by this fact. The values that have been a part of the past, influence the images that we see today, which in turn influences the values that will be in the future. The effects of racism have been compared to a moving walkway, if we do nothing, it keeps rolling along, and takes us with it.
For more on race and Avatar, you can check out Aang Ain’t White and racebending.com.