#the model minority myth

[bidoofenergy]

pleas please ambrosius is the model knight, he's what all knights should aspire to be, he comes from the right family he does well in training, he's the model knight, he works within an institution because it benefits him--as long as he works in it, because the second the director thinks he's questioning things too much she kills him--are you picking up what im putting down? he keeps his true feelings buried--never show doubt, don't show conflict, keep your head down, do what you're told, aren't you so lucky to have this chance, aren't you glad you were born as you are and not like the others--are you hearing what im saying

(listen to eugene lee yang talk about this on the trypod)

[casscainmainly]

Cassandra Cain and Asian Stereotypes

So I've seen people debating whether Cass is a racist character or not because she falls into certain Asian stereotypes. While this discussion is valid and important, a lot of the conversation (on this website and beyond) is steered by White/non-Asian people, or people who haven't read a lot of Cass' stuff. This is my take on Cass and Asian stereotypes as a Chinese Cass fan. I do not speak for all Asians, or even all Chinese people, who are absolutely free to disagree with any of these arguments.

Stereotypes I will cover here: Silent Asian, Model Minority, and Hypersexuality.

The Silent Asian Stereotype

The most obvious stereotype Cass runs into is the Silent Asian. I would recommend reading the linked article for more information. Silent Asian characters are Asians who are part of a core cast, but rarely speak. Kimiko Miyashiro in The Boys, Lilly in Pitch Perfect, and Katana in Suicide Squad are all examples of this. The article also mentions Ben from Umbrella Academy, who can only communicate with one character, thus limiting his dialogue.

Why does this happen? Removing Asian characters' dialogue reflects the Western conception of Asians as demure, rule-following, and meek, never speaking up or acting out. It also means writers don't have to spend as much time writing these Asian characters, who are secondary to White protagonists.

The problem with the Silent Asian, then, is not the silence itself, but the consequences of silence. Mute Asians exist, as do Asians who don't speak much; in media, Silent Asians are harmful because they indicate an unwillingness to focus on the Asian character.

This is why Cass, even before she learns to speak longer sentences, is not a Silent Asian. While her conception undoubtedly has unfortunate echoes of this trope, she defies it by being the protagonist of the story. A protagonist cannot be a Silent Asian, because a requirement of the trope is being a secondary character. Cass' feelings and actions are the center of Batgirl (2000), so allegations of this stereotype don't actually make sense.

Furthermore, the trope is about passivity and acquiescence to a White authority. From her introduction, Cass is neither passive nor acquiescent - her origin story is literally about defying David Cain, a White male authority figure. Beyond her not speaking much, she ticks none of the boxes for this stereotype. I think it's time for people to stop mentioning this stereotype in conjunction with Cass, who in every possible way subverts it.

The Model Minority Stereotype

The model minority myth is the belief that Asians are more successful and talented than others, particularly other minoritised groups. Like the Silent Asian, the model minority myth paints Asians as obedient and submissive. This is, in many ways, more insidious than the Silent Asian - there are still people who believe this stereotype (and jokes like 'of course you're good at math, you're Asian') is somehow not racist.

Though this myth seems positive, make no mistake that White people invented this tale for two reasons: to put down Black and Brown communities, and to prevent Asians from ever fully assimilating into White culture.

Cass plays on this myth very interestingly. I've discussed in this post how David Cain and Bruce's assertion that she's 'perfect' is a blatant reference to the model minority myth - by describing her as 'perfect' to them, they are centering their own desires, erasing Cass' individuality.

This is partially why I don't like 'Cass is Bruce's favourite' and 'Cass is an angel who can do no wrong' interpretations when people are just saying it without context. Cass being Bruce's favourite, or Bruce seeing her as an angel, is not a good thing - it is a representation of his biased attitude towards her. He is unable to accept her being a murderer because he is trapped within the model minority mindset. This is not saying Bruce is a full-on racist, but that his actions and perspectives are coloured by his Whiteness.

Cass' abrasive personality, willingness to defy Bruce and David, and very real flaws (her inability to see grey areas, communication difficulties, etc.) make her avoid this stereotype. Additionally, her close relationships with Black characters like Onyx and Duke are essential to combating the anti-Blackness at the core of the model minority myth. Her character evokes the stereotype (perfect martial arts silent fighter), but ultimately defies it through being the star of her own story (and also not being good at math. The fact she doesn't have anything to do with tech is actually one of my favourite aspects of her character, because I am TIRED of tech Asian characters).

The Hypersexual Asian Woman Stereotype

Asian women are often exoticised and fetishised as the ideal sexual partner; think of the term 'yellow fever', which describes men lusting after Asian women. The hypersexualisation of Asian women in media once again goes hand-in-hand with Asians being submissive. They are seen as innocent and child-like, while simultaneously being seductive and sexually experienced.

This stereotype is genuinely perpetuated in Batgirl (2000), mainly by the art in Horrocks' run. Where in Puckett's run there is refreshingly little sexualisation of Cass, once you hit Horrocks' run you get a LOT more shots of her lying down, sexually suggestive covers, etc. People have discussed this already, probably to more effect than I will do here.

However, as I wrote in my Gender and Sexuality posts, the writing is actually fairly defiant of this trope. Cass is vocally uncomfortable with hypersexualisation, and neither of her male love interests stick around. The problem with the Hypersexual Asian Woman is the focus on White sexual interests, where the woman is objectified for the White male gaze. Simply because Cass is the protagonist, the writing focuses on her sexual interests, and in the end it's about gaining control of her gender presentation and sexuality.

Cassandra Cain Vs. Asian Stereotypes

The through-line that connects all these Asian stereotypes is a lack of agency. There's a reason passiveness is the main trait for all of these tropes- the Asian body must be weaker than their White counterparts, in order to be tools or weapons against other minoritised groups.

Cassandra Cain, a character born from a choice that defies White male authority, rises above this passiveness with flying colours. The details of her character certainly fall into some of the above tropes, and the way her character is handled later (evil Cass, New 52), is certainly racist. However, the reason she means so much to me is because at its core, her story is a story of Asian agency. And that in itself is unstereotypical.

[alwaysbewoke]

[asexual-juliet]

no but ryo paul debut is actually making me care about paul as a character for the first time because holy fuck if a white darry & japanese american paul dynamic is not supremely compelling in terms of 1960s oklahoma race and class tensions

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

The weirdest, least successful "white supremacy" ever.

[1ore]

it wasn't enough that arizona's japanese internment camps were placed on gila river indian community and colorado river indian tribes' land as "reservations within reservations" (and against the desires of GRIC.) now i get to learn that chinese and japanese immigrants evaded the chinese exclusion act by traveling first to mexico and then to the u.s., entering through o'odham land, through the late 1800s own flavor of "prevention through deterrence," while the u.s. used what is by all rights a diverse and abundant desert to kill them, just as they do latine migrants today. and now i feel like i have to tell everyone i know about this because nobody told me. our fates as illegal immigrants are so tightly bound up i want to scream.

from Peoples of a Sonoran Desert Oasis by Jared Orsi

[chilli-talks-a-lot]

Dude, punk and Riot Grrrl specifically were so important to me because it not only allowed me to express my struggles as a girl but as an Asian-American.

The model minority myth was pushed onto my parents and onto me by my parents. Sometimes I get really stressed out about my identity because I am basically a walking, living, breathing stereotype. I get straight As every year, I'm good at math, I literally wear a Harvard hoodie every day because it helps me keep sight of my goals.

Punk is my way of combatting that. Listening to punk music and embracing punk culture is my way of saying, "I am not your model minority myth. I will not stay quiet. I have struggles. I may be doing well in school, but the education system is still systemically flawed." It helped me remember that I am who I am not because I want to perpetuate those stereotypes but because I want to go far in life. Riot Grrrl helped me say, "My ideas should be taken seriously."

But, Riot Grrrl isn't inclusive of WOC.

Riot Grrrl isn't inclusive of me.

The worst thing about this is that I thought it did. The Riot Grrrl movement supports young, white, middle-class women. I am a young, Asian, middle-class woman. I was blinded by my middle-class privilege, preventing me from seeing the hostility towards WOC in this movement. And in that, I lumped myself in with white people.

I am not white, and I don't want to be seen as white. My dad and I constantly get comments like, "You're basically white people."

So yeah. I don't want to be a Riot Grrrl anymore. We need a cool new intersectional feminist punk movement now.

[ninelivesastrology]

tw: drugs, racism, misogyny, tradwife culture, fetishization, forced pregnancy, forced sterilization

The amount of "neither Black nor white" women hoping for my relationship to fail is crazy because they're angry that they were left by their interracial partners or can't get a man outside of their race to date them (unless they're a Black man, but they only see them as valuable for sex—That lady on the Real).

Non-Black women of color who get dumped by their treasured white man actually are some of the most bitter and vindictive women I know towards women in interracial relationships. They viewed their relationship as a gateway to a better life, a privileged life because of their partner's white privilege. In response to me saying I loved my husband, my husband's "mother" told me she only got married for health insurance. It's funny because she accused me of using my husband, but that's what she did to his father. Projection. This behavior is only ever applied to Black women and it goes under a wildly different and stigmatizing name.

Breaking the hierarchy of desirability makes them crash out because it was supposed to be them, not a Black or Indigenous woman. They are supposed to be targets for harm, used for sex, not girlfriends or wives that are treated well.

As tradwife culture comes back with a vengeance and podcast debates about high value women continue, we already know who is considered to be a high value woman and who is not just by appearance. Furthermore, it's divided by number of sexual partners. Interestingly enough, the restriction of RvW seems to be an attempt at "population direction," not population control and plenty of people have already pointed out what demographic is being forced into reproducing.

Black, Latina/Hispanic and Indigenous mothers have experienced the brunt of having their children dehumanized from the time of conception, even have a history with forced sterilization. With AA, they are excluding accomplished Asian teens into their chosen colleges in favor of white teens, effectively crushing the Model Minority and letting it be the myth it always was.

There is no need for diversity and women who are neither White or Black are scrambling for the spots they were led to believe they would own if they married for privilege. Everyone wants to be the Model Minority even if they're being fetishized, but the door is closing. I would argue it's closed already.

[marblebees]

I was gonna make a post abt this when she got elected but wrt the trans woman in US congress it literally goes to show representation (especially representation in positions of bourgeois power) is NEVER going to save you. To even get there as any kind of minority you genuinely have to suck up to people in power so hard its impossible to actually DO anything once you have the power. The second you speak to step out of line you’ll realise that they were never on your side.

[skyhawkstragedy]

also say what you want about blue but hey at least she’s loyal

[not-your-asian-fantasy]

Alyssa Huynh (alt text)

[p19gen3]

poc solidarity used to be way stronger its being eroded on purpose

[the-paris-of-people]

It's cruel that I have to work this week during the last nhie season

[theharddeck]

It’s all well and good to be a grammar pro, but please just lay off with the all caps, pages-long posts, where each commenter smugly adds new homonyms. English is complicated for sure, American English even more so, but there’s dialects and regional affectations and vernaculars, not to mention there’s tons of users on this site who are ESL or have different levels of formal education, or that we live in the age of autocorrect.

I get it: to/too/two seems like an easy distinction—for some people. What if you’re dyslexic? What if English is your second language? What if you’re tired? With those “FOR THE LOVE OF GOD; IT’S EASY” posts, there’s this subtext that making a mistake is lazy or apathetic, and I don’t think people realize how demoralizing those can be to read. At the end of the day, demanding a certain level of performance of education (pls understand that’s what you’re doing, it’s performance it’s “prove to me that you know this”) and deriding any deviation is rooted in classism and white supremacy. So. Please stop the all caps posts, the “ugh this always bothers me; it’s so easy!!!” posts, the “it’s not hard, just get it right!!!” comments; it shows a stunning lack of empathy.

[mckinlily]

GUYS.

Go watch NIMONA. Right. Now.

IT’S SO GOOD.

[auressea]

the gatekeepers in our lives...

just spent HALF an HOUR 'chatting' on the phone with the Accounts Receivable manager who handles my payment-plan at the pharmacy.

learned a lot about her! 👀 she said "where I come from in East Asia" as a lead up to a very Conservative Political Opinion. I had to specifically ask her 'where from', because East Asia is SO LARGE.. yannow.. She's been in Canada for over 15 years and originally came from Hong Kong. She has the social and political opinions of a Boomer from Edmonton.

she spewed a bunch of mindlessly bigoted rhetoric about "how we're all the same!" and no one should be treated better than anyone else..

and why would the City of Richmond spend all those tax payer $$ to repeatedly repaint the Rainbow Crosswalk after it got destroyed? "Just give it up already!" "LGBT people aren't special" "everyone's entitled to their opinion!" clearly we could just give that tax-payer money to people who really need it.

She controls my access to credit and payment plans at my pharmacy

So- I gently and in a round-about-way, gave her examples of invisible privilege that many of us have. How the IDEAL is that we all ARE equal- but that it's not actually TRUE in practice.

I used my Whiteness to frame this idea- (to explain structural racism to an Asian-Canadian woman!) and then used my government enforced poverty to show her an example of the casual ablesim I suffer from.

and she was.. AWAKE for a moment. Hopefully I'll be allowed to keep my payment plan..?