Center for Asian American Media Speaks Out
The Center for Asian American Media does not support AsianWeek’s publication of Kenneth Eng’s article “Why I Hate Blacks” in its February 23rd edition. We join the growing coalition of Asian American and civil rights organizations in asking AsianWeek to take journalistic responsibility for printing these racist statements by taking appropriate action.
Debra Saunders on our side?
Although ignoring the efforts of the Asian American coalition that brought this matter to light, the Chronicle’s Debra Saunders echos most of our points.
She says: “…the Special City has a way of making excuses for bigotry and intolerance — when they percolate from the left or ethnic groups.” Uh. That didn’t seem to happen here.
More from her Feb. 28 column:
I still want to know: Did editors think that running a racist column would be cutting edge? That an Asian Ann Coulter wannabe would create buzz? That they could get away with running racist copy because it is a publication serving an Asian-American audience?
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That’s high-minded language from a paper that published a column that listed among “reasons we should discriminate against blacks” the assertion that blacks are “weak-willed” and “the only race that has been enslaved for 300 years.”No AsianWeek manager can claim surprise at the column. Eng is a self-described “Asian supremacist,” who wrote a “Why I hate Asians” column in January. In November he wrote, “White people hate us and will always hate us.” Unlike the anti-black column, those columns sparked no Chronicle story and no City Hall resolution against AsianWeek.
She also writes: “Presumably AsianWeek management will provide an explanation at a Friday town meeting billed as an open discussion on ‘the media’s role and responsibility in fostering dialogue that leads to a greater understanding between Asian and African American communities.’
But we’ve just learned from New America Media, one of the presenters of Friday’s forum that it is not a town meeting, but a forum for the ethnic media.
APALA Denounces Hateful Views in AsianWeek Column
The Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance Feb. 28 denounced the hateful views expressed by Kenneth Eng in his column published by AsianWeek in its February 23rd edition.
“Eng’s article is offensive and objectionable,” said Maria Somma, President of APALA. “There should be no place in America for this kind of bigotry. We want to tell our African American brothers and sisters that we do not tolerate Eng’s racism.”
“Even more disturbing is how AsianWeek allowed this to happen,” said Gloria T. Caoile, Executive Director of APALA. “This was not some minor mistake. Someone approved this article. Where hate and racism is tolerated in the magazine, it needs to be expunged. There is no place for this kind of journalism, if you will call it that, in the Asian American community.”
APALA is making an appeal to its members to contact AsianWeek and to sign the online petition.
APALA, AFL-CIO, is the first and only national organization of Asian Pacific American union members.
Mother Jones blogger gets it right
Neha Inamdar, on the Mother Jones blog, nails the issue:
That’s a pretty egregious slip past the editors. And here’s the thing: Kenneth Eng, a self described “Asian supramicist” wrote two previous columns for AsianWeek titled, “Why I Hate Asians” last month, and “Proof that Whites Inherently Hate Us” in November.
I’m curious to know why the editors didn’t feel impelled to reject his “hate speech” and “racial agenda” back when they published these other columns? If his aim was to get people thinking, enraged, but thinking, and they stood behind that premise before, why not stand behind him now? Instead they fired him, and they look irresponsible on the national stage.
And if publishing this column was indeed a mistake, then so were the others, and they’ve let a few too many mistakes slip on by.
South Asian Journalists forum blog
WNYC reporter Arun Venugopal posts his round-up on the South Asian Journalists Association Forum site:
A February 23 column in AsianWeek by Kenneth Eng has created a huge uproar among Asian-American community leaders, politicians such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the Asian American Journalists Association. The column, “Why I Hate Blacks,” is not nearly as ironic as I thought it might be; it’s a straight-out, racially-supremacist diatribe…
USA Today Blog: ‘San Francisco roiled by Asian columnist’s diatribe against blacks’
Michael Winter posts a round-up of developments related to the AsianWeek fiasco. Just around the time he posted the entry, the Chronicle’s Leslie Fulbright posted a story that Eng had been in fact fired.
Bay City News Service: ‘Fang refused to clarify whether an editor reviewed the column and allowed it to go to press’
From a Feb. 28 report by Tamara Barak of Bay City News Service:
AsianWeek Editor-at-Large Ted Fang today said the columnist who penned the piece “Why I Hate Black People” last week will not contribute to the free paper’s content again.
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Fang refused to clarify whether an editor reviewed the column and allowed it to go to press and did not answer questions as to why Eng’s previous two columns, “Why I Hate Asians” and “Proof That Whites Inherently Hate Us” had been printed.
“We are humbled and overwhelmed by reader response — not only chastising our editorial process, but urging us to sever our relationship with Mr. Eng. We have heard the call and Mr. Eng has been suspended,” Fang said. The statement prompted several people in the crowd to ask why Eng wasn’t being fired, to which Fang responded that Eng would not write for AsianWeek again.