Serious Good From a Frivolous Lawsuit?

If you're a regular reader of Hill of Hope, you probably need professional help, but you're also aware that we don't support people being offended, and we especially don't support offended people filing lawsuits.

However, I think Lucie J. Kim's suit against Miley Cyrus is a good idea, in fact one that's overdue.

Like Margaret Cho, I want why racism against Asians isn't taboo. Because we were never enslaved by wealthy white Americans? Because we don't tend to be illegal migrant workers? Because the government never stripped us of our ancestral lands and herded us onto reservations?

Because most Asian stereotypes are positive? Because, as a group, we don't tend to lack in education or in economic status, and we're not filling up prisons and producing two-thirds of our offspring out of wedlock?

It's partly our fault. It's true, that most Asian people don't really like to rock the boat--yellow is a little too mellow; we have no Jesse Jackson to seize upon any incident that may conceivably appear to display the tiniest bit of prejudice and harangue the perpetrators for outlandish reparations and outrageously servile acts of penitence.

I'm not saying that Ms. Cyrus deserves to lose $4 billion for her incredible idiocy, because I don't think that's what this is about. I don't think Ms. Kim or any Asian person in Los Angeles will see a penny, nor is any of them interested in a possible payout.

No, this is all about teaching Ms. Cyrus--and Hollywood and the rest of America--a lesson, which is that chink eyes need to go the way of blackface, because nobody, not even the "model minority," appreciates a racist gesture. The pop phenom may have thought she was just being "goofy," but she was rudely exploiting the insecurity of every little Asian girl (and some bigger Asian girls) who feels constantly snubbed by the cult of beauty and popularity. Who are the Asian pop stars? *Crickets* Who embodies the Hollywood ideal of Asian beauty? Sandra Oh, a woman who looks as if she was hit squarely in the face with a hot cast-iron frying pan. Asian athletes? Forget it. My sister once auditioned for a Shakespeare festival in a part of the country generally considered progressive, and was told that, while she was extremely talented, they couldn't give her a large role because of all of the "average-looking white people" who tried out.

So not only is discrimination against Asians very real, it's perfectly acceptable. Miley Cyrus has the opportunity to start effecting a change by first offering an honest apology for her ignorant and appalling behavior. That would be worth $4000 to me, and I'm sure one million other Asians would agree.