First impressions--looks like your friendly local real estate agent! You can read all about it in this article.Chu, a San Gabriel Valley Democrat, just won representation of the 32nd District where she first began her political activism as a college freshman in the 70's.
Far from elation as my primary reaction to this news, as a Chinese-American woman myself, I feel upset that Chu is more like the exception to the norm than the vanguard of a breaking wave.
To me, Chu represents (no pun intended) the utter lack of encouragement that Chinese-American families give their kids to pursue careers outside of the fields of medicine, business, science and technology.
Chu herself admits that she entered college intent on a computer science career before she felt the irresistable pull of politics. The article does not mention how her parents reacted to her detour, but I'm pretty sure they weren't too happy. A sure way to trigger disappointment and even disownment is to tell your Chinese parents that you want to have a career in the humanities, creative arts or social activism. "But why don't you want to be a doctor?!"
Call it financial risk aversion, call it mousiness, call it cowardice and conformist. Whatever it is in the psyche of the Chinese-American community it has long stifled and restricted the flow of Chinese-American participation in the avenues of cultural influence that matter most: the arts, media, social commentary and politics.
Chu is not representative of the average Chinese-American experience. Good for her, not so good for the average Chinese-American experience.
2 comments:
darnit! there goes my chance to be the first female ABC congresswoman. Althoughhhhhh, maybe I can still aim to be the first female ABC congresswoman from WISCONSIN. Since, you know, we probably won't have one of those for the next 500 years, since Wisconsin doesn't really have that many ABCs....
Ha ha, yes, the rest of the 49 states are fair game for you!
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