"Si" and "Am" wreaking havoc

The following was written by Nell Fleming - Racial Justice Coordinator at the YWCA of Charleston.

As Racial Justice Coordinator at the YWCA of Charleston, people increasingly come to me with questions about what is or isn’t considered racist. I was recently asked the following question:

“I was [viewing the scene from Lady and the Tramp with the havoc-wreaking Siamese cats] on YouTube and saw in the comments that some people think this is racist. Having had Siamese cats all my life, I see it as more of a depiction of a typical Siamese personality. Does it strike you as negative towards Asians?”

I admit the question surprised me because the person asking it is someone whom I usually go to for advice. The piece seems so obviously negative to me that it gave me pause. I wondered, if a trusted friend did not recognize the racist elements of the scene, where do we stand as a society in our education about what is racist, especially outside of our binary paradigm of black and white?

I knew why it felt racist to me, but in order to analyze the piece fully, I took a look at the opposing comments referred to in conjunction with the song clip the YouTube video. The comments had very little substance, but made general claims that the piece was racist or the piece was not racist. The main claim to prove the piece was not racist was that Siamese cats “really do act like that.” And so I watched the clip again to see what exactly Siamese cats do and don’t do in real life as opposed to cartoon life.

Here is what I found. If you watch the video without the sound, indeed you see two Siamese cats ("Si" and "Am") wreaking havoc in a house, though to the extreme and in slap-stick fashion – much like two cats might do given enough time and opportunity. As a cat lover, I remember not so fondly being afraid of a friend’s Siamese Cat, who used to sneak up on me when I arrived, and grab my arm when I would walk by. I have no trouble suspending disbelief that Siamese cats would have ulterior motives when it comes to humans or dogs.

However, the two things that you can “see” that are not realistic to Siamese cats are the eye shape and the tooth shape. The exaggerated slanted eyes and the buck teeth are not drawn on the cats as a cat caricature, but as a personification of Asian persons – in this case, Siamese (Thai). It is a stereotypical representation that is extremely negative in origin. This shouldn’t surprise anyone who knows the history of Disney and racist content, which has improved moderately over the years, but in small degrees at a time. (Aladdin came under fire for the depiction of Jasmine and Aladdin as “white middle class persons” whereas the villains and the commoners otherwise were very ethnically Middle Eastern in their appearance and talked with significant Arabic accents, among other things.)

When you listen to the song without watching the clip, however, this is what you hear: Siamese cats talking not like the Lady and the Tramp are talking in white middle- or lower-class English, but with accents of Asians speaking broken English that is obviously their second language. The fact that these cats are considered the “evil element” in the story makes it clear that being foreign, or Asian, or an immigrant is being compared with the characteristics of being dishonest, conniving and most definitely not trustworthy. When you put the images and the song lyrics together with the animation, you get two things: 1) A clever, fun, rhyming song that is fun to sing (for some) with two entertaining characters who resemble the cats we love to love or love to hate, and, 2) One of the most horrible representations of racism in children’s entertainment in the twentieth century.

For further analysis of Disney and racism, visit:

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1329215/disneys_most_racist_films_and_characters.html

http://www.cracked.com/article_15677_9-most-racist-disney-characters.html

http://www.nhaeyc.org/newsletters/articles/Racism_in_Childrens_Movies.pdf

Some definitions of racism:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&rlz=1C1RNNN_enUS362&defl=en&q=define:racism&sa=X&ei=xuooTIK-GMH98AaS-dCaDg&ved=0CBUQkAE&cts=1277749802556

Taking a Stand

The following is a guest blog post written by Robin Holstein, President of Robin's Desktop, LLC and the coordinator of a local Stand Against Racism event in Rand, WV last Friday.

When I was the young bride of a soldier in the U.S. Army, stationed at Fort Hood, Texas, I felt the stares and noticed the whispers when I went out with other soldiers’ wives. They were African-American. I am not.

Some years ago after running into a local police officer I knew, an ex-husband cursed me and “ordered” me to never hug a black man again. Recently, family members have argued and struggled with their own insecurities because a biracial child was going to be born into our family. Many still struggle, two years later.

At my age, I have seen many acts of intimidation. I’ve been shouted at, cursed, and punched. I’ve had people go behind my back and spread untrue stories. I’ve had people disclose very painful, personal events in an attempt to embarrass and upset me. Nothing has made me stop and shake my head as what I saw the morning of April 25, 2010.

Eggs, splattered against the front fender of my truck overnight. Eggs that were thrown in a childish, passive-aggressive attempt at intimidation. The act intended to send some message of disapproval, done in the cover of darkness, by someone who dared not speak to me in person.

The sun was not quite up when I left, so by the time I noticed the goo on my truck, I had already driven 25 miles. I did not need Jack Bauer to tell me, I knew what prompted the vandal. I was hosting a Stand Against Racism event. The only question was what would do more good? Do I draw attention to it or do I let it go as if nothing happened?

Less than twenty-four hours before someone lobbed eggs at my truck, I placed physical posters up in my community. Nothing happened when I posted the event on popular social networking Internet sites. Nothing happened following the article published in a local weekly paper. It was not until there was an actual, physical poster up that someone decided to “say” something to me.

After discussing the incident with the Racial Justice Coordinator at the YWCA and Deputy Attorney General Civil Rights Division, I decided to contact my local Sheriff. A Deputy was dispatched to my home. We discussed the situation, my support and sponsorship of the Stand, and the reality of trying to find the culprit.

The Deputy explained that, since there was no damage to my truck, there was nothing on which to file a formal complaint. I really could not prove the act was related to my upcoming event. His visit to my home was on record. If there were any incidents the night of my Stand, the vandalism would be included in the investigation.

Everyone handles these things differently. When people try to stop me from doing something I believe is necessary, I generally become more determined. I do not back down easily, or often.

I became involved with the Stand because of my grandniece. She is a beautiful and bright child. She has no preconceived ideas about race or sex. Before she was born people making racial comments or slurs upset me. I would tell them that I did not appreciate the comments. Now, it is different. The comments and slurs are no longer against “people” they are against family.

The Stand Against Racism event I hosted was held as planned. There were no incidents. No more eggs have been wasted on my vehicles.

I explained to the attendees at my event that we have come a long way in race relations over the many decades. Yet, there is still so much more to do. While this was just eggs, it seems someone out there felt as though they could attempt to intimidate me because I took a public stand.

Children's Book Connections

The following post was written by the YWCA's new Racial Justice Program Coordinator Nell Fleming, pictured at right with her husband and daughter.

It's not every day that an award winning children's picture book author calls a mother two days after the purchase and reading of her book. But let me start at the beginning (if there is such a place), as this tangled web of connections is hard to unravel.

It all started when a librarian at the University of Illinois Center for Children's Books responded to my request to diligently search for any fictional picture book ever published with a white woman and a black man as a couple, married, parents or otherwise – preferably on the cover of the book. I was starting my proposal for a study on the demographics of children's picture books in the current century. Only one book was referred and the librarian who found it thought that perhaps it was a non-fiction book but wasn't sure. I can understand why she thought so, because the main character, Tyler, is a real person and the source of the inspiration for this rhyming tale of how we view people based on their perceived skin color.

This was so far the only book I was able to identify that had a white woman as the spouse or partner of any person of color or in any interracial relationship in a children's fiction picture book and it isn't even completely fictional. Why does it matter if it is fiction or non-fiction you may wonder? The reason is because fiction speaks to our imagination and what is possible, desirable, and worth wishing for. Non-fiction is valuable because it speaks to what is true and real now and in times past.

My proposal was approved and I started my research last week. On the third of 2,500 pages of book covers to research, I spotted the book in question: Am I a Color Too? by Nancy Vogl. I asked myself why I had not yet purchased or checked the book out. And so, I obtained a copy and read it myself and then to my daughter, who is biracial also. Imagine my surprise when the author called me two days later to say she had found me on the Not in Our Town website. She had been following my work as the Racial Justice Coordinator at the YWCA of Charleston – specifically the Women with Biracial Children Support group we just launched last week. It took my brain a minute to figure out what was happening. As I listened to the voicemail, I wondered if she was calling about my work life, my school life, or my personal life. When I returned her call, we discussed a series of additional connections, including mutual friends in Illinois (although we both live in other states), parallel interests and odd coincidences mostly learned through Facebook.

Although I've never been one to believe in fate or purpose behind random synchronicities, it is not hard to see why people would attribute meaning to these kinds of experiences. There is a kind of otherworldly quality when the odds of meeting someone at just the right time and place to connect on so many different levels is statistically improbable at least in the world I was raised in before the internet. The issues that I hold dear used to make me the odd one…the black sheep…the eccentric one. However, now I'm connected with so many thousands of people like myself in my community, nation and the world, that I seem more average all the time. If racial equality becomes the average lifestyle, I’ll take it. I can always dye my hair blue when I turn 65.

YWCA Racial Justice Position a New Opportunity for West Virginia

The following post was written by Hallie Chillag Dunlap, a member of the YWCA of Charleston's Board of Directors and Chair of the YWCA Eliminating Racism Committee.

In the early weeks of the summer, Paul Sheridan came to me, and to the YWCA of Charleston with an idea of reaching out to the United States Justice Administration in the hopes of acquiring federal stimulus dollars to further the work of the Eliminating Racism Committee of the YWCA Board of Directors and our associated community group, One Kanawha. Members of these groups are consummate community activists, motivated by a strong social justice imperative. Members quickly recognized an opportunity to develop a staff position dedicated to this end through personal and community commitment and federal dollars.

As conversations evolved regarding how we could develop a social justice position to support our existing work, we realized that a grant application that reflected the YWCA's mission as well as community needs could truly empower a potential employee to do thoughtful and critically needed work in our community.

Furthermore, this would be a chance to meet both the requirements of the stimulus money (put someone to work) and to hire an individual to help to fulfill the mission of the YWCA, specifically our "eliminating racism" call to action. YWCA staff members (thank you Felicia Bush and Deb Weinstein) and community partners (thank you Paul Sheridan, Tracy Dorsey Chapman, JoEllen Zacks, Crystal Good, and Margaret Chapman among others) worked tirelessly to complete an intensive grant application in less than two weeks!

The dream of having a dedicated employee to push our equity work forward was an exciting and unprecedented opportunity. This individual would not have another job to distract him or her from our important mission! We realized that having a paid YWCA staff position could really grow what had been before exclusively volunteer work. Last month we were notified that we would have the opportunity to hire such an individual, which was an extremely exciting revelation for our community and committee members!

To this end, we are currently looking for a Racial Justice and Hate/Bias Crimes Statewide Coordinator. This position will coordinate a one-year, statewide, racial justice training project. In addition, the position requires that this individual facilitate statewide trainings in racial justice and hate/bias crime issues. This individual will also have the opportunity to develop a model community dialogue. We are looking for an enthusiastic, energetic individual with social justice priorities to come and dedicate themselves to the call to eliminate racism.

For more information, please see extended position specifications here.

To paraphrase the timeless words of Mahatma Gandhi, come and be the change you want to see in this world!