References
Police attacking a news crew:
Police stepping over an old man they knocked down:
Police destroying water bottles, food, and medical supplies after assaulting medics:
Categories
Month: June 2020
In addition to being Loving Day, it’s also Philippine Independence Day, a.k.a Araw ng Kalayaan, which means “Day of Freedom”. It’s observed on June 12th, and on that day in 1898, the Philippines declared independence from Spain.
Among other things, Filipinos fly the flag, whose parts symbolize the following:
- Royal blue field: Peace, truth, and justice.
- Scarlet red field: Patriotism and valor.
- White triangle: Equality and brotherhood.
- Three stars on the corners of the triangle: The three main geographical regions of the country namely Luzon (my home island), the Visayas, and Mindanao.
- The sun at the center of the triangle: Each of its eight rays representing the eight Philippine provinces that started the revolt against Spain.
I’m happy to mark Philippine Independence Day, but tracing it back to June 12, 1898 and calling it “independence” is, in my humble opinion, a bit of a stretch. While the Filipino revolutionaries did some impressive stuff, including drafting Asia’s first democratic constitution and forming Asia’s first democracy, that was quickly undone by:
- The signing of the Treaty of Paris turned the Philippines into a U.S. territory,
- The Philippine-America war, which would give us such gems as Rudyard Kipling’s dickhead poem, White Man’s Burden. Fuck you, Rudyard, and all your poems. I don’t even quote The Sons of Martha, and I was an engineering student. (And thank you, Mark Twain, for The War Prayer.)
- The massacre in Samar, where U.S. forces just up and killed every male over the age of 10.
- Garbage like this:
Tap to see the racist garbage at full size.
In spite of all this, I still celebrate the day. I just don’t do it blindly.
On this day in 1967, the United States Supreme Court issued their ruling on the case of Loving v. Virginia, which struck down laws banning interracial marriage across the U.S..
The case involved Mildred Loving, a woman of color, who was married to Richard Loving, who was white. In 1958, they were sentenced to a year in prison for marrying each other, in violation of Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act of 1924, which made it a crime for people classified as white to marry people classified as colored. In court, they had to plead guilty to “cohabiting as man and wife, against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth.”
The case also involved the state of Virginia, whose original state song lyrics included the line “There’s where I labored so hard for old Massa,” and the signature line of the chorus, “There’s where this old darkey’s heart am long’d to go.”
On this day in 1967, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the Racial Integrity Act and similar laws were unconstitutional, and this ruling was also used as a precedent in Obergefell v. Hodges, the case that made same-sex marriage legal countrywide.
For some readers, 53 years ago may seem like pre-history, but think of it this way: Both presidential candidates were of legal voting age at the time. Actually, that does make it sound like pre-history. My point is that there are a lot of people alive today who were alive at that time (myself included, by a few months).
Today, we call June 12 Loving Day. While it’s victory for everyone, it’s especially so for me and Anitra, since it means we’re not committing a crime simply by being married.
Thank you, Mildred and Richard Loving, and Happy Loving Day, everyone!
Tap the image to see the shocking candor at full size.
This moment of honesty — even though it was accidental — is quite refreshing. Ain’t nuthin’ as nice as a Trump self-own; I’m looking forward to seeing more of these over the next few weeks.
Thanks to Tony Pierce for the find!
Categories
Street Fighter 2020
Recently in San Diego, a racist picked a fight with an Asian man. It didn’t go well for the racist, as the photo above and video below show.
My favorite observation about this fight is this one on Twitter by @BCarniello:
He backed away from a pointless fight. He backed away some more. He kept backing away until he couldn’t anymore. Then he did what he had to do to defend himself. And even after he knocked the attacker out, he still tried to help him back up.
As a kid in grade school and high school, I lost every one of this type of fight. As an adult, armed with a better sense of self, started going to the gym regularly, and learned to fear this kind of thing less, I started winning — once with my accordion still strapped to my chest.
I’ve been in this guy’s shoes, and must confess that I’ve watched the video at least a dozen times in a row, cheering every damned time — not only for the coup de grace, but the grace he shows at the end by helping pick up his would-be assailant, a man who saw him as less than human. Do you think the racist would’ve done the same had he won?
Good on you, unknown Asian gentleman, for conducting yourself honorably in a difficult situation. Also: nice overhand right!
Worth reading
From the San Diego Union-Tribune:
Think of it as the 21st century equivalent of the dreaded “butt dial”. Imagine being at home, having a nice, quiet racist conversation with your wife about how black people get away with everything, the Chinese are intellectual property thieves, and white people can’t do a damn thing about either when you check your phone, look at Facebook, and the comments are telling you that you’ve been broadcasting for the past half hour.
That’s what happened to Jacksonville-based retired Navy Captain Scott Bethmann and his wife Nancy while watching TV and seeing news about the Black Lives Matter movement. Scott comments on how companies have issued statements supporting BLM, at which point he unleashes his Inner Karen:
Screenshot from News4Jax news.
News4Jax (local TV news in Jacksonville) says that the video image is completely dark and only the audio is available, which suggests that Scott may have had the Facebook app active on his phone and accidentally “butt-dialed” a new Facebook Live broadcast.
Scott: I’ve gotten an email about how “We’re supporting…” and “We need to fix this problem.” Fuck you! “Oh, if you work in my office and you’re silent, we know where you stand.” So all the white people have to say something nice to the black bitch that works in the office. But the black bitch don’t get fired. [sounds of rustling] It’s bullshit.
At any point in the conversation, Nancy refers to the black community and as News4Jax puts it, “makes other racial slurs. The husband and wife talk about women and minority groups who serve in the military…”
Nancy: Fuck Asians from China who love to steal all of our intellectual property.
She then reminds Scott that there is a standard racist modus operandi: to not appear racist…
Nancy: That’s why I’m telling you — you better watch yourself on that board.
Scott: I don’t say anything; that’s my point.
Nancy: The admission board!
Scott: I just said! The white motherfuckers can’t say anything. That’s the point we’re making here, Nancy.
Captain Scott Bethmann used to be on the board of the U.S. Naval Academy’s Alumni Association board and was the Jacksonville chapter’s treasurer and national trustee. That all changed when word about his accidental broadcast and the chapter president posted a notice on the Association’s Facebook page which included this statement:
This morning, the board and I were notified of statements made by our chapter treasurer and national trustee, CAPT Scott Bethmann, SC, USN (Ret.). The nature of those comments are not consistent with our volunteer leadership mission at our Jacksonville Chapter of the United States Naval Academy Alumni Association, the national Alumni Association, and does not represent the leadership values of our Naval Academy or the US Navy.
CAPT Bethmann has resigned from our board and his trustee position. Our board is convening an emergency meeting today to discuss our way forward.
To echo the words of Superintendent, Vice Adm. Sean S Buck, “honor, courage, and commitment, and the mission of the United States Naval Academy. Nowhere is discrimination tolerated in any of those values.”
That post received a lot of comments, including this one, which makes a very important point (the emphasis is mine):
As a retired Marine Corps Senior Enlisted, I can’t help but wonder how many performance evaluations this CAPT wrote over his career that affected the careers of minority service members? It is scary to think of the careers he likely stymied.
To borrow a line from Captain Bethmann: That’s the point I’m making here, Nancy.
Here’s the News4Jax story:
There’s an alt-right group who believe that a second Civil War — which they call the “boogaloo” — is coming, and they’re raring to take their part in it. The name “boogaloo” comes from the 1984 film Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo, which was a sequel to Breakin’. The term “boogaloo” has since been contorted into similar-sounding shibboleths: “big igloo,” and quite notably, “big luau.” It’s the “big luau” expression that led to their adopting the aloha shirt as a signifier, along with camo pants, MAGA caps, and other clothing that’s meant to signify to their buddies that “I too am a fascist.”
That’s the point of this article…
These alt-right assholes are trying to claim the Aloha shirt as part of their symbology, and I intend to do everything in my power to stop them. It’s bad enough that they’ve associated themselves with the tiki torch, but this Pacific Islander will not stand idly by as they attempt to co-opt my sartorial specialty.
Aloha shirt history
Quite unsurprisingly, Aloha shirts are the creation of an Asian expats in Hawaii. One account credits its creation with the “Musa-Shiya The Shirtmaker” store…
…under the proprietorship of Koichiro Miyamoto, pictured below:
Another story says that Ellery Chun, a Chinese merchant who ran King-Smith Clothiers and Dry Goods in Waikiki. He is believed to have been the first to mass-produce pret-a-porter aloha shirts.
Because aloha shirts have straight lower hems, you’re supposed to wear them untucked, following the example of local Filipinos, who often wear dress shirts untucked (I do).
If there’s one person who should be credited with the popularity of the aloha shirt (the term “Hawaiian shirt” is technically incorrect), it’s textile manufacturer Alfred Shaheen. While he didn’t create the aloha shirt — they’d been made in Hawaii since the 1930s, and with the rise of air travel in the 1950s, tourists started them bringing them home from their vacations in the islands. Shaheen took these shirts, which were originally cheaply-made, and elevated them with better tailoring, materials, and patterns. The red aloha shirt that Elvis wore on the cover of the Blue Hawaii soundtrack album is a Shaheen design:
Those of you who’ve known me a while know that I maintain a fine collection of aloha shirts, and I’m often mistaken for Hawaiian. You have no idea how many times I’ve been greeted with “Mahalo!” It’s the perfect clothing for my general vibe, and it’s even more appropriate now that I live in Tampa’s sub-tropical climes:
The Wall Street Journal hit the nail on the head in their article Why the Extremist ‘Boogaloo Boys’ Wear Hawaiian Shirts with this paragraph:
…the inherent jolliness of a Hawaiian shirt gives heavily armed boogaloo boys a veneer of absurdity when they appear in public that can deflate criticism. “It’s tough to talk about the danger of guys showing up to rallies in Hawaiian shirts without sounding a little bit ridiculous,” said Howard Graves, senior research analyst at the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Ala.
When an alt-right group has tried to appropriate something as a symbol, the brand has pushed back. After a neo-Nazi tried to declare New Balance “the official shows of white people” in 2016, New Balance quickly denounced white supremacy. Fred Perry has had to do the same because the Proud Boys are so fond of their shirts. Tiki Brand, the people behind the torches, have gone to great pains to distance themselves from the “very fine people” at Charlottesville. But since no single brand is associated with aloha shirts, there’s no organized pushback or single voice speaking out against the boogaloo bois and their sullying the aloha shirt by association.
There may be hope. Perhaps someone who’s a credible representative or symbol of Hawaii can speak out. The Honolulu Star-Advertiser made a good start in a recent editorial:
We’re Hawaii, and we want our shirts back.
Not only do we want them known by their proper name — aloha shirts, and not “Hawaiian shirts” as mainlanders call them — but in particular, they should not have been taken over by a violent political fringe group.
And yet, as a result of memes in social media, aloha shirts have been adopted as a kind of uniform for white nationalist groups. Folks who get the relaxed vibe of aloha shirts call that inappropriate. No aloha to those violent Hawaiian-shirt wearers.
Until we get that official voice, it’s up to us — those of us who wear aloha shirts out of love for the style, the signifier of being “the life of the party” or a person of good cheer, to celebrate a love or heritage of the Pacific islands, or any combination of all those — to defend our beloved items of clothing and keep the boogers from ruining them. Join me in this fight!
I’ll close with a gallery of Yours Truly in some of my favorite aloha and aloha-style shirts.
Recommended reading
- Esquire: Rightwing Shitheads Are Trying to Ruin Hawaiian Shirts Now
- The Economist: Why some protesters in America wear Hawaiian shirts
- Hawaii News Now: In a bizarre twist, right-wing extremists are wearing aloha shirts at protests
- Washington Post: Men wearing Hawaiian shirts and carrying guns add a volatile new element to protests
- InStyle: Hawaiian Shirts Have Become an Unlikely Symbol of White Supremacy
- Philadelphia Inquirer: Men wearing Hawaiian shirts and carrying guns add volatile new element to protests
- The State: Hawaiian shirt-clad radicals called Boogaloo were at Columbia protests, sheriff says