A recent article from 8asians.com that I read off the nptech feed pointed out some remarkably insensitive marketing coming from a new German social bookmarking site called Mister Wong. It’s remarkable in this day and age that such obviously stereotyped imagery is happening in Web 2.0 world but apparently, these folks were not in the office when that memo was handed out.
I hope I don’t have to point out here why this is particularly offensive to myself as an Asian American despite their launch in China (with a Chinese support person on the front page). I think the name, the kooky stereotyped imagery and worst of all, the sing-song faux Chinese in the image above all evokes a kind of insensitivity to the way Asians have been portrayed in Western popular culture. They might as well have Mister Wong doing the dry cleaning and running around with a rickshaw. But Allan, one might ask, you’re Filipino American, not Chinese American. Well, I have to say that anti-Chinese racism doesn’t seem to recognize national boundaries in much the same way anti-Arab discrimination doesn’t seem to differentiate between South Asians, Arabs and Sikhs. Your average racist is usually not so mannered as to put a fine point on their target’s national origin.
As for me, I am more than sure that I won’t be putting “nptech” tags on the Mister Wong website until they get rid of the subservient-Asian-as-your-tag-coolie theme.
(5 votes, average: 3.80 out of 5)
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I don’t think Mr. Wong people really intended to be offensive, and I actually don’t really see what’s offensive there – what if the service been called “Herr Frick” and its logo had a blond kid with blue eyes – should all Germans and Austrians get offended?
Mr. Wong brings nothing new to the social bookmarks field! Big deal language support, plus on different domains – Simpy[1] already supports about 10 different languages on the same domain and does NOT segregate users – Korean, Chinese (Simplified), German, Russian, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, French, and so on – see http://www.simpy.com/faq#browserLanguage for a list of all supported languages.
[1] http://www.simpy.com/
Feel free to write a review/comparison, I would LOVE to see what real people think about the two services.
Then what about other stereotypical images? Black people in oversized clothes with the bling bling hanging down the neck. Hip hop and R&B music referred as “black music” whereas country music is called “white music.” Do we only oppose the new stereotypical new comers or do we simply accept the things that are there all alone?
@Otis: Racial relations are not symmetrical so your comment that should “Herr Frick” be launched is both ahistorical and not cognizant of present racial relations in the United States today. In other words, it’s a terrifically bad counterexample.
@Kunzilla: We should oppose all stereotypes. And for me on this blog, we should especially oppose them if they’re used in the very same spaces that we’re touting for other nonprofits to use. After all, why would I tout a service to other nonprofits if it actually acts against the real-world interests of their constituents?
I’m not Asian, but my children are – and I think it offensive too. It could have been worse – they could have put glasses on him and made him a smart nerd .. the other cultural stereotype. My son is very smart but his IQ has nothing to do with his race. You wouldn’t believe the comments I’ve gotten from people remarking on his intellect and connecting it to his race. My jaw drops.
Don’t be a baby about it. How many Mr. Wongs do you know with blonde hair and blue eyes? Or black for that matter. Suck it up, and stop being a sissy about it.
I guess I’ll just have to refer you back to the graphic that starts off the post. If you don’t find that graphic to be in the realm of a racial stereotype, then I guess there’s no helping you.