A Fresh Perspective
Editor's Note: Ever wonder what Hawaii's college and high school students are thinking about? Here is a glimpse of some of the best these future leaders have to say about issues that concern them.
Whenever there is a discussion about race relations in Hawaii, it is
about either 1) Hawaii as a melting pot, where every gets along and
inter-racial marriages are common, 2) the white landowners stole Native Hawaiian land and later exploited Japanese and Filipino
plantation workers or 3) Caucasians getting harassed, mocked, bullied
and even assaulted by Native Hawaiians.
But there is a rarely discussed inter-racial conflict in Hawaii. It is
the conflict between immigrant Asians and Polynesians.
This has greater significance in Honolulu schools than non-Honolulu
schools.
You see, in most of Hawaii, most Asians are local and have adapted to
local culture. In suburban Oahu and in the Neighbor Islands, a lot of
Asians and Native Hawaiians speak pidgin, wear surf shorts, tank tops,
and love the beach. They share a common local culture.
I ask my fellow UH students who come from suburban/rural Oahu and the
Neighbor Islands about ethnic relations at their high school, they told me everyone gets along.
In many Honolulu high schools, however, things are different. At
McKinley High School (my alma mater) as well as Farrington, and
Kaimuki, a large portion of Asians there are recent immigrants from
Vietnam, Philippines, China and Korea. Also in those schools are recent
immigrants from Micronesia as well Samoans and Tongans, many of whom are living in public housing like Kuhio Park Terrace, Mayor Wright Housing Palolo Valley Housing, Kalihi Valley Housing, etc.
In the 1990s', there were fights between Filipinos and Samoans at
Farrington High School, and fights between Vietnamese and Samoans at
McKinley. The specific incidents that started the fight, I don't know.
But I have witnessed other evidence of this racial conflict. Being that
I'm neither Asian nor Polynesian, I get to hear what Asians think of
Polynesians and vice versa.
When riding the School Street bus, I heard some Polynesian kids from
public housing mocking the Filipino and Chinese languages. There were
elderly Asian people in those buses who ignored the mockery.
I heard Asians from my high school express hatred of Polynesians.
They said they were bullied by Polynesian kids. They made racist jokes
about Polynesian culture. They view Polynesians as ignorant bullies.
Most of the Asians expressing these thoughts were either immigrants or from
immigrant families.
This is a very serious issue that can lead to bigger conflicts if they
are not addressed. Yet it is almost never discussed in the major
newspapers, nor are they widely discussed in academic circles.
I am assuming that most in the mainstream Hawaii media are clueless on
this issue. After all, there do not seem to be many Vietnamese,
Micronesians, Samoans, Tongans or immigrant Filipinos working in the
local newspapers. It seems that most of the people in the local media
are either 1) Caucasians from the mainland, 2)Local Caucasians from
middle class areas like Hawaii Kai or Kailua or 3) local Asians from
suburban Oahu! Most likely, they went to private school. If they went
to public school, it's probably not McKinley, Farrington or Kaimuki.
With those circumstances, it's likely that the media people have not
witnessed any race conflicts that I have been discussing, and therefore is not something on their mind.
As for academia, in the one ethnic studies course I took at UH, NOTHING
was mentioned about conflicts between Polynesians and immigrant Asians!
Same with that one sociology course on ethnicity. All that those classes
discussed were the hardships Native Americans, African Americans,
Latinos, Asians and Hawaiians faced from the White Man!
Nothing about how much people from those groups accomplish! Nothing
about European immigrants. Almost nothing about blacks looting Korean
stores in the LA riots, and NOTHING about Samoans fighting with
immigrant Asians in Hawaii! Too many professors teach ethnic relations
courses with the assumption that the only race conflict worth
analyzing is white persecution of the non-white. They forget that their
job is to look at the whole picture.
It is time for all, including professors and news people, to address the facts and the truth.
Pablo Wegesend is currently a student at the University of Hawaii-Manoa, majoring in sociology. He is a lifelong resident of Hawaii and is a graduate of McKinley High School. You can find out more about his opinions at his blog at: http://pablothemadtiger.blogspot.com He plans to start a record label and make his own rap records.
A Fresh Perspective is a project of the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii. Project manager is Stephanie Ghilarducci, Director of Development. Submit proposed articles to her at: mailto:grassroot@hawaii.rr.com addressed: Stephanie. Recommended word count 500-750. Any and all comments or questions regarding articles or authors can also be sent to Stephanie.
This editorial is intended to provoke thought, discussion and an examination of issues. It does not reflect official policy of the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii. See the GRIH Web site at: http://www.grassrootinstitute.org/
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