First Moves
This kind of saddens me. I wrote about the oddities surrounding the Ted Turner / Asian Pacific American flub a while back. Now the identity of Asians in America is again making news in my RSS feeds, thanks to the tragedy at Virginia Tech. After the shooting, the first moves made by a few different groups concerned me. First it was China, when the shooter was “Asian-looking” and possibly Chinese. Now the Asian American Journalists’ Association (AAJA) wants the media to stop referring to him as an Asian man.
SAN FRANCISCO (April 16, 2007) — Like the rest of the nation, we at the Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA) are stunned at the news of today’s shooting at Virginia Tech. Our thoughts are with the victims and their families and friends as they cope with this horrific incident.
As coverage of the Virginia Tech shooting continues to unfold, AAJA urges all media to avoid using racial identifiers unless there is a compelling or germane reason. There is no evidence at this early point that the race or ethnicity of the suspected gunman has anything to do with the incident, and to include such mention serves only to unfairly portray an entire people.
The effect of mentioning race can be powerfully harmful. It can subject people to unfair treatment based simply on skin color and heritage.
We further remind members of the media that the standards of news reporting should be universal and applied equally no matter the platform or medium, including blogs.
For those who missed it, the shooter was identified as a South Korean man named Cho Seung-Hui. (Well, ok, there was the one slip-up by a Japanese reporter who almost referred to him as African, but quickly corrected himself…) Anyway, here we have a group of people upset that the news is accurately reporting that the man was Asian. Because it will cause a backlash against Asians? Most people are more concerned about the man himself and why he did what he did than they are with his country of origin, and I have a hard time believing that a retaliatory spirit will rise in the American populace. Not everyone in America is a reactionary racist, you know. Not even in post 9/11 America. You’d think otherwise, though, wouldn’t you? Like I said, it kind of saddens me.
Hat tip to CBS’ Brian Montopoli. Sheesh.