02EXCLUSION
Is Asian American an oxymoron?
Policy reflected culture. The 1869 Golden Spike ceremony at Promontory Point, Utah, omitted them from the festivities which united the nation thanks to their contributions. The transcontinental railroad was built after the Civil War, bringing together an expanse and frontier which previously had to be traversed by a perilous overland journey or circumnavigated on the seas. Virtually all of the western track headed eastward was laid by more than 10,000 Chinese laborers who blasted their way through sheer granite rockface. The phrase ‘a Chinaman’s chance’ was coined in that context, referring to long odds, because of the risk the workers would meet their demise as the new explosive tool of dynamite detonated before they could be hauled back up the side of the cliff in a wicker basket. Despite their involvement, without which there would have been nothing to celebrate, in the series of photos there is no Asian face to be seen in the crowd gathered with pride. Those images of ingenuity and industry were instantly known to all educated citizens as a memorial of the most massive infrastructure project of the era.
For what he called photographic justice, the late Corky Lee, who slyly appointed himself the unofficial photographer of Asian America, staged an annual re-enactment of that ceremony, bringing descendants of the original railroad workers out to the desolate landmark. Native New Yorker Lee passed away from the COVID-19 virus as he continued to document the struggle of Asian Americans in his hometown, shuttering their businesses while being blamed for the global pandemic. ‘You all look alike’ has long been a recurring theme for Asian Americans, assumed to be the model minority as they are treated as the perpetual foreigner. The attacks were mistaken identity twice over: people of various ethnic origins, such as Burmese, Korean, Filipino, even Chicana; and citizens and residents of the United States, not China. For those who scapegoat do not pause to check passports before spitting on their victims, shoving them in front of subway trains, stabbing them, or shooting them by the half dozen. The crimes culminated with serial murder in Atlanta, which the law enforcement official investigating downplayed as the confessed gunman ‘having a bad day,’ only to be discovered himself to be spreading the ‘China flu’ meme on social media.