It’s been 25 years since Vincent Chin’s brutal murder by Detroit autoworkers who blamed their woes on Asian imports, and subsequently on Asian Americans … instead of on the Chrysler honchos who thought “capitalism” and “competition” meant “protectionism” and “higher import tariffs” rather than “innovation” and “efficiency.” Detroit couldn’t build a better mousetrap, so it collapsed.

We’re not losing our jobs to minority Americans, much less to immigrants: American corporations are selling our jobs to the lowest bidders overseas. It’s global capitalism at its finest … isn’t that what this war in Iraq is about? Exporting good old American democratic, capitalistic, uber-consumer values, so we can grow more markets to build McDonald’s and Wal-Mart’s in?

In honor of the anniversary of Vincent Chin’s death, I ask you: What the hell are we fighting for these days? What are YOU fighting for? According to the “right,” most Americans polled want to kick hardworking, tax-paying immigrants out of the country; they want to achieve peace in the Middle East by waging wars; and it seems every scientific discovery or technological advancement is an abomination to God. (But didn’t God make those things to discover in the first place?)

It reminds me of a song I once loved by Zone Time:
“This is a world destruction. Your life ain’t nothing / The human race is becoming a disgrace / The rich get richer / The poor are getting poorer / Fascist, chauvinistic government fools / People, Moslems, Christians and Hindus / Are in a time zone still searching for the truth / Who are you to think you’re a superior race? / Facing forth your everlasting doom”

*** ABOUT VINCENT CHIN ***

Vincent Chin (1955 – June 23, 1982) was a Chinese American industrial draftsman murdered in 1982 in the United States, in the Detroit, Michigan enclave of Highland Park by two white autoworkers, Chrysler plant superintendent Ronald Ebens and his recently laid off step-son, Michael Nitz. Raised in Detroit, Chin was the adopted son and the only child of Bing Hing Chin and Lily Chin. The murder was notorious since it was explicitly motivated by racial hatred towards Asian Americans based on the declining auto industry in Detroit. The case of Vincent Chin became a rallying point for the Asian American community as it is often considered the beginning of a pan-ethnic Asian American movement.

Find more on Vincent’s case at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vincent_Chin or http://www.asianweek.com/061397/feature.html.

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