Equal Justice Does Not Come Easy In America

I am angry. As a non-white American, I have felt the sting of racism growing up in America. What happened to George Floyd is beyond abhorrent. What is equally evil is the fact that there were three other police officers on the scene who did nothing to protect this American. And that is why we are protesting in this country. Yet again. The police are not judge, jury and executioner. The United States is not a Third World Country, but it is beginning to have the trappings of one. This country is sick. Leaderless in a time of racial unrest and racial injustice, during a pandemic. Unfortunately, the current occupant of the White House has made the civil unrest about him, and not the George Floyd's of the world. The Trump regime has ordered the U.S. military to patrol certain areas of Washington D.C. alongside unknown and de-badged militia-type forces. Thirty one years ago today, June 4, 1989, the Communist Chinese government quelled a DEMOCRACY protest with its military, using tanks to crush its citizens. Now Donald Trump is threatening to silence Americans with the might of the U.S. military, the same military that Trump refused to join, FIVE TIMES during the Vietnam War. My father served with distinction for 20 years in the U.S. Navy and he wasn't even born in the United States. My grandfather served 30 years in the U.S. Navy, including a stint cleaning up Pearl Harbor on the USS Navajo, and he wasn't even born in the United States. The current occupant of the White House was born here, avoided service to our country and now he threatens to unleash the U.S. military on its own citizens for exercising their right calling for justice for George Floyd? Let me say that again. Trump has threatened to deploy the U.S. military against American citizens on American soil. Let that sink in. Where is the outrage from the Republican Party? Where is the outrage from the Senate? Where is the leadership to help our country heal from this crime? Anyone?

I have been called virtually everything in the racism book. Chink, gook, wetback, kanaka boy, dirty Mexican, Jap, slant-eyed, redskin, yellow, fu-man, Bruce Lee, buddha, Kwai Chang cain. Everything but the nationality that I am. Filipino. Growing up in America, I didn’t know I was different until the 4th grade, when I auditioned for the lead role as the prince in a play called "The Prince of Pollution." I won that role alongside my princess, a Korean girl named Yoo Kyung Kim. Little did I know that our roles comprised the play presented to the other grades in the school, while the parent performances were showcased with white 4th grade students as the leads. Was it racial discrimination that Yoo Kyung Kim and I weren’t able to play the leads for our parents? Maybe not, but for me as a 4th grader in the 1970s, being placed alongside another “Oriental” as the leads made me think differently. From that point forward I realized I wasn’t a white American. Race in America is institutionalized. Growing up, my friends were diverse: Half Mexican/Italian, Half Japanese/German, Costa Rican, white, white, and white. In the summer prior to my freshman year in high school, I met a fellow surfer named Kenny Naragon. We fast became friends and rode our bikes to the beach with our surfboards, surfing almost every day that summer and everyday after school. One night, we were riding home from the beach and we were arguing about a girl, and Kenny let slip, “You chinks are all the same.” After that, Kenny was no longer my friend, and then a few months later, Kenny tragically died under mysterious circumstances. I never got to say goodbye as I struggled with my decision to unfriend him. I can go on and on with the times that I have been racially discriminated against, as it started in grade school and continued on even into my professional career, when at one point I had to report my racial grievances to HR. We all know that racism is persistent in this country. It is no secret that in the United States, as great as the ideals in which the USA was founded, and as great as it ONCE WAS (prior to 2017), continues to struggle with its identity. The current occupant of the White House knows that race is a great wedge issue and he has exploited it to his advantage since before he became the leader of the free world. Let that sink in a bit. The leader of the free world is a race-baiting bunker boy. Trump back in 2017, essentially gave the police a green light to “not be too nice.” Even though there has always been and always will be rogue, racist cops. “Now, we’re getting them out anyway, but we’d like to get them out a lot faster. And when you see these towns and when you see these thugs being thrown into the back of a paddy wagon — you just see them thrown in, rough — I said, please don’t be too nice. (Laughter.) Like when you guys put somebody in the car and you’re protecting their head, you know, the way you put their hand over? Like, don’t hit their head and they’ve just killed somebody — don’t hit their head. I said, you can take the hand away, okay?” This speech and this excerpt has since been removed from the White House website. Now police brutality on the streets of the United States has existed since forever, yet the supposed President of the United States essentially endorsed this type of behavior in that speech "in front of a crowd of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, police officers, and sheriff’s deputies." Herein lies the disease. The geneation before me has failed America. My generation has failed America. The next generation is demanding "liberty and justice for all," and judging from the PEACEFUL protests from sea to shining sea (including Hawaii), the next generation may just get it right in the choices that they make in their daily lives, and at the ballot box. Change in this country does not come easy, but it does.