One of the things I have learned, in getting close to several Southeast Asian immigrant families, is that women and girls, in their cultures, aren't people. In their cultures, women and girls are luggage.
The following joke that came out of the Vietnam War illustrates the problem:
An American soldier patrolling the roads in Bin Duong Province befriends a farmer he sees walking along with his cow every day. At a particular point he notices that there is always a woman walking about 100 yards behind them. The American soldier asks, "Who is that?" "Oh," he says, "That is my wife!"
This upsets the American soldier. "Oh, come on!" he responds. "She is your wife, your life partner, your gift from God! She should be walking beside you, in a place of dignity!"
The farmer shakes his head. He says with exasperation, "You just don't understand our people!"
After he serves out his enlistment in Vietnam, the soldier comes home and, after a few decades, he decides to go back to Vietnam and visit his old haunts there.
As he walks up the roads he had once patrolled, he sees his old farmer buddy, and catches up with him and greets him warmly. The former GI turns around, sees no one down the road behind them, and says, "Where is your wife? Is she okay? Did she survive the war?"
The farmer points to a figure up the road, a hundred yards ahead of them and says, "She is there!"
"Oh, wow!" the American exclaims. "That is wonderful! Not only is she no longer walking behind you, but you even have her walking ahead of you, in a place of honor! I'm impressed!"
The old Vietnamese farmer looks at the American and says, "Land mines."
As I came to know Southeast Asians and their families, I lived that joke on one occasion, as follows.
Once, on an unbelievably hot Summer day, I was asked by a Vietnamese immigrant man to come to a house party in his air-conditioned home. When I got there, I was surprised to see that it was all men, Vietnamese and Chinese, drinking alcohol and talking. I asked my host, "Where is your wife? Where is your little daughter?"
"Shopping!" he smiled.
I foolishly assumed that he meant that mother and daughter were shopping in our local air conditioned mall.
A few minutes later, the wife drove up in their family car, and came in, soaked in sweat, one of several large bags of groceries filled with food for the guests in one arm, one of the guests' diaper-clad baby in her other arm, diaper overflowing crap out the back onto her arm, and the host's 5 year old daughter crying loudly and clawing at her mother's arm. She put the bag of groceries on a kitchen counter, and began to gently lay the baby on the floor to clean the crap off her harm and then change the baby's diaper, while she carefully ignored their crying daughter for the moment.
As all of this was going on, the Asian men kept talking and drinking booze in the air conditioned living room. I thought, "What the Hell! The father of the baby isn't even helping!"
Just then, the grocery bag became unbalanced and fell to the floor with a crash. All could hear jars of something shatter inside. As liquid oozed out of the bag, the host screamed in Vietnamese at the wife -- probably, "You stupid woman ! Get rid of that smelly baby and clean the grocery mess off the floor ! Now !" -- but continued socializing and drinking alcohol.
I couldn't stand it any more. I got out of my chair, stood up, and yelled to the wife, who I will just call "Thi," here, the Vietnamese language equivalent of "Ms.," "THI ! HELLO ! YOU LOOK LIKE YOU NEED SOME HELP ! YOU GO INTO THE BACK, CHANGE AND TAKE A NICE COOL SHOWER ! I WILL TAKE CARE OF YOUR LITTLE DAUGHTER'S PROBLEM, WHATEVER IT IS ! YOUR HUSBAND WILL CLEAN UP THE MESS ON THE FLOOR ! THE FATHER OF THE BABY WILL CHANGE HIS OWN BABY'S DIAPER ! AND THE OTHER MEN WILL STOP TALKING AND DRINKING ALCOHOL, AND GRATEFULLY BRING IN THE GROCERIES ! AFTER YOU SHOWER AND CHANGE, YOU CAN COME INTO THE AIR CONDITIONED LIVING ROOM, HERE, AND SIT IN MY SEAT, AND ENJOY AN ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGE ON THE ROCKS !"
All fell quiet. I did not realize that my announcement was upsetting and embarrassing in the eyes of everyone there, including the thoroughly-socialized wife. Finally, the wife said, "Mr. Peter, I know what you are trying to do, but it will do no good."
The Asian men all took her words to be an indication of her immediate surrender to her fate as an Asian woman. They forgave me for being stupid, and went back to talking, laughing and drinking alcohol. I felt uncomfortable with the idea of thoroughly embarrassing the host by helping the wife while everyone else sat on their a - - - - drinking booze -- it would have amounted to a declaration of war between families -- so, I stayed with the men. The incident ruined my day, and I returned home head filled with shame.
Now for the thing that motivated me to write this article:
A friend -- my computer guy -- told me about the BBC piece, "India's Daughter." It's about how a young lady in India went on a casual date with a young male friend. They saw the movie, "The Life of Pi." On the way back home, on a bus at around 8:00 p.m., a 17 year old boy and 4 men and the male bus driver beat the boy over the head with "an iron bar" -- rebar ? -- and grabbed the girl and stripped her and gang raped her repeatedly as they bit her repeatedly. As she fought back, they shoved the iron bar up her vagina, cutting into her visceral organs, and yanked it out with such ferocity that they dragged her small intestines with it. They pulled out her intestines until no more would come -- "To teach her a lesson !" they pleaded.
Then they threw the bodies of the raped girl, trailing her internal organs, and of her male friend, naked into the streets.
"She shouldn't have been out so late !," the rapists' attorneys pleaded. "Her family should have been with her ! She should have been smart enough to not fight back ! It takes two hands to clap ! Rape is mostly the girl's fault !"
She died.
That's southeast Asia.
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