A pilot plot of a widowed white man “order[ing]” in a bride from the Philippines doesn't sound like a racist, misogynistic endorsement for sex slavery and undermining the Eastern traditions of arranged marriage. NOT.
That’s right, NBC signed on a pilot show “Mail-Order Bride” about a widowed white man that “orders” a Filipina bride online.
And the Asian American community was pissed. Every Asian American was pissed, especially Filipinos, understandably. I was pissed.
Well yes, not only does this storyline offend the Filipino community for undermining the colonial history their families undergone and the idealization of Filipino women are depicted as domesticated and submissive. In addition, the show fetishizes and fantasizes the idea of arranged marriage which is seen as gateway to prostitution when, in tradition, serves as a sacred practice for Eastern cultures.
Less that 72 hours after the announcement, NBC killed the project since “The writers and producers have taken the sensitivity to the initial concept to heart and have chosen not to move forward with the project at this time,” according to a NBC spokesperson.
“At this time?” So there is going to be a next time to when a group of non-asian writers and producers are going to pitch this “idea” again, fantasizing the idea of sex slavery and arrange marriage alongside with fetishizing the Filipina woman? Unfortunately enough generalizing the “Orient,” or the characterization of an Asian fictional embodiment, has gone back for over 100 years.
In my first ever upper division English class, a short story was first assigned. It’s titled as “The Chink and the Child.” If the title offended you, then the plot line will put you through a rant for days. Basically the story follows the “hero” of the story, Cheng Huan, a store keeper in Victorian England that rescues a twelve year old girl, Lucy, from her abusive father that happens to be an aggressive, lower class fighter champion. How the story executes the fascination of the Eastern culture is definitely generalized to the point of stereotyping Asians as sexual and submissive to the other. When Cheng rescues her, pedophiliac descriptions builds insinuations of he actions arise as the Asian man prying his way to the token white angel of the story, Lucy. And even though Cheng Huan is considered the “hero,” the focus of the story glorify the innocent white princess figure “Lucy.” Even when he cares for her, it is as if she is the ruler of his world while he serves her.
If the story doesn't infuriately sexualize the “Other” or the “Orient,” the film adaptation, “The Broken Blossom” directed by D.W. Griffith, has a white actor wearing Yellow Face to play the character of Cheng Huan. He would squint his eyes half open to look Asian, his body gestures had his back hunched and him constantly having to look up towards the other non-asian characters in the film. His body gestures also suggests femininity since he acts as the “mother” figure to Lucy in a twisted, perverted and wildly intimate sense. Not only his feminine features hints submission as the “Other” as an offensive latent message for Asian suppression but also a double whammy on femininity being viewed as submissive, objectifying the female race.
Either way the representation of Asian characters in any form of literature or media has depicted the entire ethnicity as degenerative, hyper-sexual, and feminine or the “Other” as Simone De Beauvoir would have define the representation. In the case of the TV show that never will be (hopefully) exerts those exact qualities. Apparently modern-day Hollywood will never learn since it considered such a plot line.
