What is cancel culture? Is it a side effect of the era of social media and the 24-hour news cycle? Is it the gap-filling mechanism for the space where the American justice system has failed and yet society demands a reckoning? Is it a manifestation of the United States punitive justice methodology? Is it merely the newest iteration of an otherwise ancient human custom?
These questions and more were posed and pondered in a recent conversation held by the Criminal Law Society and BC Law Professor Steven Koh. Students shared their views on how to define cancel culture, who is subject or not subject to it, its efficacy, and its justness. The discussion stirred many of my own thoughts on this phenomenon.
Dear Readers: As I was writing this blog post, it started to sound more like a poem than an article – so I turned it into one. The above audio contains an introductory note to the piece as well as a voice reading of the poem so that you can listen along as you read.
“Sometimes I wonder if the Asian American experience is what it’s like when you’re thinking about everyone else, but no one is thinking about you.”
-Steven Yeun
Let’s talk about this past week and the hate crimes perpetrated against Asian Americans the last few days in Oakland Let’s talk about this past year and our past period in American history This neglected narrative This invisible experience
While the country does its annual round of capitalizing off of Lunar New Year this weekend, I think about the Asian Americans who will spend what is supposed to be one of the most festive and important holidays in their culture cowering instead of celebrating Let me tell you about the attacks that have been happening because you won’t find them headlining on national news A conversation that is long overdue
An 84 year old Thai man was attacked in bright daylight and died from his injuries Vicha Ratanapakdee Say his name and pronounce all. of. it.
Numerous robberies and assaults in Oakland’s Chinatown A 91 year old man was pushed down It was like watching my own grandfather get slammed into the pavement Look up the video on your own if you want to see it but I refuse to circulate Trauma Porn – my trauma, your porn Non-POC: You cannot fathom how personally traumatizing it is to watch these videos
Faces slashed, grandmothers set on fire The sheer volume of violence is staggering I’m having a hard time grappling with this inhumanity against our elderly Our elders Who are revered and respected in our culture in a way unlike the culture of this country Who rose from the ruins of a broken nation seeking solace Searching for a better life in the Land of Opportunity that only knew them by the word Foreigner
In the wake of these assaults there is one word that comes to mind A word that has been grinded and conditioned into the Asian American experience: Invisible Anti-Asian sentiment since the beginning of this pandemic Targeted hate crimes have surged by almost two thousand percent
Where are you, CNN? Where are you, my fellow activists and leaders of social justice? Deafening silence from the news media and our so-called allies Feigned outrage only when it’s trendy I am traumatized by your apathy
You cannot be anti-racist without acknowledging the Asian American experience.
Enough with the narrative of the Model Minority What is the Model Minority Myth? I guess I’ll save you the self-education And tell you about a nation that only respects you when you keep your head down and talk nice Get good grades and that’s the price of being tolerated in White America But despite staying out of trouble and being quiet equality never comes with being compliant
Because you see, the Model Minority Myth was weaponized by our government back during the Civil Rights movement to say that there is a “correct” way to be a minority The audacity of White Supremacy To give us a pat on the head for being silent To take a diverse race of people and reduce them to a monolith The audacity of White Supremacy To use us as their tools to undermine the Black fight for civil rights To pit minority groups against each other and further the divide
A nation built on the backs of Black people and immigrants Born with this burden that we were doomed to carry as soon as our lungs drew in the first breath The breath that got heavier and heavier with each year of life A life of N*****, Ch*nk, Oriental, “blacks” as a noun with a lower-case B, Dred Scott, Korematsu, Plessy Yellow Peril, Chinese Excluded, For Colored Only A life of imperialism and colonization and cultural appropriation A life of “I think you may have confused me with the other [insert indistinguishable face of color] in this room” and “I’ve never dated a [insert fetishizable object of color] person before” and “But what’s your real name” and “Can I touch your braids” and “Your English is good” and “You don’t sound Black” and “Your lunch smells funny” and “Go back to your country”
No amount of the Model Minority Myth embedded in deep interracial conflict will change the fact that we have always been seen and treated as secondary citizens If citizens at all
From a young age I didn’t know how to take up space It’s having to laugh off microaggressions because we are made to feel that the racism against us isn’t real – is miniscule, is just a joke Gaslit over and over We are told to embrace our “good stereotypes” I mean what exactly is our plight when we’re all just so good at math Right? But this Myth invalidates the reality of the Asian American experience Our internalized racism, our intergenerational traumas Our women the subject of hyper-sexualization Our men the epitome of emasculation It paints us as submissive and void of personality Strips us of our individuality It erases the millions of low income Asian Americans that exist in poverty It ignores the historic underfunding of Chinatowns as people huddle around what little reminders they have of their homeland It silences our struggles and shoves them to the sidelines This repulsive notion of white proximity
I’m tired of being told that we are not Oppressed Enough. Enough.
We are not your model minority.
I’ve said this a hundred times and I’ll say it again: The burden should not fall on people of color to be educators I’m going to be honest and I hope you will be modest enough to listen Because writing this piece was so exhausting So emotionally draining I wanted to swallow my words, swallow my pain To shut off my brain and just mourn in bed I wished I was privileged enough to write about Snow Day instead But instead I opened a Google Doc and my curtains and my wounds
This toxic rhetoric of “Your oppression isn’t as bad as mine” and “Now is not the time” Sorry but I didn’t know that racism had a sign-up sheet A hate crime against one community is a hate crime against all of our communities We all suffer under the puppetting hand of this systemic oppression The problem is not us and each other and this underlying tension The problem is White Supremacy so pay attention
If your anti-racism isn’t intersectional, are you really anti-racist? Don’t ask us to shrink our space when we have already gone our whole lives feeling small I promise that there is enough space to go around this arena of Oppression Olympics that was designed to be the modern day Hunger Games Designed to point fingers and call names but we are all pawns of the same system So shouldn’t we be asking instead: who designed it? And how do we get out? Unity is not possible with White Supremacy But unity against it is necessary to defeat it The only way out is together Diversify your narratives so we can do and be better So that we can uplift all of our communities and stand in solidarity This struggle for safety This struggle for scraps of space at each other’s expense
But now that I’m here, let me make this clear: Asian Americans cannot find safety in the same institutions that terrorize Black Americans Although we are wounded, the police must still be defunded Increased policing is not the answer Black Lives Matter So we must make good on our promise from last summer To use our privilege and protect the Black community So instead of calling for increased policing that will harm Black bodies Let’s get to the root and provide adequate services and resources for all of our communities Let’s rid this false notion that there is mutual exclusivity in this fight for equality The solution lies in addressing this violence that is rooted in White Supremacy A violence that is not the violence that we see but the violence that is Unemployment, Homelessness, Wealth Hoarding, Redlining, and Poverty
So let’s turn this mentality into a new story One where Asian Americans can take up space unapologetically and speak their truths and shed their invisibility One where our white and POC allies support us openly by condemning anti-Asian violence in their own communities I challenge you to check your own biases and follow through on your commitment to diversity See us, show up for us, and take on responsibility Hold accountability
Marginalized freedoms have always been and will always be intertwined My pain is your pain is our collective pain It is our collective grief and our collective loss And so your fight is my fight and my fight Should be yours, too
Rosa Kim is a second-year student at BC Law. You can reach her at kimeot@bc.edu.
the hill we climb. If only we dare. It’s because being American is more than a pride we inherit, it’s the past we step into and how we repair it.
–Amanda Gorman, “The Hill We Climb”
“We are where we are, with the huge bloody problem delicately referred to as ‘race relations,’ because of a history.”
–Charles R Lawrence III and Mari J. Matsuda, “We Won’t Go Back: Making the Case for Affirmative Action”
If you need some light in these dark and unsheltered times, go watch or re-watch Amanda Gorman’s performance of “The Hill We Climb” at the recent Presidential Inauguration. If the poem itself does not inspire, maybe the poet will. Watching that virtuosity and vision in a 22-year old gives me hope that we may be able to find a path forward.
But as we begin Black History Month, I am reflecting on how we understand the path forward in light of the past. That was a central theme of Gorman’s verse. It is also a perpetual site of conflict in our politics and culture. This tension is apparent even in Gorman’s words. Her poem is yet another entry in a long rhetorical tradition of American jeremiads.
The jeremiad is named for the Prophet Jeremiah, who warned the people of Israel of the consequences of failure to fulfill their covenant with God. From that scriptural origin, “jeremiad” has come to refer to a rhetorical denunciation of sin and the related call to reform.
The first American jeremiads originated in the Puritan sermons of early New England colonies. John Winthrop—in language that echoes in the title of Gorman’s poem—exhorted his Puritan congregants to consider, “that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word through the world.”
Within a generation, the Puritans were confronting the failure of their divine experiment. The jeremiad became a ritual means of purification, a coping mechanism for a religious community faced with its own moral failure and depravity. It consisted of three parts: 1) a scriptural precedent that established communal norms; 2) a condemnation of the current state of the community; and 3) a prophetic vision of salvation from moral failure that reconciles the discrepancy between ideal and reality. The jeremiad instantiated the American capacity for delusion and self-deception. It became an exhortation of low expectations:
“Even as the preacher exhorted, they knew enough about their listeners not to expect much from them…Theirs was a peculiar mission, they explained, for they were a ‘peculiar people,’ a company of Christianity not only called but chosen, and chosen not only for heaven but as instruments of a sacred historical design…In their case, they believed, God’s punishments were corrective, not destructive…In short, their punishments confirmed their promise.”[i]
The mutuality of sin and salvation purged the community of its guilt and implicitly encouraged its misconduct. The American jeremiad became a kind of rhetorical group therapy. It required nothing more from its audience than faith in its narrative. Belief, not action, was the prerequisite for salvation.
An example? Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address. Consider this passage in which he absolves Americans of their moral responsibility by abdicating their agency to God:
The Almighty has His own purposes. If we shall suppose that American Slavery is one of those offences which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South, this terrible war, as the woe due to those by whom the offence came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a Living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope — fervently do we pray — that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue, until all the wealth piled by the bond-man’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash, shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said “the judgments of the Lord, are true and righteous altogether.”
Lincoln’s address satisfied a deep national yearning for a conciliatory moral narrative. His formulation followed the classic jeremiadic tradition by sublimating the country’s vice into virtue. God’s very engagement with American history was proof of its unique status. The horrors of both slavery and war proved the national march towards salvation.
But this is just one kind of American jeremiad. Another, the African-American or Black jeremiad, grew out of enslaved Black peoples’ fiery denunciations of white oppression. This jeremiad was not blind to American injustice and depravity. It bore prophetic witness to it.
For Black people in America, obvious parallels with the biblical story of Exodus countered white supremacist arguments that Black suffering proved their inferiority before God. Slavery was instead proof that the African-American community was God’s chosen people. Their suffering and hardship heralded God’s greater plan for the future.[ii] Reformulating the Exodus narrative, the African-American jeremiad provided assurance of the Lord’s salvation and nurtured a communal identity as a divinely favored people.
The early form of this African-American tradition was similar to that of its Anglo-American counterpart. But the tone and content were entirely different. The White Protestant jeremiad was a ritual of purification, an unfailingly optimistic prophecy of redemption. The (white) orator always addressed a “we,” his partners in a failing community. By contrast, the African-American jeremiad was a warning to the white, oppressive other. It served ritual purposes for the Black community, but its intended effect on white audiences was to persuade and admonish, not to comfort. An example? Think of Dr. King’s adaptation of the negro spiritual, “Go Down Moses,” in which he exhorted President Kennedy to “Go down Kennedy, way down to Georgia land. Tell old [Sheriff] Pritchett to let my people go!”[iii]
For much of our country’s history, these two rhetorical traditions existed in opposition to each other. They offered mutually exclusive views of America. But if you watch or read Gorman’s “The Hill We Climb,” you will see elements of both. It is not wrong to find comfort and hope in the midst of suffering and failure. But we cannot ignore history or evade its call to action. Belief in a brighter day to come is no substitute for acting to bring it about. As Gorman said,
the new dawn blooms as we free it. For there is always light, if only we’re brave enough to see it. If only we’re brave enough to be it.
–Amanda Gorman, “The Hill We Climb”
[i] See Sacvan Bercovitch. The American Jeremiad. Madison: University of Wisconsin (1978).
[ii] See Albert J. Raboteau. A Fire in the Bones: Reflections on African-American Religious History. Boston: Beacon Press (1995).
[iii] See Keith D. Miller “Alabama as Egypt: Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Religion of Slaves” in Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Sermonic Power of Public Discourse.
When I was in college I ran a media business that I started in high school. Sponsorships, 8 figure view counts, verified checkmarks, even a Play Button award and a congratulatory letter from the CEO of YouTube—I had all of it.
But as time went by, I started to realize that something was very wrong. When I would scroll through analytics, trying to catch on to the latest trend or find what factors were making certain online content do well, I started noticing a different type of trend—a disturbing one.
Many BC Law students were outraged by the violent takeover of the U.S. Capitol. A number of student groups joined together to issue the following call to action to our elected representatives. It is presented here as a guest post.
On behalf of the Boston College Law Democrats, we respectfully ask Congress to bring articles of impeachment against President Trump at the next meeting of the House of Representatives. President Trump’s continuous undermining of the democratic process culminated today in acts of violence and a seditious occupation of the United States Capitol. The President’s inaction and implicit encouragement amount to high crimes against the Constitution. The evidence is clear that the President is not capable of upholding his oath of office, and thus should be impeached and removed from office.
Over the past four years, President Trump has repeatedly and clearly demonstrated that he is incapable of leading our nation. He has threatened our national security, the stability of our democracy and the fundamental principles of our Constitution. Instead of uniting this country, he has fanned the flames of discord. The violent insurrection on the sixth of January, 2021 was a direct result of his actions and he must be held accountable. While protesters stormed the steps of the Capitol building to prevent the peaceful transition of power, the President did not act. Instead, he incited chaos and relished in an attempt to undermine the institutions of our democratic process. As a direct result of President Trump’s incitement, the lives of duly elected members of Congress and hundreds of civilians were unnecessarily put at risk. The United States of America should no longer be forced to endure this existential threat to our democracy.
The President must not be allowed to subvert democracy with impunity. Congress must act to protect our institutions of government and ensure that President Trump will not be able to undermine them again. The President has violated his oath of office and continues to pose a threat to our democracy.
For the reasons above, we respectfully urge Congress to act.
– Boston College Law School Democrats
Cosigned by:
The Boston College Law School American Constitution Society
The Boston College Law School Latin American Law Students Association
The Boston College Undergraduate Democrats
The Boston College Law National Lawyers Guild
The Boston College Law School If/When/How Chapter
The Boston College Lambda Chapter
The Boston College Public Interest Law Foundation
Related content: BC Law professor and American Constitution Society chapter advisor Kent Greenfield drafts a lettercalling for Trump’s removal from office. The letter was signed by more than 1,000 legal and constitutional scholars.
Yesterday was nothing short of horrifying, but unfortunately, I can’t say that I’m surprised. This act of domestic terrorism was not unexpected. It was the result of one of the most divisive American presidencies of all time; it was but a likely consequence after months of repeated baseless allegations of election fraud.
That is why I am sick of the “this is not our America” rhetoric. Because this is exactly our America right now, and we best believe it. The “this isn’t our America” rhetoric lets us think that what happened yesterday was unpredictable. It allows us to neglect that the riots stemmed from a system historically built upon and contemporarily sustained by white supremacy. If we begin to believe what happened yesterday was an anomaly, it lets us shirk away from accepting that the root of the problem is deeper than the current presidency: it is an entire system that is in dire need of reform.
Screenshot of performer, author, and storyteller, Joel Leon’s Tweet/Instagram post.
Note: Identifying information has been changed to protect the privacy of those mentioned.
There come few more humbling experiences in life than getting destroyed at a video game by an 8 year old. In my heyday, I knew my way around a PlayStation controller. But times have changed.
I was sitting in a room on 10 NW, the ward of Boston Children’s Hospital reserved for surgery and orthopedic patients.
It was my first night as a volunteer at the hospital.
There are many reasons one gets involved in community service. For many, school and work requirements, as well as retreats and other social events will often prescribe the rolling up of one’s sleeves and getting out there. Many people also enjoy the intrinsic reward and benefit of making a positive difference in the world around them.
I proudly spend some of my time between Zoom classes, case briefs, and outlines, scrolling through Tik Tok while attempting to escape the pressures of 1L. I may browse Facebook and Instagram every now and then, too. I’m often left laughing at unbelievably clever people from around the world as they try to inject some joy into our current existence called 2020.
One of the recent video trends shows people preparing to “turn up” on New Year’s to mark the end of this infamous year. Most people would agree that 2020 has been unusually chaotic. We’ve experienced a global shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic, heard Black Lives Matter chanted from every corner of the country, and we’re currently living through one of the most polarizing elections in modern history. Not to mention, our society lost some impactful people: Rest in Power John Lewis, Justice Ginsburg, Chadwick Boseman, Kobe, and Mr. Trebek, just to name a few.
It’s safe to say that we are living in transformational times.
I think we can all agree that last week was unbearable. As Election Day turned into Election Week, we earnestly refreshed our news feeds while struggling through case readings. As of Saturday, it was finally over (kind of). I know many of us are tired of the political discourse, but there’s still work ahead. As members of a law school situated in an area that voted overwhelmingly in favor of Biden, it might be easy to settle into our bubbles and set aside the nation’s immense division. Unfortunately, that mindset won’t help to find a solution. In this post, I share a few proposed remedies to mend our polarized society. I’d like to include the caveat that I haven’t necessarily implemented all of these myself.
First up is the work of René H. Levy. Levy is a neuroscientist and author of the book Mending America’s Political Divide, where he utilizes his scientific expertise to propose practical solutions. Levy attributes the increasing political divide to our primitive psychology. He breaks this down into two innate instincts: political tribalism and political hatred, both of which result in a profound loss of empathy. Levy’s action plan highlights impulse control and empathy skills as two main methods to rebuild and coexist:
We are witnessing a critical moment in our nation’s history. Over the past few months, we have found ourselves looking inward at the traditional pillars of society, re-evaluating their fairness and justness.
A new organization, the BC Law Chapter of the People’s Parity Project, aims to evaluate and disable injustices within the legal community from the inside out. Writing a guest post today are organization leaders Daniel McLaughlin and Will Petrone, discussing court reform and the organization in general. If you are interested in getting involved with the BC chapter of the People’s Parity Project, contact bcparity@gmail.com.
Before we came to law school, many of us probably thought that the law and the legal system were inherently fair, and judges and justices were non-political. But as law students, we have some insight into the system, and as we’ve progressed through our law school careers, many of us have been surprised to see that judges are human. And importantly, the judiciary is not as insulated from politics and biases as we had once thought. These days, the Court is clearly politicized, and right now in particular, it is dominating the news cycle. Although most Americans think that the next president should fill the seat, Senate Republicans, representing less than half of the U.S. population, have confirmed Amy Coney Barrett’s appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court. Conservative justices now have a 6-3 majority, and are posed to threaten a woman’s right to choose, the Affordable Care Act, and so much more.
Fortunately, law school’s peek behind the curtain allows us a sliver of hope. Court reform is possible, and it would make sure that the death of one justice does not pose such a drastic threat to civil rights, our environment, and health care for all. It would also help to make sure that courts are not able to block the progress the majority of this country believes is necessary and wants to see. With the election so close at hand, it’s all the more important to advocate for these reforms to the candidates who seek to secure our votes, and channel our frustrations with the current system into momentum for change.
BC Law: Impact 