Hawaiian Sovereignty?

I've been in Hawai'i for exactly a year and a half now - 18 months - and being here on Oahu kind of threw my race-gender-sexuality-class lens for a loop because everything was so different from the frameworks in LA I had become so used to in college organizing.

For a while, I thought, okay, maybe things here are a little more color blind - it's definitely not a good thing, but overall, unless you're white, there are so many mixed race people that there are few who identify solely with one community, whether political or racial or both.

I've mentioned it somewhere before, but there are so many "racial" or "racist", aka non-PC, terms being thrown around in everyday colloquial conversation - it's even deeply embedded in pidgin vocabulary.

But then Andy said something to me a couple of months back, and it started a new perspective on the particular nature of race issues here. All he said was, "Hawai'i is the MOST racist state."

I don't think it's the MOST racist, but I did realize, this place is not colorblind, it's the OTHER end of the "bad" spectrum! Totally racist.

And then everything looked a little different. Maybe even made more sense.

There are negative stereotypes being used, enforced, perpetuated everyday, and there is one for every race on the island. Japanese, including Okinawan; Chinese, Korean, Micronesian, Polynesian - specifically Samoan, Tongan and Native Hawaiian; African American, Puerto Rican, White, Filipino...the list goes on and on. White is at the bottom of this hierarchy, but each one has an equally, if not more, negative trait attached to it. There's some sort of derogatory term for each, and if you fit in somewhere, of course there's a list of characteristics that are instantly assumed about you, as stereotypes often go.

The same goes for sexuality -- gay, lesbian, transgender, transsexual -- although generally liberal and to some, "laid-back," Hawaii is behind in the way of progressivism and political empowerment for the Queer community. Very heteronormative, if you will, even though there is a large and oftentimes visible Mahu community that resides here.

Of course this applies to some parts of LA/California and definitely parts of the greater mid-West, but for a West Coast state, it's kind of surprising.

Granted, maybe I shouldn't be speaking for all of Hawai'i or even all of Oahu, because my experiences are isolated to, well, MY experiences, but this is sort of how it's all come together for me so far.

Then there comes news of Senator Akaka's Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act, a bill that recently passed the House!

I'm only educated on the very periphery of this issue, but it sounds promising. Both the issue and the bill, of course, are very divisive and controversial because of notions and stereotypes of the Native Hawaiian community, but I think it's amazing that the bill itself has even gotten this far, and that the issue is getting this kind of visibility now.

I only got about halfway through, but I liked what I read so far. It may be a little iffy in the way of identifying who will actually benefit from this since so many people will try and stake some claim; although there are standards, some who shouldn't benefit probably will...but legislation is always hard to really narrow, and inevitably is open for interpretation somewhere.

Full text of the bill here.

How amazing would this be for this community? Don't know if it'll pass the Senate, but it's a start. And if it does pass, Obama will sign!

Anyway, there's always tons to learn here. I will miss the islands so much!

Your poop.

I tried to embed it, but unfortunately the picture is too large for this format! What a shame.

Anyway, here's the link:

Poop.

The Cove

Aichan, a friend from taiko, lent me the DVD for this film. It was kind of out of nowhere, and I had never heard of the film before she mentioned it. I approached it with some caution, but without much consideration.

As a very basic synopsis, a group of oceanic preservation activists discover that a fishing village in Japan called Taiji is killing over 20,000 dolphins a year. Some are sold to the multi-billion dollar "Sea World"-type industry, and the rest are slaughtered for meat. A particular group of activists actually breached the high security "Cove" where dolphins are grouped together, trapped, and killed, got it all on HD film, and created this movie with the purpose of stopping this cruel and gratuitous act.

So I thought, alright, a "save the dolphins!" kind of a movie. Big deal. I mean, sure, Hayden Panettiere took on this cause some months back and nobody took her OR the cause seriously then either. It just sounded like a whole bunch of ocean hippies trying to save the "intelligent beings" that are dolphins, because they're cute and happy and blah blah blah.

But I watched the film and I was, I have to say, completely overcome and shocked at the issue itself. There's a lot of cover-up by the Japanese government, the fishermen (and politicians!) who are making millions off of these dolphins couldn't be any shadier, and the whole situation is absolutely ridiculous. Basically Taiji fishermen are the bad guys, and even the folks in neighboring Tokyo have no idea that dolphins are being sold or killed. To make matters worse, dolphin meat is being slipped into "whale meat" packaging and people are unknowingly consuming the mercury-filled, toxic product.

After a day of thought, this film became blog-worthy because there's so much to think about. Too much to cover completely -- you'll have to see for yourself -- but I'm going to take a shot at a few points.

First off, the color lens. At first look, this totally looks like White ocean preservation activists vs. Japanese fishermen. It's totally a West vs. East thing, because the group that is trying to stop the dolphin killing is entirely comprised of white scientists, divers, surfers, technicians and so on. And of course, they're taking on the folks of Taiji who are trying to stop intruders from entering their village.

But okay, that's only at first look. The film could have included some people of color sure, to speak for their cause, but it also did a good job of making sure the issue at hand stood out more than the issue of race (at least for me; I would concede that this is an arguable point). So it didn't become a "all Japanese are bad" kind of thing, but rather, the fishermen who are committing this crime and the higher-ups who are condoning this action are to blame. This category is always complicated, so I won't go any further into that.

Secondly, there is a cultural issue at hand here. The Cove also mentions that the Japanese have become increasingly resistant to the West trying to tell them what to do -- it all started with the prohibition of whaling back in 1986, and Japan was very unhappy when they had to stop killing whales. Dolphins have now taken their place, and Japan doesn't want to listen to anyone about that either. If things went their way, Japan would be able to continue whaling, but almost just because they're being told by other countries, namely the West, that they can't do it anymore. It's this "Empire" state of mind, and not the Jay-Z kind. The Empire of Japan and its indignant attitude is misplaced on this particular issue, and dolphins are needlessly being killed off for it. Just a casualty, if you will, of that complicated facet of Japanese culture.

Thirdly, more bureaucratic bullshit from the International Whaling Committee, which gathers representatives from all over the world and is supposed to hold countries accountable for this kind of a thing. Of course, Japan representatives are trying to justify their dolphin slaughtering practices with faulty scientific evidence about fish preservation, but it's obvious that fish are disappearing from the oceans because of people, not because of an overabundance of dolphins. And then all the rest of the representatives do is sit around in a large conference room and talk about how Japan is wrong, but nobody really does anything about ANYTHING. To make matters worse, Japan pays off other, poorer countries, like Laos, Cambodia, and Dominica, to support their cause on the Committee, making it difficult for the rest of the committee to pressure Japan to stop their practices.

Every rich, developed country has its dirty secrets. Just one more exposed in this film.

With the Academy Award nomination, I hope this film gets the kind of coverage it deserves. I also hope that more younger generation Japanese are able to jump on this cause. I never thought I'd be writing about an issue like this, but I think this film is done so well that it needs to be put out there.

Go rent the DVD and see if for yourself. Then visit the website here for more information.

I wouldn't have taken the time to blog about this if I didn't think it worthy. Hope I can convince folks to just take a look. The footage is incredibly disturbing and, as Aichan said, "brutal," but I think it's a must see. With any issue, awareness is a first step. So this is my first action. We'll see where it goes from there.