If You're Not Sure You Can Win Your Lawsuit Just Add In Some Yellow Peril For Good Measure

Tuesday, May 04, 2010

Been getting sent in some news about this lawsuit which even though has nothing to do about race or ethnicity whatsoever - apparently isn't stopping people from making needless and offensive references to race - because you know - when all else fails - just blame us chinky MF's.

Led by the Asian Pacific American Legal Center (APALC), the coalition of community and legal organizations have cosigned a letter demanding that the racially insensitive language about the nationality of JM Eagle's employees and leaders be withdrawn from the complaint immediately [...]

The coalition takes no position about the merits of the lawsuit's claims, but it objects to the complaint's insensitive language. The coalition, which numbers seven organizations, includes the Anti-Defamation League, the Advancement Project, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund and the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. The full text of the letter as well as a complete list of supporting organizations can be found on APALC's website, www.apalc.org.

Below are examples cited in the APALC letter of racially insensitive language:

-- The lawsuit claims that JM Eagle hired "Taiwanese nationals" with "significantly less experience and fewer credentials" than previous employees with no reference to their educational background or work experience. This implies that solely based on their nationality they are less qualified than previous employees.

-- The lawsuit goes to great lengths to say that Formosa Plastics Corporation, U.S.A., "is largely controlled by the Wang family of Taiwan." The ethnicity and nationality of the family that owns Formosa has nothing to do with the lawsuit.

-- The lawsuit states that JM Eagle's Director of Production is from Taiwan. The ethnicity and nationality of JM Eagle's Director of Production is not relevant.

-- The lawsuit includes the following line in the Second Amended Complaint: "Until approximately 2003, Formosa owned and operated a boarding house near its Livingston, New Jersey headquarters to accommodate the large number of Taiwanese employees... who could not otherwise afford to live in the greater New York Metropolitan area." This information is incorrect, but, more important, immaterial to the suit. It is clearly meant to stir resentment against employees of Asian descent and is intended to incite the biases of those who hate the idea of "a large number of Taiwanese employees" moving into their neighborhoods.

According to the letter: "It appears that the plaintiff in the case and his attorneys believe they stand to gain by repeatedly interjecting Asian ethnicity and nationality to describe various entities and individuals, even though ethnicity and nationality have no relevance whatsoever."