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ASIAMS.NET |
ASIAN AMERICAN ISSUES
Is the D.C.-Baltimore Area the Center of Asian American Conservatism?
he greater D.C. metro area (including Baltimore and Northeastern Virginia) is not only the seat of the national government but the center of the U.S. defense establishment. The contractors and the large intelligence agencies -- most of which are headquartered there -- are easily the biggest employers of the region's affluent science and engineering professionals. An estimated 22% of these technologists are drawn from the 400,000 AA who make up 8% of the region's 5 million residents. This heavy concentration in the defense sector makes the area's Asian Americans not only the nation's most affluent, but also the most politically and socially conservative.
Home of AA Conservatism?
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The Asian influx into the D.C. area is largely a post-Vietnam
War phenomenon. The capitol's small but comely Chinatown on H Street between 6th and 8th boasts about 20 restaurants and a number of shops but they cater mostly to tourists and the lunch-hour crowd. Currently only about 1,000 Chinese live in Washington D.C. -- and that number has been shrinking steadily. Most live in the suburbs of northern Virginia (46,000) and southern Maryland (52,000). The D.C. area hosts only the 10th largest Chinese American population but a high percentage are degreed science and tech professionals with security clearances.
Similar credentials are found among the 110,000 Corean Americans who make up the area's largest Asian nationality. They enjoy access to 53 Corean restaurants, mostly in Annandale, Arlington, and in Aspen Hill in Maryland's Montgomery County. The vast majority of Coreans here are staunchly Republican -- not surprising since their fortunes turn on the dollars allocated to defense spending.
Vietnamese are another Republic-leaning Asian nationality with a heavy D.C.-area presence. Virginia is home to the nation's third largest Vietnamese population (40,000), mostly in the state's northeastern part. Less than half that number make their home in Maryland and D.C. combined. They do manage to support a nascent Little Saigon in Wheaton.
Indians, who received over half the H-1B visas issued to foreign tech workers beginning in 1992, have been drawn by the area's defense sector. In 2001 the 52,000 Indians living in Virginia surpassed Filipinos as that state's most numberous Asian nationality thanks to a 143% increase since 1990. An equally large number of Indians have immigrated to take advantage of Maryland's abundance of science and tech jobs.
Another good indicator of the D.C. area's political conservatism is the relative scarcity of Japanese Americans who have traditionally skewed strongly in favor of democrats. Neither Maryland nor Virginia ranks among states with the top 10 JA populations.
Is the D.C.-Baltimore area really the home of AA conservatism? Or have the more recent waves of young AA newcomers begun embracing the more liberal values of the Clinton era?
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WHAT YOU SAY
[This page is closed to new input. --Ed.]
(Updated
Tuesday, Apr 1, 2008, 06:06:35 PM)
Unfortunately, becoming racially aware is part of the societal/cultural development in the United States. This is why people are identified along racial lines, (i.e., White, Black, Asian, Hispanic, etc), and in fact, in provisions like Affirmative Action, such stratifications are required. Thus, it's one thing to promote racial harmony, but it's completely another to become concretely educated in terms of racism, the existence of it, and the perpetuation of it. Why do you think the Black race has been making such a big deal about the existence of racism in the U.S.? Are they all hallucinating? Are Asians blind, apathetic, and stupid not to notice?
I hear many Whites in NOVA claiming that racism is useful to them, when they need it. In my experience, racism in NOVA has become selective over the years, but the expression of so called, "anti-Asian hate," still exists and will continue to exist, regardless of all the claims and counterclaims on this board. Asians need to wake up to the reality in this country and not be blinded by their own, particular experiences, whether these individual experiences were positive, negative, or neutral as per Man of Lha-sa, Metropolitan Aware, and Ken.
NOVA Cosmopolitan
Friday, June 07, 2002 at 10:34:10 (PDT)
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