It looks like they caught that dude in Seattle.

http://www.angryasianman.com/2008/05/groping-suspect-arrested-in-seattle.html

As you mentioned, let’s see if certain parts of the blogosphere react.

What does bi-bim-bop have to do with this?

Nothing, but it looks pretty good, right?

You asked, so I called her. Was anything resolved? I really don’t know. It never was personal for me (so the personal touch neither helped nor hurt), and Jenn still has her ideology which I still feel is highly destructive. In the end, we agreed that it would probably just make sense to blog about our differences, which is what we were doing in the first place.

I understand what you’re talking about with your friends, but we’re a political blog, so we never talk about our personal lives very much. Most of our stuff gets resolved right here, and the blog enables us to do it asynchronously, which is good given the fact that we have people all around the world.

Anyway, I have a blog about blogging coming up in the next day or so.

I always figured if you have a problem with something or someone, and access to a better type of communication (such as phone or meeting in person), then online debate is just a waste of time. I’m probably coming from a narrowminded view of online debating, which could also explain my other qualms with it. So trying to point out how and why I support Jen, the nature of the 44’s, or that APIA males have to try to defend their name to great lengths is not needed for me. I just put online debating on the bottom of my list when it comes to communication. Mind you, I also come from a background where friends of mine would post something on their blog, another friend gets upsets and posts their views, both go back and forth obviously frustrated with one another, and then both would meet each other 4 hours later and pretend nothing was ever said. “Didn’t you just tell one another to go fuck themselves?” Again, highschool was just 6 years ago for me.

But do whatever it is you feel you should do. My suggestion is only a suggestion, and I’m just stating my opinion as to why it should be done.

I think you’re supporting her because she’s a fellow Asian woman, and you’ve developed a relationship with her because of her blog. Which is fine. I admire that.

I had a problem with her mindset and method–not her–which is why I commented publicly so that people could discuss it on her blog. I never made any personal attacks at all. I never (and still don’t) have a problem with her personally; I just have a problem with her (and James’s) mindset and way of thinking.

They’ve come here before, and we’ve never threatened them or ask them to leave. We like it when they come.

As minbo mentions, we welcome disagreement here, which is why our culture doesn’t always translate well to other sites. Hell, we even link her site! I’ve been on the end of the dogpile here too. You, Ramona, have a problem with my post, for example, and you’re free to discuss it here–nobody will impose a different view on you, though people may disagree. You don’t have to call me on the phone because if you disagree with my post, I’d like you to post it on the blog! I won’t take it personally, and if I’m wrong, I’ll say so. And I can defend or sometimes even change my views right here.

That’s the great thing about our site and our culture. There is no need to conform to anyone else’s ideology. This is also the problem sometimes with being a 44. You get used to discussing issues online without taking things personally, and sometimes that mindset doesn’t translate well when visiting other sites.

I think there’s something wrong with Haloscan. It happened to me to the other day where all the comments were there, recent ones disappearing, then coming back again.

Jae-
With all due respect, and maybe I missed something here or on Reappropriate, but I don’t know what you’re on about. I only suggested calling her since you were the first to have a problem with her post, so I figured calling her would have been the best choice from the start instead of this whole back and forth posting online. I already said a little piece of my opinion on Jenn’s blog when it comes to online debating.

Maybe it’s just me being naive and in my early 20’s, but all honestly the minute I found out you guys had each other’s numbers this whole thing just seems so highschool. Which was only 6 years ago for me.

Minbo makes a great point above.

Ramona wrote:

Dude, you have more of an advantage than I do. Why not just call her?

Since you ask, I’ll oblige. But before I do, I just want to make two points on the public record.

1. My act of calling is not an act of using my male voice to suppress her female voice. Regardless of what is said, the act of a male calling a female (whom he has never met in person) is not an act of sexism, even if said male happens to be Asian.

2. The act itself of an Asian male calling an Asian female who is dating James is not racist against James. Reading the blog of said Asian female is not racist against James. Breathing oxygen is not racist against James.

It’s surprising how defensive we Asian men have to be in order to protect our names, but if we can agree on these two points, I’ll call.

AsianBGirl/Ramona, I don’t think that there is any special weird beef between Fighting 44s and Jenn. At the end of an unresolved disagreement of opinion, the question is can people agree to disagree and respect the other position. I believe that Jenn and some members of the 44s are not able to agree to disagree. Jenn and some members of the 44s feel there there is a lack of fundamental respect.

In my opinion, there is a large amount of disagreement on many issues on the 44s site. If the disagreement is the result of a difference in perspective or world view leading to radically different foundation axioms (eg “The nature of mankind is inherently good or inherently evil”. Not something like “all male models are mental midgets because that’s what I saw in Zoolander”), yet the logic which progresses from the axiom to the resulting opinion can be understood, then everyone that sticks around can agree to disagree. Everyone can respect that while they still feel that they are right, their intellectual opponents may not be entirely wrong either.

As long as the issue is truly being debated (no rants or inflexible sacred cows), any perspective and any issue is fair game to be aired and discussed. This allows some very radical views to be explored, leading to the perception that the 44s is some super militant wack job forum. The culture on the forum is such that if incomplete reasons, bad reasons or no reasons etc. are offered in defense of a position, regardless of how mainstream or radical the position, that person will be called out, often very roughly. If the person responds extremely poorly, the resulting dog pile can get very caustic causing the person feel that they were “run off” the site by radical rabid mad dogs. This is more of a general comment, not an observation about Jenn and the 44s as she never really posted here. Every long term member of the 44s at some point has been on the receiving end of a call out or dog pile.