Interesting piece of news I ran into the other day: anything Korean is suddenly the hottest trend in Japan these days. As a recent article at Salon.com explains it,

Koreans have a harsh history in Japan. Their homeland was under Tokyo’s colonist yoke for 35 years, and in Japan they still face discrimination and cruel stereotypes. But thanks to the mega-hit South Korean soap opera “Winter Sonata,” Koreans these days also face something quite different in Japan: adulation.

On visits to Tokyo, the show’s two main actors -- Bae Yong-joon, 32, and Choi Ji-woo, 29 -- are mobbed by swooning fans, and sales of chewing gum and chocolates they advertise have surged.

Japanese are filling Korean language classes, crooning Korean pop songs at karaoke clubs and buying out flights to Seoul to visit places featured in the drama. Ayumi Udagawa, 30, has gone a step further. Like thousands of women in recent months, she has registered with a matchmaking agency for the ultimate hot-selling item: a Korean husband. . .

The phenomenon is quite a twist -- if a superficial one -- for the image of Koreans in Japan, which colonized the Korean Peninsula from 1910 until 1945. Koreans in Japan have struggled for decades against stereotypes depicting them as irrational, untrustworthy and violent.

Despite deep cultural similarities, the two countries -- and their people -- remain far apart. “This is perhaps the first time Korea is admired so widely by ordinary Japanese,” said Chung Dae-kyun, Tokyo Metropolitan University professor of Korean studies. “It’s a very positive development for both countries.”

Is this just the latest fad to hit Japanese culture, or is it a fundamental shift in how in Koreans are treated in Japan? I may be a little pessimistic, but I’ll wait until Japan apologizes for the atrocities that they committed against Koreans during WWII (i.e., “comfort women") before I’m truly convinced that it’s the latter.

A recent New York Times article cites a study which notes that criminal charges of civil rights laws have fallen dramatically under Bush’s administration:

Criminal charges of civil rights violations were brought against 84 defendants last year, down from 159 in 1999, according to Justice Department data analyzed by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University. The study also found that the number of times the Federal Bureau of Investigation or another federal investigative agency recommended prosecution in civil rights cases fell by more than one-third, from more than 3,000 in 1999 to just over 1,900 last year.

Federal court data also show that the government has sought fewer civil sanctions against civil rights violators. One of the study’s authors, David Burnham, said the results showed that civil rights enforcement dropped across the board in President Bush’s first term in office. . . It is unlikely the decline has occurred because of fewer civil rights violations occurring, the study suggests.

The number of complaints about possible violations received by the Justice Department has remained at about 12,000 annually for each of the past five years. . . Civil rights cases made up a tiny fraction of the Justice Department’s total of 99,341 criminal prosecutions in 2003. The study found, however, that only civil rights and environmental prosecutions were down from 1999 to 2003 as the total caseload rose by about 10 percent.

What’s that again about being a “uniter, not a divider?”

I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving. We spent it with my brother’s family near Albany, NY. It was a very casual and nice way to spend time with relatives -- as well as to eat some very yummy food.

On Thanksgiving eve, we attended an interfaith service at the First Churches in our hometown, Northampton, MA. I had not attended any kind of pre-Thanksgiving Day church service before, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. But I was pleasantly surprised at how well-organized, moving, and poignant this interfaith service was.

As part of the service, they really emphasized the Thanksgiving tradition from the perspective of American Indians who were already here when British colonists landed here so many centuries ago. Several speakers noted that the original Pilgrims received generous help and assistance from the indigenous Indian nations in this area and that the Indians were not always “repaid” with the same levels of kindness.

The pastor of our church, Edwards Church (Peter Kakos) led a very moving confessional that reminded us why so many American Indians view Thanksgiving with dread and anger. My daughter Sangha also participated in the singing of a couple of traditional American Indian songs to celebrate the fact that there were already settlements here when Northampton was “founded” 350 years ago.

Events such as this remind us how fortunate we are to live in an area that not only offers so much to do, but which has so many people, organizations, and institutions who share our own beliefs and perspectives on social activism and justice.

The Chronicle of Higher Education posted a recent article about the ordeal that Professor Oneida J. Meranto of Metropolitan State College in Denver is undergoing. To make a long story short, as the article describes,

Last winter two students filed grievances accusing the associate professor of political science at Metropolitan State College of Denver of having a liberal bias and intimidating conservative students. Although college officials found as recently as October that she had done nothing wrong, she received death threats and dozens of hateful e-mail messages ("Hispanics, they should be cooked, and mixed into the Taco Bell menu. They should all be killed.” “Shoot this commie bitch"). She was too frightened to walk to her car alone, so students escorted her.

A few conservative students apparently did not get along well with Professor Meranto’s admittedly liberal perspective, so they went on a vindictive crusade to have her fired or at the least, to tarnish her reputation and make her the poster child with all things that are supposedly wrong with being a “liberal.” Another particularly telling aspect of this episode was the support (or specifically, lack thereof) that she “received from her supposed allies:

The college’s Faculty Federation, an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers, fired off a letter to the university’s president, Raymond N. Kieft, calling on Mr. Culpepper to apologize for his “reckless charges” in writing to Ms. Meranto and asking the administration to write a letter supporting her. Neither was done.

Ms. Meranto complains about the lack of faculty support, particularly from colleagues in Chicano and women’s studies. Vincent C. de Baca, chairman of the Chicano-studies department, writes in an e-mail message: “We had nothing to do with her situation and we want to keep it that way.”

Her story and struggle to keep her personal and professional integrity are particularly nasty. Is it a coincidence that Professor Meranto’s ordeal is occurring at a time when our cultural environment is becoming increasingly conservative, anti-intellectual, and personally vindictive?

I wonder how inspired these students to take such extraordinary measures to retaliate against a professor with whom they had political disagreements? Oh, I don’t know . . . could it be people named . . . George W. Bush or John Ashcroft?

Chai Vang, a Hmong refugee living in Wisconsin, allegedly shot and killed six people the other day in an hunting dispute. Apparently, Vang mistakenly occupied a hunting perch located on private property, was confronted by the owners (or those who knew the owners), told to leave, started to leave, but then turned around and fired dozens of shots from a semi-automatic rifle toward the people and later, those who came to help.

The details are still emerging about this tragedy, but the question that comes up is, was Vang set off by racial taunts or derogatory slurs, as he now claims? As an earlier CBSNews.com article reports,

Some Hmong leaders questioned whether racial differences may have figured in the shootings; authorities have not determined a motive. . . In Minnesota, a fistfight once broke out after Hmong hunters crossed onto private land, said Ilean Her, director of the St. Paul-based Council on Asian Pacific Minnesotans. . .

Vang’s arrest left some Hmong citizens in his hometown fearful of a backlash. About 24,000 Hmong live in St. Paul, the highest concentration of any U.S. city. And the shooting has already provoked racial tension in an area of Wisconsin where deer hunting is steeped in tradition.

Locals in the Birchwood area, about 120 miles northeast of the Twin Cities, have complained that the Hmong, refugees from Laos, do not understand the concept of private property and hunt wherever they see fit. Michael Yang, a Hmong activist, said various Hmong groups held an emergency meeting Monday to talk about how to respond. Those at the meeting heard stories from some Hmong hunters about friction with white hunters.

Of course, there is no excuse for what Vang did. As the article also points out,

But, Minnesota state Sen. Mee Moua rejected the idea that cultural differences played any role in the shooting. “We’re all just speculating that may have been a trigger for him,” said Moua, who is Hmong. “We’re all searching for answers.” Moua added that Hmong-Americans feel racism on a daily basis, but “that doesn’t mean you kill people.”

A recent article in the New York Times elaborates further on some of the racial/ethnic aspects of this story. Ultimately, Sen. Moua is right -- facing racism does not mean that you kill people and in no way am I justifying what he did. But it would clearly explain what made Vang snap -- the last spark that finally ignited years, even decades of having to quietly and passively deal with prejudice, racial hostility, and systematic racism.

Update:
After rejecting plea bargains from the prosecutors on lesser charges and rejecting the use of an insanity-based defense, on September 16, 2005, Vang was indeed found guilty on six counts of first-degree murder and two counts of attempted murder. Vang will now spend the rest of his life in jail with no possibility of parole (Wisconsin does not have the death penalty).

While we’re on the subjects of academics, USA Today reports that a recent study found what many of us have already noticed firsthand -- that barely 11% of college students study as much as their professors think they should. However, the study still points out that despite the shortage of studying, students’ grades seem to be improving anyway.

Can you say, “grade inflation?”

An article in a recent New York Times notes that Democrats overwhelmingly outnumber Republicans among college faculty, especially in the social sciences and humanities where the ratio is 7 to 1. The article is based on a research paper located here. The writer also says that this ratio is likely to increase in the future as older faculty, who are more likely to be Republican, retire and are replaced with younger faculty, who are more likely to be Democratic. One interesting excerpt:

The political imbalance on faculties has inspired a campaign to have state legislatures and Congress approve an “academic bill of rights” protecting students and faculty members from discrimination for their political beliefs. . . Academic leaders have resisted his group’s legislative proposal, saying that discrimination is rare and already forbidden, and they dispute the accusations of faculty bias.

There are different theories on why Democrats predominate over Republicans in academia. One is that conservatives are simply not that interested in academic careers, as opposed to liberals who choose academic fields that fit their world views. On the other hand, many conservatives say that they are directly or indirectly discriminated against in hiring decisions because so many faculty who influence those decisions are overwhelmingly liberal.

The actual research paper reports that, from largest to smallest, the biggest Democrat-to-Republican ratios are in:

• Anthropology 30.2:1
• Sociology 28:1
• Philosophy 13.5:1
• History 9.5:1
• Political Science 6.7:1
• Economics 3:1

Did you see the Monday Night Football promotion before the game where Desperate Housewives star Nicolette Sheridan is seen wearing only a towel and tries to seduce Philadelphia Eagles star receiver Terrell Owens into skip the game for her? In the end, she drops her towel (although all the audience sees is her upper back), Owens smiles and says, “The Eagles will have to win without me” and then she jumps into his arms.

I personally didn’t see it but apparently plenty of people did and were upset by it, complaining to ABC, the NFL, and the FCC. But were they complaining that it was inappropriate because of the sexual imagery or because of the Black male-White female sexual imagery?

Tony Dungy, well-respected head coach of the Indianapolis Colts (and who is Black) commented that “To me, that’s the first thing I thought of as an African American. I think it’s stereotypical in looking at the players, and on the heels of the Kobe Bryant incident, I think it’s very insensitive.” As the CNNSI writer points out,

In fact, I tell you what’s been the most amazing moment for me since Monday night. It was a friend telling me that one of his buddies was shocked by the suggestion that all this controversy could’ve had anything to do with racial attitudes. As my friend’s friend said, “Aren’t we past the days when we have to think like that?”

No, we aren’t. If you want to know how touchy the subject of black men hooking up with white women is, take a quick poll of America. There are plenty of black women who will have something to say about it. There are still plenty of interracial couples who know what it feels like to be stared at when they’re out together.

And there are plenty of parents, black and white, who are petrified by the thought of their sons and daughters proclaiming their love for somebody with a skin color different from their own. And when it comes to sports, there are plenty of people uncomfortable with the notion of a black man bedding a white woman.

I never thought that Monday Night Football would prove to be such an interesting sociological issue!