Author Zia
warns against
racial profiling
and labeling

Helen Zia looks at the espionage
case of Wen Ho Lee

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By Burl Burlingame
bburlingame@starbulletin.com

Circumstances have a way of changing things. Before Sept. 11 the Chinese were viewed with high suspicion by the U.S. government; after that date it was the Muslim world. Caught in the tangle were Chinese Americans and Muslim Americans. Both are the targets of overt and unconscious "racial profiling."

How else, argues essayist and author Helen Zia, do you explain the government's overzealous pursuit of scientist Wen Ho Lee for espionage? At one point facing 30 life sentences for supposedly leaking nuclear secrets to the Chinese communists, Lee eventually plead guilty to a minor charge of mishandling sensitive document in order to be released from prison. The embarrassed judge spent a half-hour apologizing for the government's behavior.

Zia's account of the Lee case, "My Country Versus Me," was recently published. She's speaking on "The Impact of Sept. 11 on Asian Americans" at 6 p.m. today at the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawaii. It's free.

"The best way to bring people together and build understanding in this global society is to openly share our stories and dreams with one another," said Zia, whose previous work was "Asian American Dreams: The Emergence of an American People."

"Quite a bit has changed in the last half-century for Asian Americans," said Zia. "In the 1950s there were only about 400,000 Asian Americans in the United States; now there are about 10 million. That's using the census definition, which includes Indians and Middle Easterners. So, that's a large, diverse group with no common language, culture or race. Our perceptions of this mass of citizens is set by Hollywood and Washington D.C., and it's picked up by the news media.

"News organizations like the New York Times were describing Lee as the biggest spy and traitor since the Rosenbergs, and that was without a shred of evidence. Very intelligent people came to such conclusions based on the flimsiest of assumptions, and there was a rush to judgment. The Times apologized twice in print for doing so.

"The Lee case shows that we -- as a nation -- can't paint with such a broad brush. Counterintelligence investigators such as the CIA, in a politicized climate, made a rabid attempt to find a Chinese spy in our midst -- not a spy, but a Chinese spy. This was not an unfortunate thing that happened to one individual.

"Terrible injustices result. Incarcerating 120,000 citizens during World War II on the basis of their race could have been avoided. When the Navy spy plane was seized by the Chinese communists recently, there were calls to intern Chinese Americans in retaliation.

"And racial profiling doesn't work, as Sept. 11 proved. Hijackers didn't fit the profile."

She sighed.

"The labels stick forever. Our book about Lee is usually found in the spy section of bookstores. Can you believe that? It's like Lee has a scarlet 'S' on his forehead.

"You have to be careful when throwing around labels. Tomorrow, it could be any one of us taken away."

'My Country Versus Me' Where: Japanese Cultural Center of Hawaii, 2454 S. Beretania St. When: 6 p.m. today Admission: Free; validated parking $2 Call: 945-7633

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