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Culture War Roundup for the week of September 1, 2025

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Asians form their own ethnic interests groups

Some do, sure. But there's no such thing as "Asian ethnic interests" - why Vietnamese, Indians, Koreans, Chinese, Sikh and Indonesians would have the same interests? I've met many people of different Asian descent, and they had very varied interests - I can't imagine how a single group would be able to represent them.

These ethnic interest groups agitate to the disadvantage of the native population

Do they? Any substantiation of that? I am sure some particular group of, say, Indians may agitate to the disadvantage some particular group of, say, Norwegians (of course, when I say Indian, I mean American person of Indian descent, and so on). But (leaving aside the definition of "native population", which I am sure you will provide me with in the other branch) claiming every Asian group always would advocate a policy that is contrary to the interest of every single "native" group seems to need a very extraordinary proof. At least it is not at all obvious why it would happen, so if you want somebody to believe it it makes sense to try and prove it.

When the native population protests they are called racist.

I am pretty sure if you think that every Asian by their mere genetic buildup has interests that are all the same and are always opposed to the interests of all people who are not Asian, that is the textbook definition of racism. In fact, if I needed to define the set of ideas that are based on this assumption, I would think "racism" is the best term that would describe it. I mean, if the race is the sole criteria you are looking at, how else would one call it?

Some do, sure. But there's no such thing as "Asian ethnic interests" - why Vietnamese, Indians, Koreans, Chinese, Sikh and Indonesians would have the same interests? I've met many people of different Asian descent, and they had very varied interests - I can't imagine how a single group would be able to represent them.

First generation yes. As you get further from the original immigration, people are much more likely to form pan-ethnic support groups for 'people who look kind of like me and have my kinds of issues'. A second-generation Indonesian is quite likely to feel they have a lot common with the second-generation Taiwanese and Japanese boys who can relate to overbearing parents, not really fitting in with your customs from the old place and the fact that white girls don't seem to go for Asian men, or whatever. Especially as they start marrying each other within that group.

Not in all cases, certainly, but in enough to matter.

(India and Sikh etc. are more different. I would expect to end up with a generic East Asian identity rather than anything).

Not in all cases, certainly, but in enough to matter.

Enough to matter for what? The claim was they form interests group which are detrimental to "native whites" (whoever that be). There's a big difference between kvetching about overbearing mothers (certainly no "native white" ever had one of those) and conspiring to take down the whites.

Enough to produce a cohesive pan-East-Asian political movement that can push strongly for desired outcomes on issues that matter to this new, more cohesive group.

Given that native whites are not allowed to coordinate any political movement that directly represents their own interests, and that these issues whatever they turn out to be are not likely to 100% beautiful win-wins for everyone involved, these are likely to come at some expense to whites.

they form interests group which are detrimental to "native whites"

conspiring to take down the whites

These two things are not the same. The existence and tolerance of non-white racial blocs and only non-white racial blocs can be detrimental to white people without any malice or conspiracy required.

Do they? Any substantiation of that?

I mean, there's an Issue with immigration from mainland China, which is that the CPC uses various means to weaponise the Chinese diaspora and the CPC is not our friend. There are legit reasons to want relatively few literal enemy agents in one's country.

This has nothing to do with racism; this issue doesn't apply to Taiwanese (many of whom are Han), (South) Koreans or Japanese, because Taiwan, South Korea and Japan don't have governments hostile to us and ruthless enough to pull this shit. It also mostly doesn't apply to ethnic Chinese whose ancestors immigrated way back, as they're culturally assimilated and don't typically have close family members in mainland China to be taken hostage.

The concern about CPC influence is not racist and is reasonable, but that wasn't @NYTReader's claim. His claim was about "Asians" - which covers the whole continent (in UK, Pakistanis are called "Asians", and why not - Pakistan is in Asia), or, more charitably, everybody who looks certain way - whether they are Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Laotian, Kazakh, Uzbek or none of the above, and ignoring when and under which circumstances they came into the country. I can't see it but as pure racism. And it never made any sense.

I just felt it was worth pointing out (and noting the boundaries of) the big exception where those interest groups are straight-up "the enemy".

Yes, I certainly agree specific groups can be evil and pointing it out on specific basis is not only not racist but also entirely correct thing to do, even it it concerns people of some specific racial background. What I object is a blanket characterization like "Asians form groups that do evil things". It loses specificity to the point it becomes useless and stupid.