nwasianweekly.com
May 26, 2007

Should the Asian Weekly take sides?

By Assunta Ng
Northwest Asian Weekly

Editor’s note: This is part eight in a continuing series by the publisher of the Northwest Asian Weekly and Seattle Chinese Post. The newspapers are celebrating their 25th anniversary this year.

Imagine yourself the casualty of a tug of war — your arms and legs torn apart by opposing sides.

That’s what happens to the Northwest Asian Weekly when conflicts arise in the Asian community. Some community leaders expect us to stand by them. If we do, we are accused of being an enemy or traitor by the other side. If we remain neutral, we are presumed guilty by both sides and must pay a price eventually.

Over the past 25 years, plenty of rivalries in the Asian community and other groups have drawn this paper and our sister paper, the Seattle Chinese Post, into thorny situations.

I remember when one leader of the Alliance of Chinese Organizations, which formed to rival the Chong Wah Benevolent Association (an umbrella Chinese organization that used to represent many Chinese organizations), suddenly turned towards the Chinese Post’s editor at a community meeting in the 1980s.

“Do you think what Chong Wah did was right?” he asked pointedly.

To answer yes or no would be fatal to us as well as the community. If we get involved in squabbles, our credibility and objectivity as journalists are affected. Many incidents have shown that our community doesn’t understand that the primary goal of a newspaper is to inform and educate. Influence is a secondary goal.

When I first started the papers, I never expected to be dragged into disputes. I never instructed my editor to say this, but his reply was brilliant:

“We are managing a newspaper, not managing the community or cases.”

Some hot issues

No one in the Asian community had ever forced us to take sides and reveal our position on any particular controversy until the 1998 storm between Chinatown merchants and Uwajimaya, which had proposed the closure of one part of South Lane Street for its store expansion.

Even the deeply divisive issue of whether our neighborhood should be called “Chinatown” or “International District” hasn’t put us at odds with the opposing parties. The Asian Weekly uses both names, and both sides seem to accept our choice.

The official name is Chinatown/International District. But it is too wordy for headlines, a concern shared by mainstream journalists. If we just use “I.D.” in headlines, some readers might wonder, “What’s ‘I.D.?’”

Another hot issue in the community was McDonald’s proposal to open a location in Chinatown/International District back in 2000. Before the story erupted, one activist who was opposed to the idea visited our office to court my support. I sensed this would divide our community, so I declined to commit. As soon as he heard that the Northwest Asian Weekly would stay neutral, he looked disgusted.

And this year, some “civil wars” have sparked between the local Chinese and Taiwanese chambers of commerce. We report the stories as is. Even by reporting them, though, we are criticized for not doing enough or for taking the initiative to tell these stories.

Chambers divided

The quarrel in the Seattle Taiwan Chamber of Commerce began five years ago when member Christine Chen split from the group due to personality differences and started her own chamber, the Pierce County Taiwan Chamber of Commerce. Recently, three different camps within the Seattle Taiwan Chamber of Commerce held their own elections to select who would be the next president. Three elections were held within a few weeks, and two new presidents were chosen! Each discredited the other election’s result.

At meetings, the former president would be shouted and yelled at. A lawsuit was even filed against him by members of the Taiwanese community who contend that he created a scam that cheated them out of close to a million dollars. Would you consider shouting at meetings to be professional behavior?

We offered to interview the leaders of the victims’ group about the alleged fraud, but they declined. Instead, they sought to purchase libelous advertisements in the Seattle Chinese Post. We published the first ad, but not before editing out all the slanderous words. The victims had agreed to the changes. To my surprise, other Chinese-language newspapers printed the ad as is. My journalism professor at the University of Washington would be appalled if we had printed it that way.

The victims’ group gave us a second ad with even more fiery content and demanded that we print every word or else not get it. “We paid for it. We want every word (of the ad) to be in,” one victim said. If the other papers allowed him to do it, why can’t the Chinese Post do the same, he demanded. Sorry, we can’t do that until the court decides that the accused is guilty, we responded. Once again, other papers printed the exact copy given to them.

It doesn’t matter that we didn’t get the ad. What matters is that I didn’t want some community members to perceive us as arrogant. What is sad is that many of them couldn’t distinguish ethics from arrogance!

Unlike other kinds of trade, such as real-estate transactions, which go to the highest bidder, or buying goods at the lowest price to maximize profits, newspapers are not free to make just any business deal. We have to reject inappropriate advertisements, including discriminatory, offensive and dishonest messages, that readers could justifiably complain about.

We didn’t even want to attend their meetings, which had degenerated into petty accusations, jealousy and ego boosting. So the Chinese Post just printed the results of each election of the Seattle Taiwan Chamber of Commerce.

Then the Seattle Chinese Chamber of Commerce held its election late January; the majority of the board chose Pauline Lau as their new president. We reported it in the Chinese Post and the Asian Weekly. About a month later, Benjamin Lee, who lost the election after four years as president, started another chamber, the Washington Chinese Chamber of Commerce.

In the interest of full disclosure, I am a dues-paying member of the Seattle Chinese Chamber. But during the fight over Lane Street, I did not renew my membership because I had to stay neutral.

Within the Asian community, people not only don’t get along, but there is much distrust and so many power struggles. When people fight over petty issues, they waste time and talent. A lot of good things can happen if people think about what they can do for the community and how to bring people together, rather than personal agendas! That’s what a community organization should do!

Here is the challenge for us as a community newspaper: Community leaders who are involved in confrontations feel they should be “paid back” for their long-time support of the Northwest Asian Weekly.

Sometimes issues stir up so much emotion that even our staffers find themselves on opposing sides. I have to remind them that our job is to give coverage to all sides as much as possible. It sounds like the fair thing to do, but the strategy often bombs when we’re stuck in no-win situations.

Coverage for all parties

But sometimes it works, like in the case of the Chen murder-suicide story of 2001, when our stance helped defuse tensions.

The husband had shot his wife and turned the gun on himself while their children were in another part of the apartment. I interviewed both sides of the family, as well as the kids. Because the children were staying with their maternal grandmother, and because many friends were visiting them while I was present, my story focused more on the deceased mother and her relatives’ perspectives.

But the deceased father’s family perceived my story to be biased. His brother called and cursed at our receptionist and even threatened to sue, even though she had nothing to do with the story. The receptionist felt intimidated and rushed the message to me at home. I called him back and invited him to come in and talk.

“Your newspaper is one-sided,” he said in our office. “Publisher Ng, there are many things you don’t know. The other side didn’t tell the whole truth.”
“That’s why I invited you to come in and tell me your side,” I explained.

Afterwards, I wrote a follow-up story from the brother’s perspective. He was courteous from the beginning until the end of the interview.

The consequences of being neutral

My staff often offers this advice: Just write what we think is right. Is that as easy as it sounds? If they had to face the community like I do, would they make the same comment?

If I were the kind of publisher who hides behind her desk, I could have the attitude of a free thinker who doesn’t care about the consequences. That’s not my style, however. I enjoy interacting with the public.

It is also easier for the mainstream media to agree with one side or reject both sides, and not have to apologize for their choice. Why? The mainstream media aren’t hurt by the consequences like we are, as they have a huge market share and could survive with or without the support of our community. They generally don’t mingle in the Asian community, so they don’t have to encounter the sour faces or cold stares that I have endured at community events.

In many circumstances, it is not as simple as a yes or no answer. Our position, whether tough or soft, fair or subjective, long or short term, can literally cause people heartache and pain.

In the Lane Street case, some representatives of Uwajimaya might still be unhappy with us to this day. Likewise with the key organizers of the Save Lane Street committee. I suspect that’s the reason why one of them became a major investor in a new Chinese newspaper a few years ago — because she was so disappointed with us. Another organizer was so hurt that she tried to start a boycott against us by persuading Chinatown businesses not to advertise in our papers. A third one spread the rumor that Uwajimaya bought our silence. Even with their resentment, we continue to cover their events and use them as sources in our papers.

Today, all parties involved in the Lane Street controversy are friendly towards us, and we are grateful that they are our advertisers. In fact, one of those detractors shocked me with this comment a few months ago: “You have done a good job.”

The voice of the silent members

In the McDonald’s case, the activists’ protests kept the franchise out of Chinatown/International District.

But that doesn’t mean everyone in the neighborhood was opposed to a McDonald’s. Some people disagreed with the activists but kept silent because they didn’t have the courage to speak out. Many of them wondered if Starbucks was allowed to open a store in the I.D., why not McDonald’s?

The argument was echoed a few weeks ago in Jerry Large’s column in The Seattle Times about having a Target and Lowe’s in the proposed Goodwill development on Dearborn Avenue South. Large pointed out how convenient it would be to have those stores near downtown. Consumers want choices, and if they crave burgers, they have to go somewhere outside the I.D. Haven’t you heard of Asian immigrant parents who compromise with their American-born kids by going to a fast-food restaurant first and then heading over to an Asian restaurant for a second meal? Besides, Seattle wouldn’t be the first Chinatown to have a McDonald’s; many major Chinatown neighborhoods, like New York’s, Boston’s and San Francisco’s, have them.

Some community members wondered: If Michael Chu, the owner of the building that McDonald’s was interested in moving into, couldn’t find a tenant and couldn’t make his mortgage payment, would the protesters be willing to help him pay? Of course not!

One concern of the protesters was public safety. At the time, the McDonald’s at Third and Pine in downtown Seattle was frequented by thugs at night. The neighborhood activists were afraid that the same would happen to the Chinatown/I.D. McDonald’s. It’s a legitimate concern for this neighborhood, as transients and drug dealers already hang out here at night. Yet the public’s impression was that Chinatown/I.D. merchants were a bunch of sour grapes that only wanted to eliminate competition. If McDonald’s was so interested in setting up shop in the I.D., the community could have demanded it set up tight security measures and made other requests that would benefit the area — just like they did with billionaire Paul Allen, who provided tons of money to local organizations after he began constructing buildings in the I.D.

What is interesting is that many people who were not directly involved in the issue but know the opposing parties said to me privately, “You are doing the right thing by not taking sides.”

The role of the Northwest Asian Weekly is to inform, inspire, serve and give voice to as many sides as possible, and we want to engage the community in tough issues but we don’t want everyone to lose their cool. The last thing we want is to be caught in the middle of a community battle.

Next: My regrets over the past 25 years.

Assunta Ng can be reached at assunta@nwasianweekly.com.

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Northwest Asian Weekly • P.O. Box 3468 • Seattle • WA  98114
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