1AC

Since elementary school, I have been aware of the myth of the model minority. When I was little, I thought it was a good thing, and I was proud when people simply expected me to do well just because of my race. Almost a decade later, in high school, I became exposed to the dark side of the myth. I no longer have perfect grades in school, and now, everywhere I turn, people see me as a disappointment. My parents are ashamed to talk about me to their friends. My friends laugh when I tell them my grades. It seems as if everyone has already created, in their minds, what I am and what I will be. When I detach from this mold, I am a disappointment and a failure. This years resolution is completely about engaging with others, and it has seriously led me to think about how we shouldengage with others. Throughout the years as a debater, Ive come to realize that our discursive engagement with China is completely characterized by fear and threat. China debates go hand in hand with Taiwan War, re-shoring of jobs, nuclear war, etc. In the debate community, there is only one way by which we view China: as a threat. This type of perception is true in both debate and real world politics, and especially true in the case Latin America. Ever since the 1800s, the United States have had a history of blocking outside political influence in Latin America. This goes back to the Monroe Doctrine, which stated that:
The American continents...are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers. We should consider any attempt on their part to extend their [political] system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not
interfere. But with the governments who have declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we have...acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny, by any European power in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States.

In the status quo, instead of the Europeans, it is China. The United States engages in Latin America not to help its inhabitants, and not even directly for our own benefit. The U.S. engages in Latin America simply to compete with China.
Fergusson 12 [Robbie Murray Fergusson, University of Glasgow China in the International Arena, July 23,
2012]//kevin

Washington has long asserted that it is the sole overlord of the Western Hemisphere and will not tolerate any perceived outside interference in the regions affairs. The Monroe Doctrine of 1823 stated that Latin America and the Caribbean were not to be considered by the European imperialist powers as areas ripe for colonization. Since then, the region has been
under the political, culturalr and economic leadership of the United States of America, despite resurgent colonial interest from Spain, and laterally, the attempted ideological infusion of the Soviet Union. Fast forward 178 years since the signing of the treaty, and there is a new potential adversary for the United States in the region.

Chinese Premier Jiang Zemins 2001 visit to Latin America signified a new Chinese interest in the continent. He promised support, investment, and the deepening of trade links, as a growing China sought natural resources, political allies, and new markets for its rapidly expanding industrial sector. While more attention has been paid to Chinas burgeoning relationship

with African states, China has quietly built up its presence begun to take notice and worry about the implications of this rise.

in Latin America, and the United States has

Americans must construct China as the Yellow Peril - threatening, unpredictable, and unstable - in order to create juxtaposition with their own identity. Without this construction, Americans are nothing.
Pan 4 [Dr. Chengxie Pan, Senior Lecturer in International Relations at Deakin Univers ity, The China Threat in America
Self-Imagination: The Discursive Construction of Other as Power Politics page 314]//kevin Indeed, the construction of the other is not only a product of U.S. self-imagination, but often a necessary foil to it. For example, by taking this particular representation of China as Chinese reality per se, those scholars

are able to assert their self-identity as mature, rational realists capable of knowing the hard facts of international politics, in distinction from those idealists whose views are said to be grounded
more in an article o faith than in historical experience. On the other hand, given that history is apparently not progressively linear, the invocation of a certain other not only helps explain away such historical uncertainties or anomalies and maintain the credibility of the allegedly universal path trodden by the United States, but also serves to highlight U.S. indispensability. As Samuel Huntington puts it, If being American means being committed to the principles of liberty, democracy,

individualism, and private property, and if there is no evil empire out there threatening those principles, what indeed does it mean to be American, and what becomes of American national interests? In this way, it seems that the constructions of the particular U.S. self and its other are always intertwined and mutually reinforcing. Some may suggest that
there is nothing particularly wrong with this since psychologists generally agree individuals and groups define their identity by differentiating themselves from and placing themselves into opposition to others. This is perhaps tru e. As the Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure tells us, meaning itself depends on difference and differentiation. Yet to understand the US dichotomized constructions of self/other in this light is to normalize and render them unproblematic, because it is also apparent that not all identity-defining practices necessarily perceive others in terms of either universal sameness or absolute other ness and that difference need not equate to threat.

The Chinese other does not have to be aware of this dichotomous threat construction; nor do they have a choice. When this construction occurs, and when they are perceived through ones subjective lens, our identities are rendered illegitimate and replaced with constructed identities.
Pan 4 [Dr. Chengxie Pan, Senior Lecturer in International Relations at Deakin University, The China Threat in America
Self-Imagination: The Discursive Construction of Other as Power Politics page 317-318]//kevin By now, it seems clear that neither Chinas capabilities nor intentions really matter. Rather, almost

by its mere geographical existence, China has been qualified as an absolute strategic other, a discursive construct from which it cannot escape. Because of this, China in U.S IR discourse has been objectified and deprived of its own subjectivity and exists mainly in and for the U.S. self. Little wonder that for many U.S. China specialists, China becomes merely a national security
concern for the United States, with the severe disproportion between the keen attention to Chi na as a security concern and the intractable neglect of Chinas [own] security concerns in the current debate. At this point, an issue here is no longer whether the China threat argument is true or false, but is rather its reflection of a shared positiv ist mentality among mainstream China experts that they know China better than do the Chinese themselves. We alone can know for sure that they consider us their enemy and thus pose a menace to us. Such an account of China, in many ways, strongly seems to resemble Orientalists problematic distinction between the West and the Orient. Like orientalism, the

U.S. construction of the Chinese other does not require that China acknowledge the validity of that dichotomous construction. Indeed, as Edward Said point out, it is enough for us to set up these distinctions in our own minds; [and] they become they accordingly . It may be the case that there is nothing inherently wrong with perceiving others through ones own subjective lens. Yet what is problematic with mainstream U.S. China watchers is that they refuse to acknowledge the legitimacy of the inherent fluidity of Chinese identity and subjectivity and try instead to fix its ambiguity as absolute difference from us, a kind of certainty that denot es nothing but otherness and threats. As a result, it becomes difficult to find a legitimate space for alternative ways of understanding an inherently volatile, amorphous China or to recognize that Chinas future trajectory in global politics is contingent essentially on how we in the United States and the West in general wants to see it as well as on how the Chinese choose to shape it. Indeed, discourses of us and them are always closely linked to how we as what we are
deal with them s what they are in the practical realm. this is exactly how the discursive strategy of perceiving China as

threatening other should be understood, a point addressed in the following section, which explores some of the practical dimensions of this discursive strategy in the containment perspectives and hegemonic ambitions of U.S. foreign policy.

Images of threats reinforce the security dilemma between states and breed mutual antagonisms that make threat-thinking self-fulfilling prophecies.
Foster 94 ((Professor at the National Defense University), Gregory, Alternatives, v. 19 n.1 p. 86-88) Threattalk becomes threatthink. The resultant paranoia and intolerance invariably blind us to emerging
By ridding oneself of the many bad habits of English usage we have adopted, one can think more clearly, developments and conditions that truly threaten our well-being but fall outside the bounds of our distorted perception. This brings us to a second fundamental issue: the effect our image of threat has on reality. The late Kenneth Boulding made the astute observation that there is a reciprocal, escalatory dynamic associated with threat imagery. For example, Country A, feeling itself threatened (however and for whatever reasons) by Country B, increases its armaments to reduce its insecurity. This makes B feel threatened, and so B increases its armaments to bolster its security. This makes A feel even more threatened, so A again increases its armaments. This growing threat forces B to further increase its armaments. And so on until either war breaks out or some other change (such as internal economic collapse) reverses the process. This is how threatthink becomes threat. If there is a single, documentable truth to be derived from an assessment of threat-based thinking, it is that the perception of threatat least where that threat has a human componentalmost invariably becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. For this reason alonethe fact that we have shown ourselves perversely capable of creating unwanted inevitability we must face up to a third fundamental issue: the more general failure of our overall approach to envisioning the future. Most of us justifiably consider ourselves unqualified to divine the future. We therefore typically defer to experts and authoritiesfuturists and assorted government technocrats presumably possessed of special powers or information the rest of us do not havewho end up thereby dictating not only our future but our present as well. These are the individuals who tell us not only that there are threats, but what they are and how we must deal with them. What we refuse to recognize is that the future these purported visionaries are able to see is invariably nothing more imaginative than a simple projection of what already is happening. It also is an

assured way for them to solidify and perpetuate their own power over us. The future they see, because the rest of us accept it on authority as all but inevitable, closes out any perceived need to pursue other potentially fruitful possibilities; it provides an excuse for ignoring present needs that, if fulfilled,
might well produce a markedly different future; it ensures nothing more enlightened or progressive than creeping incrementalism and evolutionary drift; it creates false expectations about what can and will be; and when it fails to materializeas it so often does because of the unexpectedit produces feelings of helplessness, not among the purveyors of the deception, but amoung those of us who have so carelessly relinquished our fate to them.

Sinophobia and the fear of the Chinese is the root cause of racism against Asians
Keith 12 [Zak Keith The last permissible form of racism in society July 26, 2012]//kevin
Lundberg will be releasing a book next year, titled, Yellow on the outside, about what it is like to be an Asian in Sweden.Meanwhile, research confirms his image of racism against East Asians.Its background is rooted

in a very old notion of the proliferation of East Asians, that they are threatening to swarm into the worldthe so-called yellow peril. This form of racism began spreading during the 1800s and continued throughout the 1900s. In the 1970s, it was said that Japan would achieve global domination through its industrya role currently inherited by China. Financial journalism is replete with articles about the Chinese who are taking over the world or becoming our masters, often illustrated with racist caricatures.East Asians are excessively numerous, all look alike and are diligent, disciplined and well organized . Unlike racism concerning Africans, for example, Asians are regarded as a threat to white supremacy in the Western hemisphere. That is why racist stereotypes about Asians are considered acceptablethey're supposedly rebellious and kicking at those on top .
Consequently, they resemble another form of racism: the post-WW1 hatred of Jews, the anti-Semitism that preceded the Holocaust.Exactly as with the Jew-hating humor of the first half of the 1900s, the Asian is depicted as threatening and scheming, while simultaneously ugly, geeky and ridiculous. In particular, the Asian man is depicted as feminine, sycophantic and bears the closest resemblance to anti-Semitic caricatures of Jewish men today, writes researcher Tobias Hbinette in his report, Japanese, Japanese, Japanese : Representations of East Asians in contemporary Swedish visual culture. He points out that Swedish East-Asians are a politically weak and fragmented group, without a common lobbying organization, which therefore encumbers confrontation.Consequently, this form of racism continues to be reproduced daily in Swedish society.The host of Sing-along at Skansen gets to dress up as a Chinese with a

coolie hat, while the content of the program portrays the Chinese as taking over the world. Make a comparison: what if the host were to dress up as an African with a curly black wig and shoe polish on his face, or as a Jew with a giant nose, yarmulke and upturned palms?Yet, chink humor is regarded as an unrestrained protest against jittery political correctness. As long as we are afraid of China, Swedish Asians are required to live with everyday racism , taunts and ching-chong greetings.Or, to quote Patrick Lundberg: I want to live in Scandinavia, but about once a week, I just feel like dying."

Racism against Asians unique in the aspect that it is hidden and invisible. Its a kind if racism that is rarely mentioned in our education and even when it is mentioned, the facts are distorted
Keith 13 [Zak Keith Anti-Chinese USA Racism & Discrimination from the Onset July 2013]//kevin While the slavery of Africans and the genocide of Native Americans are familiar topics to many, what the Chinese in America endured remains an unfamiliar subject to most. Severe acts of racism and discriminationpogroms, massacres, mass expulsions and neargenocidal policieswere perpetrated against the Chinese, but the facts surrounding this Chinese chapter in American history are largely neglected or suppressed, and certainly not taught in standard school text books. Official mentions of the topic, if any, are anemic at best and tend to emphasize the concessions granted to the Chinese or the few reparative steps taken by the US government, which, as a rule, came as too-little-too-late for many Chinese
Americans.There has been no intentional negative focus in the creation of this article. A factual rundown of all major historical events affecting the Chinese in America will readily show that most landmark developmentsfrom the founding days of the USA to recent decadessimply were detrimental for them. The American treatment of its own ethnic-Chinese population (among others) and the ethno-specific targeting of this particular group of fellow immigrants leaves a lot to be desired.To be fair, not everything bad that happened to the Chinese in America should be construed as being solely due to ethnic persecution. During the Great Depression, San Francisco Chinatown residents perpetuated and capitalized on negative stereotypes, such as staging spontaneous knife fights between opium -crazed triad members for passing guided-tour groups to attract visitors. Additionally, there were situations created by the Chinese community, particularly in the 1960s, that brought on justifiable police raids and ensuing investigations, such as their underground sweat-shop operations and human trafficking, etc. Yet, similar activities by other groups, such as the Italian-American

mafia, have not resulted in any wholesale ethnic discrimination that was written into law, as in the case of the Chinese. Although the Alien Land Laws in many states have been repealed, challenges
to legislation restricting alien land ownership have generally failed. US Courts continue to uphold the right of state legislatures to restrict alien rights to property, meaning that although most of these restrictions have been repealed, they can be reinstituted at any time. Since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, these issues are being revisited primarily by the federal government rather than individual states. American textbooks continue to list WWII

casualties at 40 million killed, completely sidelining the roles and sacrifices of Asians. In China alone, which was officially an Allied nation during WWII, there were 35 million deaths.The mass media continue to project contradictory images that either dehumanize or demonize the Chinese, with the implicit message that they represent either a servile class to be exploited, or an enemy force to be destroyed. This has created and continues to create identity issues for generations of American-born Chinese: a sense of being different, or alien, in their own country; of being subjected to greater scrutiny and judged by higher standards than the general populace.Asians currently constitute nearly 5% of the US populationone out of every twenty US citizens is of Asian descent, many of whom are fully acculturated Americans. Yet, Asian continues to be equated with foreign, and associated with a range of negative stereotypes.Studies continue to indicate that
Asians in the West are plagued with Perpetual Foreigner Syndromeregarded as inherently inassimilable. Fallacious utterances such as there were some Asian faces among the Americans can sti ll be heard, betraying the lingering concept of Manifest Destinythe assumption is that by default, Americans are Caucasians or at most, black, while Asians remain outside the equation.

This kind if racism is particularly bad because its acceptable in society.

Keith 12 [Zak Keith The last permissible form of racism in society July 26, 2012]//kevin Making fun of the Chinese and East Asians is the last remaining form of open racism allowed. It is everywhere around uson stage, in comedy, in film and on product packaging. Everywhere, we encounter the yellow Asian with a coolie hat and grotesquely large front teeth, grinning stupidly at us.However, research shows that hiding behind our jeering laughter is a form of racism similar to that of the post-WW I-era hatred of Jews. Some time
ago, journalist Patrik Lundberg, an adoptee from South Korea, wrote a column in Helsingborgs Dagblad about the racism

he is subjected to on a daily basis due to his Asian appearance. I am used to being humiliated, he said. People stretch their eyes and mock, while Patrik Lundberg no longer dares to walk with a camera around his neck, due to the stereotype of the Eagerly Photographing Asian. Ive dyed my hair and contemplated eye surgery, wrote Lundberg, whose point was that this is not about ethnicity per se. It is about biological racism, based on contempt toward a perceived non-Aryan race. However, Lundbergs column received attention for something entirely different: the authors criticism of the candy, Kinapuffar (China Puffs). Everybody thought it was about the candies, says Patrik Lundberg today. The debate was ruined. The problem is that Swedish Asians are often from the well-integrated middle-class and thus, kicking them around is considered acceptable.

In modern society, the Yellow Peril is seen as the myth of the model minority. The two stereotypical caricatures of Asian Americans form a circular relationship, meaning that each image results in the other
Saito 97 [Natsu Taylor Saito, Assciate Professor, Georgia State University College of Law, Model Minority, Yellow
Peril, Functions of Foreignness in the Construction of Asian American Legal Identity Asian American Law Journal, Volume 4, Issue 1, Article 6 1997]//kevin

Hardworking, studious, unassuming, thrifty. Inscrutable, sneaky, competitive. Those of Asian descent are sometimes portrayed as the "model minority, people who are succeeding in America despite their status as minorities by working and studying, saving and sacrificing for the future. However, as the "yellow peril," Asians and Asian Americans are also depicted as military, cultural or economic enemies and unfair competitors for education and jobs. The positive versions of these stereotypes include images of Asian Americans as hardworking, industrious, thrifty, family-oriented, and even mysterious or exotic. It is striking that the negative images almost invariably involve the same traits. Hardworking and industrious become unfairly competitive; family-oriented becomes clannish; mysterious becomes dangerously inscrutable. As Gary Okihiro notes: The Asian work ethic, family values, self-help, culture and religiosity, and intermarriage-all elements of the model minority-can also be read as components of the yellow peril.... [Tlhe yellow peril and the model minority are not poles, denoting opposite representations along a single line, but in fact form a circular relationship that moves in either direction. How can such apparently contradictory images be simultaneously attributed to Asian Americans?
One piece of this puzzle came to me as I pondered another inadequately explained part of Asian American legal historythe Supreme Court's decisions in the Japanese American internment cases, Korematsu, Hirabayashi, Yasui, and Endo.

The myth of the model minority justifies oppression towards all other minorities
Saito 97 [Natsu Taylor Saito, Associate Professor, Georgia State University College of Law, Model Minority, Yellow
Peril, Functions of Foreignness in the Construction of Asian American Legal Identity Asian American Law Journal, Volume 4, Issue 1, Article 6 1997]//kevin The model minority myth often serves to divide Asian Americans from other people of color,

and to justify the subordination of other groups. The term first identifies Asian Americans as a minority group, setting up Asians for comparison and, thereby, competition, with other minorities. Then Asian Americans are identified as a "model" for these groups, i.e. the successful minority that others should emulate. If Asian Americans have been given a racialized identity and placed in the middle of the racial hierarchy in order to help preserve and maintain racial stratification in the United States, it follows that division and competition among groups identified as minorities would further these ends. The model minority myth has, in fact, contributed to tensions between African American and Asian American communities. Neil Gotanda examined this phenomenon as it appeared in the sentencing colloquy of Judge Karlin in
People v. Soon Ja Du, a case in which a Korean store owner shot and killed a young African American girl, Latasha Harlins. By invoking gang imagery in association with the girl and describing Du Soon Ja as an "innocent shopkeeper," Gotanda notes that: Judge Karlin characterizes Du Soon Ja as a successful shopkeeper and by implication Karlin presents the Korean community as a successful "model-minority." This presentation thus provides Judge Karlin with an ideological framework to both distance herself from Latasha Harlins individually, and also more generally to absolve nonBlacks .. of any social responsibiliy for the effects of racial subordination upon African Americans. But the model minority myth does not simply divide minority groups from each other. It also justifies the subordinated

position of each of these groups. One of its messages is that "[s]ince model minority Asian Americans have succeeded .. African Americans [are] themselves responsible for their situation." This was clearly the subtext of a 1984 speech by then-President Ronald Reagan, who noted that
Asian Americans were preserving the American dream by living up to the "bedrock values" of America, "the sacred worth of human life, religious faith, community spirit and the responsibility of parents and schools to be teachers of tolerance, hard work, fiscal responsibility, cooperation and love."'131 "It's no wonder," Reagan emphatically noted, "that the median

incomes of Asian and Pacific-American families are much higher than the total American average." Hailing Asian and Pacific Americans as an example for all Americans, Reagan conveyed his gratitude to them: we need "your values, your hard work" expressed within "our political system." Recent debates on affirmative action illustrate how the purported

success of Asian Americans has been used to justify the elimination of remedial programs, and the concomitant effort to convince Asian Americans to actively oppose such measures. Frank Wu notes that "House Speaker Newt Gingrich has carefully included Asian Americans in his
attack against affirmative action. Gingrich has asserted that 'Asian Americans are facing a very real danger of being discriminated against' because they are becoming too numerous at prestigious universities which have affirmative action." 133 Neil Gotanda points out that the positing of Asians and Latinos in the middle of the racial

hierarchy serves to minimize the importance of the social and economic disparities between African Americans and European Americans, making it appear that such disparities "are the product of 'natural' and 'normal' socioeconomic forces.... The presence of
more successful Asian Americans and Latinos, located between Whites and African Americans, proves that the social and economic barriers can be overcome and are not rooted in 'race.

Negative and simplistic caricatures of China are racist and weaken our ability to create intelligent foreign policy.
Lubman 4 (Stanley, "The Dragon As Demon: Images Of China On Capitol Hill" (March 4, 2004). Center for the Study
of Law and Society Jurisprudence and Social Policy Program. JSP/Center for the Study of Law and Society Faculty Working Papers. Paper 18., Stanley Lubman is Lecturer in Law and Visiting Scholar at the Center for the Study of Law and Society, University of California ( Berkeley), http://repositories.cdlib.org/csls/fwp/18).

In Congress, alliances of partisans of single issues insist vocally on highly negative views of China. Critics of Chinas human rights practices, including a repressive criminal process and suppression of dissent,
have joined with members who speak for the religious right in decrying Chinas birth-control policies and hostility to religions not licensed by the state. Supporters of Tibetan independence and an autonomous Taiwan add further heat to debate, as do others in whose geostrategic perspective China has already become a threat to American security. Underlying the views of some, echoing the labor unions, is a commitment to protectionism. One respected Senator suggested during the debates that latent racism may lurk even deeper. These views cloud

debate because they often caricature a complex society and foster unconstructive moralizing rather than analysis of the problems that they address. By demonizing China they obstruct the formulation and maintenance of a coherent American policy toward China and weaken Congress contribution to making US policy.

Thus, we affirm. The United States federal government should substantially increase its economic engagement toward Cuba, Mexico or Venezuela but we disidentify from its sinophobic representations of China. The resolution, on paper, is neutral, but it is completely different from how economic engagement is enacted in real world politics. Although we affirm the entirety of the resolution, we advocate a disidentification with the threat construction and bashing so apparent in real world policy. Disidentification is a strategy that works against the dominant ideology. Its a continual process and local everyday struggle that transforms from within. US Economic Engagement as well has the way we choose to discuss economic engagement only serves to instill negative representations about the Chinese. Our disidentification allows us to better recognize and understand and fight against these representations that affect us in our daily lives.
Muoz 99 [Jos Esteban Muoz, Sarah Lawrence College, Duke University Disidentifications: Queer of Color and the
Performance of Politics 1999]//kevin Pcheux built his theory by describing the three modes in which a subject is constructed by ideological practices. In this schema, the first mode is understood as identification, where a Good Subject chooses the path of identification discursive and ideological forms. Bad Subjects resist and attempt to reject the images and identificatory sites offered by dominant ideology and proceed to rebel, to counteridentify and turn against this symbolic system. Th e danger that Pcheux sees in such an operation would be the counterdetermination that such a system installs, a structure that validates the dominant ideology by reinforcing its dominance through the controlled symmetry of counterdetermination.

Disidentification is the third mode of dealing with domiant ideology, one that neither opts to assimilate within such a structure nor strictly opposes it; rather, disidentification is a

strategy that works on and against dominant ideology. Instead of buckling under the pressures of dominant ideology (identification, assimilation) or attempting to break free of its inescapable sphere (counteridentification, utopianism), this working on and against is a strategy that tries to transform a cultural logic from within, always laboring to enact permanent structural change while at the same time valuing the importance of local or everyday struggles of resistance. Judith Butler gestures toward the uses of disidentification when discussing
the failure of identification. She parries with Slavoj iek, who understands disidentification as breaking down political possibility, a fictionalization t the point of political immobilization. She counters iek by asking the following questio n of his formulations: What are the possibilities of politicizing disidentification, this experiment of misrecognition, this uneasy sense of standing under a sign to which one does and does not belong? Butler answers: it may be that the affirmation of that slippage, that the failure of identification, is itself the point of departure for a more democratizing affirmation of internal difference. Both Butlers and Pcheuxs accounts of disidentification puts forward an

understanding of identification as never being seamless or unilateral as the Freudian account would suggest. Both theorists construct the subject as inside ideology. Their models permit one to examine theories of a subject who is neither the Good Subject who as an easy or magical identification with dominant culture, or the Bad Subject, who imagines herself outside of ideology. Instead, they pave the way to an understanding of a disidentificatory subject who tactically and simultaneously works on, with and against a cultural form. As a practice, disidentification does not dispel those ideological contradictory elements; rather, like melancholic subject holding on to a lost object, a disidentifying subject works to hold on to this object and invest it with new life . Sedgwick, in
her work on the affect, shame, and its role in queer performativity has explained: The forms taken by shame are not distinct toxic parts of a group or individual identify that can be exised; they are available for the work of metamorphosis , reframing, refiguration, transfiguration, affective and symbolic loading and deformation; but unavailable for effecting the work of purgation and deontological closure.

Social and political change is ultimately a game of persuasion. Our storytelling and speaking out is key to shatter false believes about Asian Americans
Chang 93 [Robert S. Chang, Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Research and Faculty Development, Berkeleys
Asian American Law Journal, Toward an Asian American Legal Scholarship: Critical Race Theory, Post -Structuralism, and Narrative Space California Law Review Vol. 81 Issue 5, Oct. 31 1993]//kevin I tell counterstories in this Part to show how narratives perform three related and overlapping functions. Narratives can perform the following functions: (1) reveal the real-life effects that discriminatory laws and

governmental neglect have on individuals' psyches and Asian American communities' development, (2) counter the popular notion of Asian Americans as apolitical, and (3) effectively challenge unjust laws and correct past injustices. These functions of narrative are especially important for Asian American Legal Scholarship, since the model minority myth and the erroneous belief that Asian Americans do not face discrimination cloud and mask the oppression of Asian Americans. We must tell our stories and our history again in order to shatter the myth and other mistaken beliefs about Asian America. Only then can we bring about social change. If social and political change is ultimately a game of power and persuasion, then narratives provide both an insight into everyday realities and a moral "punch" to justify and bring about change.

We are a pre-requisite to good policymaking. Representations shape how we perceive and act toward the Other
Jourde 6 Cedric * Ph.D., Political Science, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, 2002 * M.A., Political Science,
University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, 1996 * B.Sc., Political Science, Universit de Montral, Montral, 1995 Hegemony or Empire?: The redefinition of US Power under George W Bush Ed. David and Grondin p. 182-3 2006 Relations between states are, at least in part, constructed upon representations.

Representations are interpretative prisms through which decision-makers make sense of a political reality, through which they define and assign a subjective value to the other states and non-state actors of the international system, and through which they determine what are significant international political issues.2 For instance, officials of a given state will represent
other states as 'allies', 'rivals', or simply 'insignificant', thus assigning a subjective value to these states. Such subjective categorizations often derive from representations of these states' domestic politics, which can for instance be perceived as 'unstable*, 'prosperous', or 'ethnically divided'. It must be clear that representations are not objective

or truthful depictions of reality; rather they are subjective and political ways of seeing the

world, making certain things 'seen' by and significant for an actor while making other things 'unseen' and 'insignificant'.3 In other words, they are founded on each actor's and group of actors' cognitive, cultural-social, and emotional standpoints. Being fundamentally political, representations are the object of tense struggles and tensions, as some actors or groups of actors can impose on others their own representations of the world , of what they
consider to be appropriate political orders, or appropriate economic relations, while others may in turn accept, subvert or contest these representations. Representations of a foreign political reality influence how decision-making actors will act upon that reality. In other words, as subjective and politically

infused interpretations of reality, representations constrain and enable the policies that decision-makers will adopt vis-a-vis other states; they limit the courses of action that are politically thinkable and imaginable, making certain policies conceivable while relegating other policies to the realm of the unthinkable.4 Accordingly, identifying how a state represents another state or non-state actor helps to understand how and why certain foreign policies have been adopted while other policies have been excluded. To take a now famous example, if a
transnational organization is represented as a group of 'freedom fighters', such as the multi-national mujahideen in Afghanistan in the 1980s, then military cooperation is conceivable with that organization; if on the other hand the same organization is represented as a 'terrorist network', such as Al-Qaida, then military cooperation as a policy is simply not an option. In sum. the way in which one sees, interprets and imagines the 'other* delineates the

course of action one will adopt in order to deal with this 'other'.