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Jarren Thompson
Professor Lee
Salt Lake Community College
4/23/16

Americas Sickness

The Yellow Peril is not just a way of thinking, it is a sickness. The Yellow Peril is
Americas sickness and has been around since the first Asian came to America. Asian Americans
today have achieved a sense of a model American but this sickness is still very present. Early
Asian Americans put up a lot of competition for white Americans from their outstanding work
ethic to their school abilities. Horace Greeley said, "The Chinese are uncivilized, unclean, and
filthy beyond all conception without any of the higher domestic or social relations; lustful and
sensual in their dispositions; every female is a prostitute of the basest order." (Tim Yang, Pg 1)
Asian Americans suffered from stereotypes that all Asians look alike. After Pearl Harbor
Times Magazine printed an article on how to tell the difference between Chinese and Japanese
people. Japanese people are short, more positive, dogmatic, and arrogant. Chinese men when
were on the railroad were referred to as degenerate heroin addicts who encouraged gambling,
prostitution, and other bad things. A lot of west coast cities experienced riots in which Asian
were injured or even killed.
There was even anti-Chinese propaganda; one picture was of a Chinese man with a knife
in between his teeth and a pistol in his hands standing over a dead white victim. This sort of
propaganda would make American citizens angry and want revenge. In 1942 laws were put in
place to stop the Chinese and Japanese from immigrating into America and for those living in
America they werent able to achieve citizenship because of this law Chinese concentration
camps were also created at this time because Americans were to afraid the Asians who have been
living in America for a very long time were spies or would try to kill them. In 1982 two white
males had just lost their jobs when they saw an Asian-American and killed him because they
thought her was Japanese and blamed him for losing their jobs.

In 2001 there was a spy plane incident that led some conservative to want Chinese
internment on a personal level. A conflict with Asia makes Asian Americans more susceptible to
anti Asian moods among white Americans which leads to anti Asian American actions. That is
why white Americans are so afraid they put all Asians on the block due to a few Asians actions.
It like in football if one player messes up on a play the coach could make the whole team run a
lap or something and its nit quite fair.
Racial discrimination at its lowest level has not changed from the yellow peril that first
began in America such a long time ago. There are a lot of stereotypes that cause the yellow peril.
Even though it is a different time and era the racist ways of the American people never go away,
they dont even fade! Now I am not an Asian American but I still know how it feels to be
discriminated against whether its because of the way you look or talk or act in public, it still
sucks to be discriminated against. All the reasons above are still experienced today and some are
still very real but I see Asian Americans as people to look up to who have carried themselves to
new heights and who are elevated above the rest in academics and just in general.

Sources
1. Tim Yang, Dartmouth college:
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~hist32/History/S22%20-The%20Malleable
%20Yet%20Undying%20Nature%20of%20the%20Yellow%20Peril.htm
2. Gwen Sharp, PhD on June 20,2014
https://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2014/06/20/old-yellow-peril-anti-chinese-posters/

Questions: Syllabus
1. This paper showed me that its not only me who has felt discrimination or hatred. This has
shown that a lot of people have come out of worse places than I have and have made it.
2. I dont really know what my major or career will be but perhaps the way I talk to people
will be different and I wont ever judge anything by the cover ill always read more into it
and get a different perspective.
3. This has changed America it has influenced a lot of lives maybe sent some people into
severe depression or even made someone feel really good about themselves like their
better than everyone else.