The Paley Center for Media hosted a discussion on Wednesday featuring an A-List panel of AAPI luminaries addressing the role the media should play in combating hate and violence towards Asians and Pacific Islanders.
Moderated by ESPN’s Cassidy Hubbarth, the panel featured pro basketball phenom Jeremy Lin, actor Ken Jeong, actress Olivia Munn, Crazy Rich Asians director John Chu, media and culinary entrepreneur Eddie Huang, Interior Chinatown author Charles Yu, and Fox Business correspondent Susan Li.
“I’ve been called Margaret Cho, I’ve been called Connie Chung before of course being in television news,” remarked Li. “But what we need to do in news is we really need to tell stories that are not obvious. Not the Chinatown business stories or the massage parlor stories. I want to talk about the rising political class, which by the way Asians are.”
She added: “I think they are a major swing vote upcoming. They represent 60% right now. But they don’t vote Democrat they don’t vote Republicans – so they are up for grabs. This is a major political power and major economic power as we evolve. So I just want to talk about them as humans and not in a derogatory sense. So nothing of the obvious is something that I want to do in the future.”
Essentially telling new Asian stories, not traditional ones.