[The violent killing 40 years ago resonates with attacks on Asian
Americans that persist today.]
[[link removed]]

CRIES FOR JUSTICE ECHO FORTY YEARS LATER IN THE RE-RELEASE OF ‘WHO
KILLED VINCENT CHIN?’  
[[link removed]]


 

Joe George
June 21, 2022
The Progressive
[[link removed]]


*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

_ The violent killing 40 years ago resonates with attacks on Asian
Americans that persist today. _

,

 

Despite what its title might suggest, the 1987 PBS documentary _Who
Killed Vincent Chin?
[[link removed]]_ is
not a mystery. Almost immediately, the film details Ronald Ebens’s
beating of Chinese American draftsperson Vincent Chin on June 19,
1982, after an altercation in a Detroit bar. Ebens, with the
assistance of his stepson Michael Nitz, used a baseball bat to beat
Chin, who died four days later of his injuries, just two days before
[[link removed]] his
wedding.

But by asking the question posed in the title of their Academy
Award-nominated film, directors Christine Choy and Renee Tajima-Peña
move beyond the actions and motivations of a few men and explore the
conditions that led to Chin’s murder and the denial of justice for
his mother, Lily Chin—conditions that still persist during the
documentary’s re-release in 2022, forty years
[[link removed]] after the killing.

To create this larger context, Choy and Tajima-Peña use a verité
approach, which mixes subject interviews with various types of
footage. In addition to scenes of news reports about the attack and
conversations with those involved, the filmmakers include a
performance by local musical group, The Blue Pigs
[[link removed]],
and statements from workers at a Chrysler plant —people who
seemingly have nothing to do with Ebens, Nitz, or Chin.

Even news reports that deal with the case, such as when
journalist Helen Zia [[link removed]] debates a circuit court
judge about the manslaughter sentence given to Ebens and Nitz
(resulting
[[link removed]] in
only a $3,000 fine), are shot by Choy and Tajima-Peña through
television monitors, to remind us that we are viewing the event
through a media lens.

This approach undermines the arguments made by Ebens and many other
white figures in the film. To hear Ebens tell it, Chin’s death was
the result of too much drinking and flared tempers. When a verbal
confrontation between the two allegedly prompted Chin to “sucker
punch” him, Ebens was filled with rage, resulting in Chin’s death.
Even in light of the facts that Ebens started the argument, that he
complained “It’s because of you little motherfuckers that we’re
out of work,” and that he and Nitz searched for Chin for nearly
thirty minutes after he had fled the bar, Ebens describes the night as
a mix of bad choices and even worse luck. 

As Zia and others come to the aid of Chin’s mother, working to prove
that Ebens and Nitz violated Chin’s civil rights and to open a
federal case, Ebens presents himself as the true victim. He and
others, including his attorney, characterize the actions of the civil
rights group American Citizens for Justice
[[link removed]] as, at best,
using him to make a point about injustice or, at worst, seeking fame
at his expense. 

Choy and Tajima-Peña avoid editorializing, letting Ebens and others
speak for themselves without correction or response. But when placed
in the film’s larger context, his defense is clearly inaccurate and
self-serving. 

In perhaps the most striking moment of the film, Lily Chin describes
seeing her son’s body after the attack. As she struggles to breathe
through tears, she recalls that night: “You answer me, open your
mouth. Move your mouth, let Mama see you.” The scene cuts to Ebens
sitting on his living room couch, an embarrassed smile creeping up as
he also recalls that night. “That’s the first time I’d ever been
in a jail cell,” he says. “Hopefully, it’ll be the last time
I’ll ever be in a jail cell. That’s not a good experience for
anyone.”

[Screen Shot 2022-06-21 at 10.12.36 AM.png]

Creative Commons

As this juxtaposition makes clear, Ebens refuses to look past his
immediate circumstances to see the life of comfort he continues to
live in contrast to Chin’s irreplaceable loss, let alone the
external prejudices that drove the attack. Through various forms of
footage, Choy and Tajima-Peña establish the economic depression that
hit Detroit in the late 1980s, and the U.S. auto market’s inability
to keep up with smaller, and thus cheaper, vehicles from competing
nations. Scenes from a propaganda cartoon depict smaller vehicles from
Europe and Japan as a plague invading the United States, infecting the
country. 

While the foreign car market certainly includes German automakers like
Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz, the anger against Japanese manufacturers
sparked a wave of larger anti-Asian hate. So vast and generalized is
the prejudice that it gets directed at Chin, a Chinese-born and
U.S.-raised draftsperson who has nothing to do with the Japanese auto
industry. 

The layers of tragedy become clear as the film follows the trial of
Ebens and Nitz. Repeatedly, Lily Chin’s cries for justice get swept
aside to protect the feelings of white people. When a reporter asks
Wayne County Circuit Judge Charles Kaufman about the need for further
investigation, he gets defensive and complains about his massive
caseload. When, in a television debate, Zia asks why Ebens and Nitz
were allowed to make a plea bargain, she’s called naïve by a man
who describes plea bargains to her condescendingly.

No matter how many times Lily Chin must publicly call for justice, no
matter how many others echo similar abuse directed at them, the legal
system repeatedly values the comfort of Ebens and Nitz over the cries
of others. 

While Ebens was sentenced to twenty-five years in prison, the
conviction was quickly overturned. And, though certainly devastating,
Choy and Tajima-Peña refuse to let this be the story of three men on
a bad Michigan night forty years ago. By situating Chin’s murder
within the Detroit community, the automotive industry, and the racist
U.S. legal system, the filmmakers force us to contend with the
question posed by the film’s title.

Those same forces continue today, even if they take different forms.
Violence against Asian Americans has increased
[[link removed]],
with assailants blaming everything from sexual expectations
[[link removed]] to the
coronavirus pandemic
[[link removed]] to conflicts
[[link removed]] between
other nations. As the nation enters another probable economic
depression, anger will undoubtedly be directed at vulnerable groups
and not the business leaders who hoard wealth nor at the capitalist
system that allows them to do it. Media outlets are giving attention
to the “great replacement theory
[[link removed]],”
which motivates attacks against people of color, and, along the way,
white feelings are being given greater importance than the physical
harm done to Asian people. 

Ronald Ebens killed Vincent Chin, with the help of Michael Nitz. But
as _Who Killed Vincent Chin?_ makes clear, by allowing these systems
of racism and oppression to flourish, we, too, are responsible.

* Asian Americans
[[link removed]]
* anti-Asian violence
[[link removed]]
* criminal justice system
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web
[[link removed]]

Submit via email
Frequently asked questions
[[link removed]]

Manage subscription
[[link removed]]

Visit xxxxxx.org
[[link removed]]

Twitter [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 




[link removed]

To unsubscribe, click the following link:
[link removed]