Vincent Chin Case: More than a Hate Crime- Racialized Masculinity

In my Contemporary Asian American Issues class this semester, we talk a lot about the Vincent Chin case, which was the beginning of the pan-ethnic Asian American Movement in 1980’s because the case was seen as a hate crime attack toward the Asian American Community but the case pre-dated hate crime laws in the United States. VINCENT WHO? For those who don’t know about the Vincent Chin case, here’s a quick synopsis of what happened:

“On the night of 19 June 1982, Vincent Chin, a twenty-seven-year-old Chinese American draftsman, stopped in a Detroit bar with three friends to celebrate Chin’s upcoming wedding. While in the bar, Chin became involved in a fist fight with Ronald Ebens, a white Chrysler factory foreman. The dispute continued into the parking lot, where Ebens pulled a baseball bat from his car. Chin and his friends fled. For the next half hour, Ebens and his stepson, Michael Nitz, allegedly stalked Chin, eventually locating him in front of a fast food restaurant. There, while Nitz grabbed Chin from behind, Ebens struck at least four blows to Chin’s head. The Highland Park police arrested Ebens and Nitz at the scene. Chin died four days later from severe head injuries. Instead of celebrating Chin’s wedding, his guests attended his funeral” (Espiritu 141).

There were so many battles in court about whether this case was just a drunken brawl gone wrong or a hate crime. The only thing in court that could link this case to being a hate crime was the fact that in the bar Ebens said, “It's because of you little motherfuckers that were out of work". Ebens was referring to job's being lost to Japan, even though Vincent Chin is not even Japanese he's Chinese. But my Professor helped me realize that there had to be a motivation or intent for Ebens to literally beat Chin to death, and race was not the only factor. This got passed over in the case a lot, but the first interaction with Ebens and Chin in the bar was Ebens called Chin a boy instead of a man and Chin retorted "Do not call me a boy". In the first interactions, race is not even a factor between them; what is a factor is the reasserting of masculinity and manhood. After this interaction, they got heated and Chin threw the first punch at Ebens inside the bar.  My Professor stated that "Yes, race was a factor in the case, but it was not the motivation to go out of his way to beat Chin to death". So what was the motivating factor for Ebens to get a baseball bat from his car and beat Chin's skull in. Well, from my realization I think racialized masculinity had a primary factor in the killing of Chin. Race has always been a crucial part of the construction of the masculine identity; the formation of nonwhite masculinity was because of white men being in the hierarchal view of masculinity and oppressing and excluding nonwhite men (Carroll 383). Every racial male identity group has different stereotypes and expectations ascribed to them; like white men are dominant, strong, and powerful and Asian men are weak, soft spoken, passive, and submissive. So when Chin punched Ebens to the ground in the middle of the bar and Chin was standing over Ebens in a stance of dominance, there was a major threat to Ebens Dominant White Masculinity. The hierarchal view of masculinity had shifted and Chin a Chinese American man (whose identity would suggest that he's passive) had dominated Ebens, a white American man. Obviously, Ebens being a white man could not let himself stay emasculated by a Chinese American man; he had to reassert his masculinity in some way. So when they all got kicked out of the bar, instead of just going home, Ebens purposely drove around looking for Chin to regain his dominance. THAT WAS THE INTENT AND MOTIVATION. Masculinity is inherently violent, but people don't realize that maintaining this constructed violent dominance and power can mean someone's death.

Carroll, Bret E. American Masculinities: A Historical Encyclopedia.Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage 
        Publications,2003. Print.

Espiritu, Yen Le. Asian American Panethnicity: Bridging Institutions and Identities.  Philadelphia:  
        Temple UP,1992.