Joy Luck Club

Amy Tan

'Uncle Tom' Author Perpetuates False Stereotypes. The author Amy Tan is an Asian female 'Uncle...more

'Uncle Tom' Author Perpetuates False Stereotypes. The author Amy Tan is an Asian female 'Uncle Tom' (look up the term) for her garbage called the 'Joy Luck Club'. It portrays all Asian men in a made-up, negative light, while causing her Asian female protagonists to marry White men, who even cheat on them in the movie, but that doesn't stop the Asian girls from staying with them. Amy Tan is a self hating Asian female. She is like some Asian girls who grew up hating the fact that she looked so different from her classmates/peers, and fit in however way she could by acting White, and wanting only White men. Personally, she has been massively depressed most of her life (look it up), and has had a terrible marriage with a Caucasian. In her books, she tries to justify her life decisions by portraying White men as White knights, and Asian men as controlling and oppressive, when that couldn't be farther from the truth. Amy Tan set Asian men and women back decades in this country. How come in Hollywood flicks we see mostly see Black-Black couples, or Latin-Latin couples, but the Asian women are always with a White guy? It seems like every TV show and movie in the past ten years pairs an Asian girl with a White guy romatically. Asian men are being completely suppressed in television and film. Amy Tan helped glamorize the exclusive Asian female/White male pairing that is everywhere on TV, movies, and commercials these days, at the complete suppression of Asian men. These shows affect kids. Teens, especially girls, judge themselves on others' opinions, and are easily influenced. Young, insecure Asian girls are conditioned through social norms/media to 'act White' and want only White men, and young Asian American boys growing up in the US are conditioned to think they are unattractive. Whether it be fashion magazines, gossip mags, TV, movies, or our friends, all of us are influenced and emulate in some way what we see on screen or in literature. Entertainment can be as influential as advertising. So many shows and movies in America demean Asian men, while perpetuating an 'Asian Girl Fetish' in this country. It is Hollywood Colonialism, which reaches the entire globe. Have you ever met any Asian families!? The Asian men are predominantly kind, quiet, giving, loving husbands, and providing fathers, and their WIVES make almost all the decisions (at least in Chinese culture). They direct the husband and kids, so to speak. I'm tired of hearing false oppression crap about Asian men from White people, and brain-washed Asian girls, just to make us unattractive in their minds. Also, here's a FACT, not a generalization - as a group, Asian men have the highest average education and income, combined with the lowest avg rates of murder, theft, infidelity, spousal abuse, rape, child molestation, divorce, and crime in this country.    hide

Amy Tan: "The Joy Luck Club" I'm pasting in something I wrote in discussions about "happiness in...more

Amy Tan: "The Joy Luck Club" I'm pasting in something I wrote in discussions about "happiness in literature" in the Dag Solstad facebook discussion group ("Vi som elsker Dag Solstad"). It relates to one of the more memorable sequences of Tan's book. Det er sikkert flere gode litterære besøk pÃ¥ Ã¥ komme nærmere "lykken", ihvertfall bitevis, om enn altsÃ¥ ikke som hovedtema (der vi venter pÃ¥ Solstads neste bok). Et eksempel til, som rant meg i hu da jeg skrev om Undset i forrige melding, er 譚恩美, alias Tán Ä’nmÄ›i, som i sin storslagne og originale og siden filmatiserte og derfor enda mer berømte "The Joy Luck Club" forteller om den unge pike Jing-Mei, som øver og øver, etterhvert mismodig og uten musikalsk suksess, pÃ¥ Schumanns "Bittendes Kind" (opus 15, nr. 4, fra 1838, i spørrende D-dur). Sidene gÃ¥r, strevet vedvarer, mismotet stiger, nabogutten er flinkere, hvordan skal det tryglende barn egentlig flytte sine kryssende fingre i takt 14, læreren eldes og hører dÃ¥rligere, og mor er naturligvis ikke fornøyd. Dagene blir Ã¥r, livet leves, mor er stadig ikke tilfreds, det er vanskelig Ã¥ være kineser i Amerika, sceneteppene skiftes og vaskes, etc. etc. SÃ¥ ramler hun en gang siden i livet ned foran det samme piano og de samme noter, og spiller "Bittendes Kind", sannelig glir det forbausende bra, og oppmuntret spiller hun til og med neste side: "Glückes genug" (altsÃ¥ opus 15, nr. 5, i konfirmerende D-dur). Tan lar Jing-mei, nÃ¥ alias June, gjennomstrømmes av litterær lykke og ro; hun forstÃ¥r at de to Schumann-stykkene faktisk hører sammen, som spørsmÃ¥l og svar, som lengting og tilfredsstillelse, som mørke og lys, eller som Eusebius og Florestan, som Schumann ville sagt. Dette er kun pr. langdistansehukommelse, men det er knusgodt skrevet, og er altsÃ¥ blant det jeg husker som best og vakrest i Tans bok. PÃ¥ny møter vi "litterær lykke", men ikke som hovedtema, og vÃ¥r katalog over forfattere som har gjort store anstrengelser for Ã¥ beskrive lykke (mens vi venter pÃ¥ Solstad) trenger flere poster.   hide

I read this book because I have been reading almost all the works from Amy Tan. I read it during...more

I read this book because I have been reading almost all the works from Amy Tan. I read it during trip to work and home, on the way to other libraries, and before going to bed... Because I worked too hard on it, I caught cold in the evening when I finished it (well, there is a relation.). I would say that I can read it. I like the way how Amy tells the story, the real story. But I made me feel too sad.    hide

Wow! I absolutely adore the movie, but it cannot really be compared to the book. They have the same...more

Wow! I absolutely adore the movie, but it cannot really be compared to the book. They have the same characters and most of the same stories, but there're differences between the two that don't really allow for comparisons. I've always been fascinated by the Chinese, knowing that there're many different cultures in that one country, and this was an interesting look into the lives of both women from China and their American born daughters as they struggled to relate to each other. I love Amy Tan's style of storytelling.   hide

I began the book not liking it, thinking it was a chinese version of the ya-ya sisterhood....more

I began the book not liking it, thinking it was a chinese version of the ya-ya sisterhood. Initially, all of the characters seemed to be unplesant and miserable. However, once you read each person's perspective, you begin to develop a deeper understanding of why these women are who they are. Although fictional, Amy Tan has woven in real events from Chinese history, and used the novel to show westerners how chinese thinking is different. It was interesting for me to see how legend and superstition shape much of the culture, and how dynamic it is.   hide