{"id":1842,"date":"2012-02-06T13:47:08","date_gmt":"2012-02-06T17:47:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/?p=1842"},"modified":"2012-02-07T15:15:59","modified_gmt":"2012-02-07T19:15:59","slug":"jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/","title":{"rendered":"Jeremy Lin and the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Sometimes compliments are the worst insults.<\/p>\n

In early 2010, back when he was a Harvard phenom, I had the privilege of interviewing NBA basketballer Jeremy Lin. \u00a0We were still building this crazy thing called Patheos, so I met Jeremy at his dorm and used a $150 HD camera. \u00a0I presented the interview in text form (see\u00a0Part One<\/a> and\u00a0 Part Two<\/a>)\u00a0because Jeremy spoke in an immobile monotone. \u00a0Even so,\u00a0 Question 1<\/a> of my homemade interview has gotten over 36,000 views. \u00a0Suffice it to say that Jeremy Lin has a following.<\/p>\n

He particularly has a following amongst Asian-Americans. \u00a0And some Asian-American young men, long stereotyped as timid and unathletic, nerdy or effeminate or socially immature \u2014 have fought back tears (which may not help with the stereotype, but is understandable under the circumstances) as they watched Jeremy Lin score 25 points, 7 assists and 5 rebounds for the New York Knicks. \u00a0Here are the highlights, but the lowlights <\/em>are the pseudo-compliments from the commentators, whose astonishment at Jeremy\u2019s success speaks volumes:<\/p>\n

<\/iframe><\/p>\nI loved watching Jeremy\u2019s aggression on the court and his enjoyment of the game. \u00a0I loved seeing his teammates\u2019 celebration, since Jeremy has obviously won their hearts with his courage and kindness. \u00a0I did not <\/em>love the belittling comments. \u00a0Now, I\u2019m always reticent to cry \u201cracism,\u201d and I won\u2019t cry \u201cracism\u201d in this case. \u00a0The commentators are not showing hatred of a race. \u00a0I won\u2019t even call it bigotry \u2014 at least not bigotry outright. \u00a0If anything, they\u2019re showing what President Bush famously called \u201cthe soft bigotry of low expectations.\u201d \u00a0Their astonishment at the sight of Jeremy Lin outperforming the other players, their consistent references to how exhausted he must be, and how \u201cmagical\u201d a night he\u2019s having (rather than a natural result of talent and hard work) suggests that they\u2019ve bought into the stereotype of the physically inferior Asian-American male.<\/p>\n[Update: Yes, I know they have other reasons to be surprised by his big night \u2014 he\u2019s never played so much and never scored so much in a single game. \u00a0I may be being unfair here, but I still hear echoes here of the same kind of \u201clow expectations\u201d that Lin has had to deal with, as an Asian-American basketballer, throughout his entire career.<\/em>]<\/p>\nI grew up in the Bay Area with a Korean adopted sister and best friends who were Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Filipino. \u00a0I married an extraordinary Chinese-American woman, and thus joined her family and community (amongst whom I now live). \u00a0Even though I\u2019m Caucasian, I\u2019ve been around Asian-American communities long enough to see that Asian-American men and women face different stereotypes and different challenges. \u00a0Asian-American women by and large have a positive, helpful image in American society. \u00a0Although some Asian-American women will complain about stereotypes of submissiveness or nerdiness or asexuality, so many Asian-American women have become doctors, lawyers, reporters and businesswomen that they\u2019re generally seen as intelligent, professional, attractive, friendly, and relatively innocent or untainted by bad attitudes and bad influences. \u00a0Even positive stereotypes can be confining, of course, but they\u2019re better than negative ones.<\/p>\nFor Asian-American men, in contrast, the positive stereotypes are few: they\u2019re good at math and good at short-people sports like table tennis and gymnastics. \u00a0The negative stereotypes are legion: they\u2019re the geeky, socially inept guys with coke-can glasses in the engineering labs; they\u2019re the perpetual adolescents playing video games on their super-computers at thirty or forty years old; and they\u2019re the physically and sexually immature, small and timid young men who can\u2019t talk to girls and get their second jobs before they get their first kiss.<\/p>\nLike most stereotypes, these come from somewhere<\/em>. \u00a0Recent generations of immigrants from Asia have come from the wealthy and the educated, so that the families who make it to the United States are among the most intelligent and ambitious that Asia has to offer. \u00a0Of course they tend to be successful. \u00a0If it was only the most athletic Australians who could manage the immigration experience, then Australian-Americans would tend to be athletic at a higher percentage than Americans in general. \u00a0Also, the sons of immigrants from Asia are pressed by their parents (and by their own sense of filial duty) into careers that are secure and financially rewarding, like engineering and medicine. \u00a0(Daughters are typically allowed to take a little more risk.) \u00a0Some Asian-American men grow up in ethnic enclaves where they\u2019re relatively sheltered because their parents are (with great justification) suspicious of American cultural influences. \u00a0And they may begin romantic relationships later because their culture encourages them to focus first on their education and professional development. \u00a0Isn\u2019t that a good thing?<\/p>\nBut stereotypes are stereotypes <\/em>because they\u2019re intellectually lazy generalizations that only tell a part of the story. \u00a0They feed more off our ignorance and our fears than our knowledge and understanding. \u00a0The stereotypes I listed above do not describe the Asian-American men I know, or only offer a profoundly caricatured description of one part of their character.<\/p>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright\" style=\"margin: 4px;\" title=\"JLin\" src=\"https:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/photo\/2011\/0311\/nba_g_lin12_576.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"277\" height=\"155\">Jeremy, like many Asian-American male athletes, is consistently underestimated. \u00a0Great basketball players don\u2019t come from Harvard for a very simple reason: because great basketball players don\u2019t go to Harvard in the first place. \u00a0They\u2019re\u00a0recruited by Duke or Kansas or UCLA or UNC. \u00a0A high school basketball player with Jeremy Lin\u2019s statistics should<\/em> have been recruited heavily by the nation\u2019s top programs. \u00a0But Jeremy Lin was unrecruited and had to send video tapes and pitch himself. \u00a0He performed brilliantly in college, and many college coaches kicked themselves for overlooking him. \u00a0Then he was undrafted for the NBA \u2014 but performed well in the Summer League and was picked up by the Warriors. \u00a0Arguably, there are reasons he was overlooked other than race. \u00a0Jeremy isn\u2019t the flashiest player; never the tallest or strongest guy on the court (he entered high school 5\u20193\u2033 and 125 lbs), he has had to add layer after layer of skills and strategies and basketball intelligence. \u00a0But still, someone with his track record, someone with his statistics and all around game, would have gotten more notice if he weren\u2019t a relatively small, baby-faced Asian-American in a league that has hardly ever seen an Asian-American succeed.<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 263px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" \" title=\"Jeremy Yin and Yao Ming\" src=\"https:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4073\/4951999062_3a9fbb68aa.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"263\" height=\"350\"><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jeremy Lin and Yao Ming<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nJeremy is not Yao Ming, a 7\u20196\u2033 freak of nature with tree-trunk legs who could have an impact even if he was not terribly athletic or aggressive. \u00a0He\u2019s 6\u20193\u2033, broad-shouldered, 200 pounds, and 24 years old \u2014 but he looks a bit boyish\u00a0next to the towering hirsute beasts of Eastern Europe. \u00a0But that\u2019s part of what\u2019s great about him. \u00a0Jeremy cannot depend on his size. \u00a0He has to depend on skill, speed \u2014 and fearlessness<\/em>. \u00a0Jeremy looks at the guys on the court, 5 inches or 10 inches taller than him, 50 pounds or 100 pounds heavier, and he can\u2019t wait to take them on<\/em>. \u00a0And he often beats them.<\/p>\nStanding in a room full of other Asian-American men, Jeremy looks like a giant. \u00a0Standing on an NBA court, he looks like those other Asian-American men looked next to him. \u00a0He represents them in the NBA. \u00a0That\u2019s why Jeremy Lin is more than a mere basketball player for Asian-American men. \u00a0Many Asian-American men love basketball with a passion. \u00a0Some part of them may have bought into the stereotype themselves. \u00a0To be crude about it: could a guy like me, an Asian-American, hold his own on the court with these mammoth African-American super-athletes? \u00a0He takes their doubts and insecurities \u2014 and schools them on the court.<\/p>\nI asked Jeremy whether it felt like a burden to carry the hopes and expectations of so many Asian-American men upon his shoulders, and he answered that he couldn\u2019t play for other people. \u00a0\u201cI can\u2019t even play for myself. \u00a0The right way to play is not for others and not for myself, but for God. \u00a0I still don\u2019t fully understand what that means. \u00a0I\u2019m still learning to be selfless and submit myself to God and give the game up to Him. \u00a0My audience is God.\u201d \u00a0He does, however, have a responsibility to be a \u201cgodly role model,\u201d and when I asked whether it would please him if his success shattered negative stereotypes of Asian males, he broke into a big smile. \u00a0\u201cI would be pleased,\u201d he said. \u00a0\u201cAbsolutely, I would be pleased.\u201d<\/p>\nSo would I. \u00a0You go, Jeremy.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sometimes compliments are the worst insults. In early 2010, back when he was a Harvard phenom, I had the privilege of interviewing NBA basketballer Jeremy Lin. \u00a0We were still building this crazy thing called Patheos, so I met Jeremy at his dorm and used a $150 HD camera. \u00a0I presented the interview in text form […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[728],"tags":[816,814,589,1378,815,1373,813],"class_list":["post-1842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports","tag-basketball","tag-faith-and-sports","tag-harvard","tag-jeremy-lin","tag-nba","tag-sports","tag-yao-ming"],"yoast_head":"\n<title>Jeremy Lin and the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations - Philosophical Fragments<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Sometimes compliments are the worst insults. In early 2010, back when he was a Harvard phenom, I had the privilege of interviewing NBA basketballer Jeremy\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Jeremy Lin and the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations - Philosophical Fragments\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Sometimes compliments are the worst insults. In early 2010, back when he was a Harvard phenom, I had the privilege of interviewing NBA basketballer Jeremy\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Philosophical Fragments\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-02-06T17:47:08+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2012-02-07T19:15:59+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/photo\/2011\/0311\/nba_g_lin12_576.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Timothy Dalrymple\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Timothy Dalrymple\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"7 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/\",\"name\":\"Jeremy Lin and the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations - Philosophical Fragments\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2012-02-06T17:47:08+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2012-02-07T19:15:59+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/#\/schema\/person\/de8c9a4caf0177191808914f83826310\"},\"description\":\"Sometimes compliments are the worst insults. In early 2010, back when he was a Harvard phenom, I had the privilege of interviewing NBA basketballer Jeremy\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Jeremy Lin and the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/\",\"name\":\"Philosophical Fragments\",\"description\":\"Daily Thoughts on Faith, Culture and Politics from Timothy Dalrymple\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/#\/schema\/person\/de8c9a4caf0177191808914f83826310\",\"name\":\"Timothy Dalrymple\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/53a368bbc8d116657d6af168549f2add?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/53a368bbc8d116657d6af168549f2add?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg\",\"caption\":\"Timothy Dalrymple\"},\"description\":\"Timothy Dalrymple was raised in non-denominational evangelical congregations in California. The son and grandson of ministers, as a young boy he spent far too many hours each night staring at the ceiling and pondering the afterlife. \u00a0 In all his work he seeks a better understanding of why people do, and do not, come to faith, and researches and teaches in religion and science, faith and reason, theology and philosophy, the origins of atheism, Christology, and the religious transformations of suffering\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/author\/tdalrymple\/\"}]}<\/script>\n","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Jeremy Lin and the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations - Philosophical Fragments","description":"Sometimes compliments are the worst insults. In early 2010, back when he was a Harvard phenom, I had the privilege of interviewing NBA basketballer Jeremy","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Jeremy Lin and the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations - Philosophical Fragments","og_description":"Sometimes compliments are the worst insults. In early 2010, back when he was a Harvard phenom, I had the privilege of interviewing NBA basketballer Jeremy","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/","og_site_name":"Philosophical Fragments","article_published_time":"2012-02-06T17:47:08+00:00","article_modified_time":"2012-02-07T19:15:59+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/photo\/2011\/0311\/nba_g_lin12_576.jpg"}],"author":"Timothy Dalrymple","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Timothy Dalrymple","Est. reading time":"7 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/","name":"Jeremy Lin and the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations - Philosophical Fragments","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/#website"},"datePublished":"2012-02-06T17:47:08+00:00","dateModified":"2012-02-07T19:15:59+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/#\/schema\/person\/de8c9a4caf0177191808914f83826310"},"description":"Sometimes compliments are the worst insults. In early 2010, back when he was a Harvard phenom, I had the privilege of interviewing NBA basketballer Jeremy","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2012\/02\/06\/jeremy-lin-and-the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Jeremy Lin and the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/","name":"Philosophical Fragments","description":"Daily Thoughts on Faith, Culture and Politics from Timothy Dalrymple","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/#\/schema\/person\/de8c9a4caf0177191808914f83826310","name":"Timothy Dalrymple","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/53a368bbc8d116657d6af168549f2add?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/53a368bbc8d116657d6af168549f2add?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg","caption":"Timothy Dalrymple"},"description":"Timothy Dalrymple was raised in non-denominational evangelical congregations in California. The son and grandson of ministers, as a young boy he spent far too many hours each night staring at the ceiling and pondering the afterlife. \u00a0 In all his work he seeks a better understanding of why people do, and do not, come to faith, and researches and teaches in religion and science, faith and reason, theology and philosophy, the origins of atheism, Christology, and the religious transformations of suffering","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/author\/tdalrymple\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1842"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1842\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}