Is it wrong to take the path of least resistance?

Hello guys, happy holidays. Do allow me to get this off my chest please. Something happened on Facebook recently which upset me and I want to know if I had crossed the line, if it was my fault for being an autistic moron. Now I have a friend who is an English teacher in Singapore and he uploaded a post about how teaching English in Asia totally sucks because Asian people always prefer white teachers - this is even if the white teacher is a Russian, Ukrainian or Polish person who struggles on in broken English with a strong Slavic accent. Yes, of course it is a ridiculous situation - teachers should be judged on their ability to do their job well, not their skin colour and to assume that a white teacher will automatically speak English better than an Asian teacher is just plain bullshit. I don't dispute any of that and if there are Asian people who prefer white teachers because they like white skin, then they are just fucking stupid assholes. I can't make that any clearer, okay? So yeah, it sucks to be an English teacher in Asia when you are Asian and I can empathize with my friend's frustration. However, I tried to offer him a solution: don't teach English then, or at least start looking for a different profession whereby you're judged on your ability to do your job, where your bosses are far more interested in your output than your skin colour. Well, that is me being my blunt, autistic self - I'm always very pragmatic and practical.

I then got a notification on Facebook that my teacher friend responded to my comment but when I got round to looking at it a few minutes later, he had not only deleted his comment but mine as well. I felt disappointed as I wanted to know what he had to say about it - he had every right to disagree with me, even berate me or scold me if he felt that what I said was unjustified or incorrect but to censor me like this? It was clear he didn't want to talk about it, not with me at least. But if he wasn't ready or happy to talk about it, then why make that post on Facebook in the first place then? Was the only acceptable response one of total agreement with what he had posted, rather than one that challenged him to question his response? But what good would a pity party do? The way I see it, there is a problem with his industry and his profession - is the problem real? Yes it is. Can we solve it? No we cannot, because it would involve changing the attitude of millions of fucking stupid people in Asia. But can I help my friend in this instance? I think I can - he is a very bright person with many different skills, so even if he doesn't teach English, there are many other jobs that I am sure he would be very good at, he can easily find another job where he can earn a good living whilst being spared the idiocy of these fucking idiotic Asians who prefer white teachers. Problem solved - or is that perhaps me being a little bit too simplistic?

There are times in life when we will get frustrated and it feels inevitable: such as when America elected Trump, of course I didn't get the results I wanted, or even closer to home in the UK, when the country voted for Brexit and then gave Boris Johnson a landslide at the most recent general elections. Did I get what I want? No, quite the opposite. Do I think that the people who voted for Trump, Brexit and Johnson are fucking idiots? Yes, of course I do. But what can I realistically do about it even if I am extremely upset or angry about the situation? Would ranting on social media somehow cure millions of people of their ignorance and stupidity? Oh if only it was that simple but no, we cannot cure stupidity I'm afraid, it is something we have to learn to live with and the sad truth is that we are surrounded by stupid people most of the time. Good grief, I still have friends on Facebook ranting about the results of the most recent general elections as if complaining would change the outcome of an election that took place weeks ago. Don't get me wrong, of course everyone has the right to express their opinion on social media but I do wonder what some people expect to achieve in complaining online like that? Are they simply trying to let off some steam (which is fair enough I suppose)?  Or are they really trying to find solutions to the current situation, to try to improve the way things are (be it for themselves or for society)? In the case of my teacher friend, I get the feeling it was purely the former; I mistook it to be the latter - my bad.

So let's address the issue at hand: okay, some Asian students and parents prefer white teachers - why is this the case? Well let me go back to my childhood - back then, my Asian teachers in school tended to have a moderate to strong Asian accent when they spoke English, this was quite unlike the way white people on TV spoke. So if you wanted to learn how to speak English without a strong Asian accent, the assumption was thus that you had to learn from a white person. This is a flawed assumption because it assumes that all Asian teachers would have a strong accent and that all white people would speak English flawlessly. Whilst it is true that older Asian teachers do tend to have a stronger Asian accent when they speak English, this is not the case with younger Asian teachers, especially if they have been educated in the West. Likewise, not all white people speak English as a first language - what if they are white Europeans from Poland, Romania or Lithuania? And even within England, there is a wide range of accents, some of which are considered undesirable or even hard to understand. So for example, you wouldn't want a British teacher with a very working class accent teaching your children how to speak English because that's not an attractive accent at all (see video below). Likewise, if your English teacher is from Newcastle or Birmingham, then you're in trouble if they have retained their original accent. Heck, most people from Newcastle and Birmingham would code switch the moment they realize I am from London and speak in a manner which I can understand them more easily. So even within white native speakers of English from England, not everyone has the right accent to be an ideal English teacher. But not everyone in Asia is aware of this vital distinction.

Of course, since I have lived in the UK since 1997, I am only too aware of this. Therefore the only sensible approach to this issue is to judge each teacher as an individual, by his/her accent rather than make sweeping generalizations based on their nationality or skin colour. And if some Asian parents are ignorant of the range of accents in somewhere like England, then that's their problem. You only allow it to become your problem if you allow it to bother you. Has my teacher friend in Singapore been refused employment on the basis of the colour of his skin? Did the job go instead to a Romanian who speaks English as a fourth or fifth language? It does get to the point where we have to talk about bad employers - so if there is an English school in somewhere like Bangkok or Seoul which is staffed by Eastern Europeans speaking really bad English, then would you want to work there in the first place? No, clearly you don't. Clearly, you wouldn't want to be associated with a school which doesn't take pride in the education process, choosing instead to exploit the ignorance of the locals when it comes to skin colour. Do schools like that exist? Yes they do, but what are you going to do about it? Try to somehow shut them all down? No you can't - no law is being broken. If some dumb Thai or Korean parents are willing to pay good money to such schools for their kids to learn really bad English from a Russian or Romanian teacher there, then it's all consensual. Sure I feel bad for the kids, but the parents are happy customers as long as their kids are being taught by a white teacher. If they really cared about their children's education, then they ought to check if these teachers are doing a good job instead of making such generalizations and stupid assumptions.

At this point, I want to use an example from the world of modern art. I'm sure you have all heard about the piece of art work by Maurizio Cattelan which was a banana taped to the wall. Three copies of that were sold, two for US$120,000 and a third for US$150,000. Do I like that piece of art? No, I don't. Would I pay that much for art? Probably not, unless I'm truly convinced that it has a value that reflects that price. But is it worth US$120,000? Actually the answer is yes, it is actually worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it. Now I am using a rather extreme example - let me use a far more down to earth example to bring this point down to earth: when I was living in Soho, my neighbour wanted to sell his flat and he put it on the market with a ridiculous asking price. We thought he was going to have to lower the asking price if he was serious about selling it but sure enough, a buyer did come along and gave him his asking price. So there was a moment of shock when I turned to my partner and asked him, "given our flat is similar to that one which just went for that crazy amount of money, did the value of our flat just increase by like 30% if that's what people are willing to pay for an apartment in Soho?" Such is the nature of free market economics - the market gets to decide what the price will be for anything that is up for sale: be it a bizarre piece of modern art involving a banana and some duct tape, an apartment in central London or indeed, an English course at a school in Bangkok or Seoul staffed mostly by Eastern Europeans who struggle with English. Sure you may have an opinion about the quality of the product or what it is worth - but someone else could decide to disagree with you, pay a lot more for it than what you think it is worth and so what can we do then?

So if you're going to get angry about what happens at these bad English schools, then where do you draw the line, where do you stop? Would you then get angry with the fact that this Italian modern artist can make an obscene amount of money simply by sticking bananas to walls when nurses work day and night in hospitals but are barely able to make ends meet in many cases? Certainly I feel that nurses perform such a vital role in our society and deserve to be paid more for their work. How do we react then to this supposed injustice that we are witnessing? There's a lot there is wrong with the world, a lot of that can fall under the category of 'injustice' - we are able distance ourselves from some of those situations. So how strongly you feel about nurses being underpaid will depend on whether you are a nurse or not or if someone close to you (a family member, a good friend etc) is a nurse. Hence it is understandable that my teacher friend is feeling rather aggrieved by this discrimination that he could face in Asia as an Asian English teacher and perhaps as someone who is neither a teacher nor working in Asia, it isn't my place to try to tell him how to deal with his feelings on this issue. Don't get me wrong, I think it is important for my friend to have a safe place to air his frustrations with his friends, I just don't think that throwing him a pity party is going to solve any of his problems but perhaps that's just me being a little bit too pragmatic. Perhaps all he wants is to have his rant, get it off his chest and get back to teaching; rather than look for a more permanent solution to remove himself altogether from this discrimination he is facing in Asia.

Is the grass greener on the other side of the fence here in the West? I don't think so - I think it depends on the individual making the best of the situation. Allow me to share the story of this British-Chinese actor: we'll call him Leon (not his real name as he doesn't deserve any publicity on my blog). To be fair to Leon, credit where credit is due, he has done a few very high profile projects on TV and film in the period 1995 to 2004 but he has struggled to find work as an actor as he has turned into an older actor and he hasn't done much in the last few years. I attribute this to the fact that he has lost his youthful good looks because that's the key thing that has changed: he has grown old. But when I spoke to him, he blamed it on racism in the industry - he said that casting directors are always using the same cohort of white actors for leading roles instead of ever considering casting someone like him. I hate to break it to him, but other younger, more youthful looking British Chinese have been cast in other high profile roles and perhaps you could make an argument that not enough roles are created for older Chinese actors in the UK but certainly, Leon is fueled with a great sense of injustice, that somehow discrimination has robbed him of the stardom that he deserves - the stardom that he got a small taste of back in the period 1995 to 2004 when he did do some roles which led to him walking down the red carpet in Leicester Square, giving interviews to reporters. Leon is longing for those days again and instead of moving on and accepting that it is probably his appearance that's the problem these days, he has spend so much energy on this campaign to end racial discrimination in the industry. So the reason why Leon hates me is because I had the audacity to suggest that it may have been his appearance that is the main problem, whilst he insists to believing that he is a victim.

Don't get me wrong - I certainly agree that the industry can do a lot better in terms of diversity in casting, to make sure that all minorities are better represented in the programmes we watch. But the irony is that even if Leon does achieve great success at changing the attitudes of casting directors here in the UK, the people who are going to benefit from his campaign is going to be younger, more good looking black and Asian actors - it is hardly going to be himself. There's probably going to be a bitter mix of anger, regret and resentment each time he reads about yet another young black or Asian actor being cast in a leading role in a BBC production because he's going to think, "damn it, that should have been me!" And all I can say in response to that is, "Leon, these young actors have a lot to thank you for in terms of what you have achieved in your campaign for more diversity in casting - but your career is over, I'm afraid. I hope you have gained some kind of joy and satisfaction in helping others - that is your legacy." But is that going to satisfy Leon? Hell no, through long conversations with him, I know how angry and bitter he is that he didn't become a big British star like Benedict Cumberbatch or Hugh Grant and this campaign was a desperate attempt to try to rescue his acting career. Whilst I do admire the fact that he is trying something instead of simply doing nothing, I wonder if he realizes that he has bitten off more than he could chew in setting such high expectations trying to change the whole industry to suit his needs.

I face the same problem that Leon is facing: I used to get a lot more work as an actor but the work simply dried up in my 40s after I lost my hair. I used to look young and fresh, even as recently as 2012 when I was 36 years old, I actually played an 18 year old teenager in the Channel 4 sitcom the Midnight Beast. Oh yeah, us East Asians tend to look a lot younger than we actually are but I knew that couldn't last indefinitely and I was always playing characters a lot younger than I actually am. After I turned 40, I was still being put up for parts like university students and characters in their 20s rather than their 40s. The acting work dried up as I looked into the mirror and realized that I am now in my mid-40s and rather than try to start a campaign to get more acting roles for Chinese actors in their mid-40s (like myself and Leon), I simply said, "thank you very much everyone, I have had my fun" and moved back to the world of finance where my age or ethnicity has little bearing on the work I do. I took the path of least resistance whilst Leon simply refused to give up his dreams - he wants to continue acting, that's all he wants to do, he doesn't want to consider starting a new career in another industry where his age, looks and ethnicity wouldn't matter at all. Whilst there's something admirable about his determination and tenacity, there comes a point where I do wonder if he is flogging a dead horse and at what point do you walk away. Since Leon's last big role was a few years ago, so I'm afraid I think his horse is pretty dead at this stage.

Leon is a pretty extreme example in that he observes a problem in his industry and then he tries to move mountains to try to solve the problem, in order to improve his own career. Whereas my English teacher friend in Singapore isn't trying to do that much, after all, we're talking about curing millions of Asian people from Thailand to South Korea to Taiwan of stupidity and ignorance. Geez, that's a mammoth undertaking - talk about setting yourself up to fail! No, unfortunately there are just some problems that you cannot solve and so what you can do however, is to try to focus on things that are indeed well within your control. So in the case of my teacher friend, here's a few suggestions that I have come up with:

1. He can switch to teaching another subject within the social sciences where his skin colour isn't a factor. A lot of this prejudice and misconceptions about white teachers being better at their jobs is tied to the language but not associated with other subjects. In fact, in mathematics for example, the stereotype goes the other way - East Asians are perceived to be much better at mathematics and so why not pick a different subject to teach by that token? 
2. Not all English schools in Asia are exploiting the ignorance of stupid Asian parents - there are some which will hire teachers based on their ability rather than their skin colour. So why not simply avoid the bad schools and only work for the good ones? Heck, I remember learning French in Singapore at l'Alliance Française and the best teacher I had there was a Chinese-Singaporean teacher who was brilliant; I had other white French teachers from France who weren't as good as her. She was one of the most popular teachers there and her skin colour didn't matter at all. 
3. Learn to ignore the stupid people who think that you're any less of a teacher based on the colour of your skin - why should what they think matter? I am pretty careful about whose opinion I take seriously because you should never ever allow a racist idiot to determine your self-worth. Hell no, these people can bitch all they want about me (don't get me started on the haters I get on social media), but I would not allow them to undermine my self-confidence.
4. Leave teaching altogether - after all, I know my friend is a intelligent person; he possesses loads of transferable skills which will enable him to get a job in another industry that will allow him to thrive without his skin colour being a factor at all. After all, if he is complaining that much whilst teaching, then he can't be enjoying his job all that much. 
5. Stop being your own worse enemy in terms of imagining that the situation is dire and that there's absolutely nothing you can do about it - if you think that you're being discriminated against because of the colour of your skin, then there's nothing you can do about it and you're a helpless victim of racism. But there are so many reasons why a student may not get along with a teacher and racism is but one of several factors. In pursuing this tunnel-vision narrative of being a victim of racism, my teacher friend is conveniently ignoring so many other factors that can play a vital part in the teach-student relationship. I've had awful Chinese teachers back in Singapore and that's a Chinese teacher teaching me - a (mostly) Chinese student the Chinese language yet they still were bloody awful teachers.

So there you go, that's it from me on this topic. What do you think? Did I cross the line in trying to suggest a solution to my friend's situation? Was I being an autistic moron, lacking empathy whilst trying too hard to be pragmatic in this case? Or is my friend simply indulging in a pointless exercise by complaining about the stupidity of some people which quite frankly, has no solution - like how are you going to cure stupid people of their stupidity? Also, what would you suggest an English teacher in Asia do to cope with this situation then? Do leave a comment below please, many thanks for reading.