Minh’s Notes

Maybe I’m increasing the signal-to-noise ratio at Facebook?

Those of you who’ve known me for awhile probably know of my contempt for so-called “social networking” sites. If they were merely about getting in touch with long-lost friends and looking up someone’s e-mail address, and maybe even bragging about how many favorite colors you have, I’d have no problem with MySpace, Facebook, and the like. But they’re run by for-profit companies, of course, and that means they need a way to monetize our eyeballs. My eyeballs don’t want to be monetized.

I once described social networking sites as “one giant, conflated popularity contest”. I still think that’s the case with MySpace, but Facebook has since been more cunning about its whole business. You can easily find fault with a service where you’re encouraged to maintain a tell-all profile, add as many “friends” as possible, and chitchat with them, but do nothing much else. Facebook, however, caters not only to the super-vain among us, but also to those who have something better to do there. Applications. Facebook is a bazaar, and there’s something for everyone at a bazaar.

This blog has been my soapbox for nearly six years, but after high school, its readership declined considerably, not helped by the fact that Google relegated it to the second page of results for my name. That’s where Facebook came in. Although I was initially wary of its terms of service, Facebook was an irresistible distribution channel for my blog. I relented, and now it’s where the majority of my readers come from.

People are quitting Facebook cold turkey. But as much as I’d like to follow suit one of these days – having already backed up everything I’ve ever done on the site with the glory that is ScrapBook – I can’t quite leave yet, because along with Facebook would go my audience: you. My profile stays, for now. As much as I dislike their tactics, I know how the record labels must feel, so beholden to Apple for sales.

Soapboxes exist to tell everyone what they didn’t know they wanted to hear. If you stand on one, you scream at the top of your lungs, at every chance you get. It’s too bad Facebook just happens to be holding the donation hat.

Entry №1162, posted by Minh Nguyễn at 5:40 PM | Edit | Permalink
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In 2004, I went with some fellow high schoolers on a mission trip to Chicago. Towards the end, we were treated to a day at Navy Pier and all the touristy areas downtown. On the way back, we stood waiting for the Blue Line train in a brightly-lit but very boring station underground. (Matt, who had a knack for napping wherever he went, leaned into a small nook in the wall and promptly began sleeping.) Soon, a man nearby pulled out his guitar. His strumming wasn’t so bad, but his singing was. Despite that, we sang along, added a bit to his donation box, and stayed around until the train came. Though the music he produced didn’t hold a candle to the stuff in our iPods, it was very welcome. It was real; it was there.

The Washington Post ran a story today about an experiment that saw renowned violinist Joshua Bell perform in street clothes, during rush hour, at a busy DC Metro station:

No one knew it, but the fiddler standing against a bare wall outside the Metro in an indoor arcade at the top of the escalators was one of the finest classical musicians in the world, playing some of the most elegant music ever written on one of the most valuable violins ever made. His performance was arranged by The Washington Post as an experiment in context, perception and priorities—as well as an unblinking assessment of public taste: In a banal setting at an inconvenient time, would beauty transcend?

The article is a beautiful profile of the harried, hurried crowd. But really, you don’t need a virtuoso. There’s already plenty to observe wherever you go. The guy in the corner with the multi-million-dollar Stradivarius? He’s just there to show you what everyone else is missing out on.

Many thanks to Steve Nguyễn for the tip.

Entry №1105, posted by Minh Nguyễn at 2:28 PM | Edit | Permalink
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I’m still not a fan of The Review, but the paper’s latest diatribe against the ethnic theme dorm program deserves comment, because I don’t think the reactions I’ve seen are adequate. The columnist rehashes the same points everyone throws at the program, and I know those points will be refuted in time, so I won’t rebut them point-by-point. Instead, I think I’ll keep your attention better with a higher-level defense of the program.

Disclaimer before I begin: the only ethnic theme dorm I’ve lived in is Casa Zapata, so I’m probably making ruthless generalizations here, but I believe the theme dorms have a lot in common anyways.

Ethnic theme dorms are not the one-day “multicultural fests” that your elementary school might’ve organized. They put a lot of effort into events throughout the year, exposing students to the many issues facing minorities in less fortunate sections of our society. Although the issues are typically discussed from the perspective of a particular ethnic group, they transcend race. For instance, Casa Zapata’s talks may mention illegal immigration with some frequency, but the community places importance on this issue more for protecting the poor than for protecting any particular race.

Ethnic theme dorms may exude more of a sense of community than other dorms do, but it’s not a matter of inclusion or exclusion, and it’s not a matter of who has more in common with whom. In my experience, ethnic theme dorms do more to keep everyone in the loop. It’s partly a matter of your dorm mates recognizing and greeting you when you’re more than 500 feet away from the dorm. Even if you’re not of the same ethnicity as they are. I was a freshman in Casa Zapata last year, and I certainly didn’t feel like that weird outsider who likes Mexican food. A lot of dorms, including non-themed dorms and especially fraternities, make similar attempts at creating a tight-knit community, but they don’t get called out for it, because – for example – “all the Roble kids sit at the same table” simply isn’t a valid complaint in our setting.

When I was little, I was under the naïve assumption that, if somehow everyone would just ignore each other’s race, everyone would eventually forget about it, and we could move on. It was naïve because it conflates two approaches: ignoring an individual’s race when interacting with them, and ignoring the topic of race altogether. The former approach is laudable: who cares whether you’re white or Asian or Hispanic when you’re playing cards with someone? However, the latter approach is unacceptable: if you ignore the issue of race, it doesn’t eliminate the problems that raised the issue in the first place.

We are in a university. It’s true that many of us have already overcome the “prejudice and poverty” that the ethnic theme dorms often discuss. But our role as students is to learn about the world’s problems, both technical and societal, both facing us and facing others. Our role is to take that knowledge and eventually work towards solving them. Those actually facing prejudice and poverty today are counting on us. Celebrating food or music or other aspects of a culture is just one aspect of an ethnic theme dorm. It’s somewhat of an icebreaker, to get everyone ready for the real issues.

It boils down to this question: do we want “racial harmony” just within our school, or do we want it for the society at large? If it’s the latter, we can’t settle for the columnist’s stop-gap solution of eliminating the discussion. Yes, after doing so, we will get bogged down in our schoolwork anyways and forget the whole thing happened. But what about those not fortunate enough to be here? We’re not just in it for ourselves.

Entry №1103, posted by Minh Nguyễn at 4:17 PM | Edit | Permalink
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