Hyphenated Americans do not have a clear idea what their community newspaper [CN] means to them and to the community. This translates to not knowing who they are, and not knowing what they are doing.

Archetypal of this knowledge in a vacuum which may be interpreted also as a denial of the self-being, is when one becomes a fierce defender of freedom of speech, yet castigating the media as if it has no right to speak out, championing the cause of liberty, but in fact it is a clear abuse of liberty and freedom, and advocating tolerance for the opinion of others yet intolerant to those who differ.

Similarly, not understanding what a community newspaper is all about is as disturbing as when marching down the street crying for the withdrawal of our troops from Iraq and not knowing how, or writing about winning the war on terror yet condemning war itself.

CN identifies hyphenated Americans. It mirrors their community. It is the community itself. It is through CN that hyphenated Americans identify their excuse for being, and in the eyes of the outside world, are identified by it.

This explains why we have an identity crisis, especially among our young second generation of cross-originated Americans.

In San Diego and anywhere I go -- i.e., in Illinois where I guest-wrote daily mainstream and CN editorials mostly out of my community work as vice chairman of community relations commission of Freeport City -- well-meaning American friends and acquaintances would very often ask me – Ed, what’s going on in the community? I don’t read our community newspapers, unless a copy is handed to me. As if CN is too low for their status. As if it will embarrass them if they go out of their way and look for a copy.

There is an air of arrogant indifference in this innocent greeting. Because I am tired of it, I devised a standard reply to the same recurring question: I said, Look at the mirror. What do you see – yourself? No it is not. You did not look at yourself in the mirror.

This response gives me the opportunity to explain to the unknowing mass of innocents in our midst that if they don’t read our community newspaper, they are not looking at themselves in the mirror.

For so many years since foreign born Americans came to this country, or since they were born in this country, they never really knew who they were, or how they looked like. They are not even aware that copies of CN – their mirror to look at to see themselves – are circulated in strategic distribution centers around the neighborhood where they can get those copies for free.

CN is one of the many symbolic emblems that stand for the other half of the hyphenated American’s identity. It is what they are connecting to, and what they are connecting for if they are to become part of their own community.

Even though colored foreign born Americans are married to U.S. born Caucasian-Americans who are living in a white neighborhood and looked up to as successful in life professional-status-wise, it is only when they open the pages of the community newspaper that they see how their world looks like, and how for example, an oriental or Filipino life evolved in a purely American environment.

No external mainstream media is in a better position to reflect on the community’s internal affairs with a certain degree of affinity, and to capture in print the hyphenated American’s original way of life, customs and traditions that blended into the American way of life, except the CN.

In this westernized environment, CN is a reflection of every hyphenated Americans where they can trace back and connect to their otherwise forgotten root. For CN mirrors them and their community in such a way that they become aware of themselves as originally a different race; and knowing where they came from, it is easier for them to know what their real identity is all about in this multi-racial melting pot otherwise known as the United States of America.

In a community saturated with foreign born Americans and their children born here, most of them are highly educated and well-to-do. They have all the modern media electronics one can find in the market. But these are all irrelevant to what are printed or published in CN, and what CN stands for.

The real identity problem most African-Americans, Asian-Americans, Latin Americans and Pacific Islander Americans encounter is -- no matter how a non-white American turned himself/herself into a mainstream Caucasian-American in his/her way of thinking and doing things, Caucasian-Americans will still not accept him/her as a Caucasian-American per se. It is the same way when say, Filipinos look down at a Filipino who has mutated to become a dyed-in-the-wool Caucasian-American.

Like other Americans who came from Europe, Russia, and the Middle East, and from all parts of the world, if you will, we are all in a figure of speech, half-bird-half beast in America, in so far as questions of nationality and identity are concerned. As we already knew, population-wise America means mishmash -- a blend.

For example, to resist a bad mutation of the best Filipino values, Filipino-Americans must never forget who they really are and what had become of them -- and that is, truly Americans that think like a Filipino-American, and a truly Filipino-American that thinks like Americans, depending which world demands they should be.

In short, they should see and live life as the Filipino and the American in them would see and live it. They can be Filipinos when they should, and Americans when they should and be comfortable in both worlds-- but they should not be purely American in a Filipino setting and vice versa because they will be painfully out of place, and to say the least, horribly irrelevant.

Many may take issue out of this observation, but it's just the basic nature of human beings tracing back to the caveman not only in the differentiation of white and colored tribes but also of even man and ape -- that similar but not quite. This is part of my research for the draft of the book on globalization that I am working on. The path of my theme is, we all breathe the same air in the global village, but through a different nose.

Take this half-bird-half-beast analogy in a positive context. What we are trying to do is, if we are “birds” or “beasts” in the environment we live, we see to it that we are the best of all the “birds” or the best of all the “beasts”, in both worlds – the American way. Our subsumed dual identity must be connected rather than disconnected.

The worst cultural disconnection in the community itself is prevalent among our second generation. CN does not mean anything to them at all. The question in their mind is – What is there in CN that would interest us if there are mainstream newspapers, TV or radio in the living room where you can have all the news, entertainment, ads, etc. you want?

If they are that remotely detached from their own CN, they are totally disconnected community-wise. With this unfortunate ingrown attitude, they lost the opportunity to see themselves in the mirror. Not knowing even what CN stands for is complete community alienation. In both worlds, they become painfully irrelevant.

This loss of identity translates to many traumatic experiences. Most young mutants of this kind are involved in criminality and gang war because in mainstream society, they cannot identify themselves and others, and relate to other people of their age.

Parental problems at home where the generational gap between the elders and the too americanized hot-dog youngsters, lead to family break-up, drug addiction and suicide. For instance, like many other communities, the Filipino-American community is not spared from being statistically reported as part of this demographic disgrace.

Unable to recognize the meaning of CN and what CN could do to or for them and what CN could do to and for the community, our disconnected young and their elder counterpart rely on mainstream media for news coverage. It is sad to know that outside of CN, hardly does the media really care about this community concern.

I remember an embarrassment in this regard. In one of my surveys of CN, the community was outraged when the county’s main newspaper ignored their local fiesta celebration. I tried to counsel complaining community leaders that in the freedom of the press, nobody can dictate the 4th Estate’s well-guarded prerogative when and what to report or publish. Nobody but the media itself determines what is “news”.

A mother would want CNN, MSNBC or Fox News to cover, publish and publicize her daughter as the prettiest in a locally held community beauty pageant, but not one of them would give a damn. She could turn to CN because it is of community interest. CN identifies with the community. The mother and her community in this local event have no identity in the world media.

The irony is, the mother believes in the freedom of the press as essential to a life of liberty and pursuit of happiness. Yet she kicked the bucket when the media exercised the right of the freedom of the press to reject by their own standard, useless or worthless news.

It reminds us of how the recent liberal-leftwing street protesters of the war in Iraq condemned the media when it covered the hurricanes in the Gulf Coast instead of covering their so-called Washington March. They are marching for freedom, yet to them there is no freedom of the press.

The mother’s anti-media resentment models a regrettable disconnection not only with CN but also with the importance of CN to the community. On the other bank of this overflowing river of CN and community disconnections, the lack of understanding as to the role of media in news coverage can also embarrass not only the community but also the most vicious advocate of freedom that in the street or in writing is carried too far. It betrays the intolerance of those who tirelessly preach tolerance. Freedom is not only precious but also a great excuse.

It is not farfetched to see with open eyes, that self-alienation of the young and older generations is foremost of the many challenges this nation faces today.

We have some modest successes in many of our struggles to improve our local community. And perhaps there are even more of those setbacks that buckle our knees. But we do not lose hope even when we stumble. Instead, we quickly pick ourselves up, and our reaction to continue is pushed to the hilt.

That’s because deep in the soul of every American, the fire of hope, like the flame of the Statute of Liberty, burns eternal.

It can never be put out by those who want our God-based hyphenated cultures to be godless, nor debased by those who would want to erase all vestiges of Godliness in our society that believes in God, even as we pray to the Almighty Father to forgive them for they knew not what they are doing. #

© Edwin A. Sumcad, October 28, 2005.