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1. America looked up to
Warrior is a new American drama based on Bruce Lee's initial conception. Justin Lin, who has directed "The Fast and the Furious," is the director of the series, which focuses on the lives of Chinese immigrants in San Francisco's Chinatown in the mid-to-late 19th century. It was conceived by bruce bruce, which means that it must have a familiar " kung fu " . Before watching the first episode, I thought it should be a " quasi-martial arts film " , attracting the audience by showing the elements of kung fu that foreigners love to see, but watching the first episode After finishing it, I found it to be more complex and refined than I imagined. It not only intends to describe Chinatown and the Chinese, but also wants to show the Chinese in the wider American society. The mayor, police and poor white citizens in the play are the focus of the main creator's description - not black and white The rough setting, but the comprehensive description.
The first scene of the film is the Chinese ah sahm (I don’t know if the protagonist is called Ah Sheng if I read it in Cantonese?) Landing in the United States and disembarking from the ship, I see arrogant immigration officials, flattering agents, and many others who are already thin Weakened by the long boat rides, German Chinese immigrants, and white Americans protesting against Chinese immigrants at the docks.
What kind of people are the Chinese who come to America? Most are Cantonese. In 1876 , Li Gui, who visited the United States, had a more detailed record of the overseas Chinese in the United States in his "Eastbound Diary" :
San Francisco (San Francisco, San Francisco), Calif. (California), USA, is known as the Golden Mountain for its real estate gold. There are about 160,000 Chinese men and women in the United States, about 40,000 people living in San Francisco, about 100,000 people living in other cities in Kazakh province, and the rest are scattered in the hinterland. There are six Cantonese conference halls in San Francisco, including "Sanyi Guild Hall"—Nanhai, Panyu, Shunde, with Sanshui, Qingyuan, Huaxian—about 11,000 people; "Yanghe Guild Hall"— Xiangshan, Dongguan, Zengcheng, with Boluo - about 12,000 people; "Gangzhou Guild Hall" - Xinhui, with Heshan and Sihui - about 15,000 people; "Ningyang Guild Hall" - — Xinning, no people with the surname Yu — about 75,000 people; “Hehe Guild Hall” — Xinning Yu, Kaiping, Enping — about 35,000 people; “Hehe Guild Hall” - Xin'an, Guishan, Jiaying Prefecture - about 4,000 people. Those who do not enter the museum are about 2,000 people from other provinces, believers and actors. ... This Bingzi (Guangxu two years, 1876) is also the number of summer.
After understanding this note, it is not difficult to understand why the Chinatown in the story is the main place of conflict. Because of the Chinese concept of regional clan, people naturally divide into different gangs, fighting for their own interests. Some people may also wonder why most of the Chinese immigrants who got up early to go to the United States are Cantonese? We all know about the Opium War and the large amount of reparations made by the Qing government to foreign countries, but there is another fact that many people may not understand, that is, at the end of the Qing Dynasty without the establishment of a modern central, central, financial and administrative system, most of the debt fell to Guangdong. After the Opium War, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and the fighting between the natives and Hakka people made the social environment of Guangdong worsening. So many people decided to try their luck. Chinese brokers distributed a large number of advertising brochures to promote the prosperity and well-being of the United States. Seeing their fellow villagers make a fortune, many people also set foot on the ship to the United States. Among these people, there are some gentry, and most of them are uneducated people.
But gold everywhere is just a legend, and more Chinese immigrants have become laborers. In the New West of the United States, Chinese are the cheapest labor force. Chinese workers account for 90% of railway workers and farms in the western United States . At that time, it was necessary to pay a white American worker 2-3 US dollars, and only 90 cents to a Chinese worker . The favor of the capitalists for the Chinese naturally made the Chinese the most unpopular group in the society at that time. In 1876 , Daniel Keney organized a powerful anti-Chinese group Workers Party in California, blamed the importation of Chinese laborers for California's economic depression, and organized anti-Chinese riots in many cities. In 1876 and 1877 , there were two riots in which white racist armed forces attacked San Francisco's Chinatown. During the anti-Chinese riot in Los Angeles on July 23 , 1877 , within three days, racists attacked Chinese shops and residential areas and destroyed them. About 25 Chinese Laundromats. Kaney publicly declared , " The Chinooks must go away !" By the end of the 1870s , the clamor had permeated California and spread across the country. Congress on June 17 , 1878Japan passed a resolution urging the government to revise the treaty between China and the United States to stop Chinese immigration.
The conflict in the play comes from this history. The prototype of the anti-Chinese white Bill in the play is Daniel Kenny. And at that time, their Chinese exclusion played a role. In 1882 , the U.S. Congress passed the "Chinese Exclusion Act", which stipulated that Chinese would not be allowed to enter the country within 10 years ; Judges deportation ; neither state nor federal courts may grant Chinese naturalization as U.S. citizens, etc. This is the only exclusion law in the history of the United States against the people of a country, and it is also the saddest act in the history of the United States.
But why are you discriminated against and still go to the United States? It is very simple, because the minimum wage in the United States at that time was still higher than the income in China at that time, and the Chinese sent a lot of money back to the country to support their families.
2. Disgusted Chinese gangsters
The gangs that feature the most in the story are the real, non-fictional gangs in Chinatown history. Under all kinds of discrimination and internal struggles, in order to protect themselves, the Chinese organized " guild halls " to protect their fellow villagers, the communities organized by gangsters in Chinatown, and attracted Chinese from all walks of life, especially those lower-class Chinese who could not find jobs. Due to cultural barriers and lack of supervision, they gradually started the opium trade (so the proliferation of opium in the late Qing Dynasty was not entirely driven by foreigners), brothel business and gambling business.
How to say that " where there are people, there are rivers and lakes " , and Chinatown is no exception. Some people have class. At that time, there were Chinese immigrants who immigrated to the United States, gentry businessmen with assets, and they formed the " Sanyi Guild Hall " , and there were also low-level immigrants who fought for survival. Most of them were " four It is difficult to avoid the contradiction between two different classes of members of the " Yup Club " , so there is a plot in which the two gangs are incompatible with each other in the play. These conflicts will even affect the normal life of ordinary people, because during the conflict period, if you buy things from the shops under the Sanyi Guild Hall, you will be beaten by the staff of the Siyi Guild Hall.
The other is that most of the gangsters in Chinatown are bachelors, so they are not bound by the family and the law, and they are more unscrupulous in committing crimes while living in a vacuum. It is precisely because of them that the pubs, gambling halls, and brothels in Chinatown constantly emerging.
No one can stop the struggle in Chinatown. As in the play, the white American police cannot understand Chinese culture and cannot mediate; secondly, and more importantly, the Chinatown guild hall bribes local officials. As shown in the play, the white mayor wants to get Political capital, had to cooperate with gangs in Chinatown.
At that time, the constant strife and struggle in Chinatown made white people think that Chinese people are like this, and their disgust for Chinese people (thinking that Chinese people hate black people more than black people because they will stab you in the back) was amplified by gang activities, which also indirectly prompted " The introduction of the Chinese Exclusion Act.
3. Everyone walking in this land.
This is the first story about early Chinese immigration, a history unfamiliar to Americans and even the Chinese themselves, and its existence has pioneering significance. A large number of bloody and sexual descriptions in it also rewrite the stereotypes of Chinese people in American TV dramas.
What's more important is the description of American society at that time in this drama. When the United States was still growing, the Chinese participated in this society as a group, and what kind of stories happened. This drama is not only a Chinese drama, It is a drama about America and a pluralistic society.
Also, as I said before, this drama did not write everyone very simple. In it, Chinese can be cowardly people who are discriminated against, or they can be ruthless people who will do anything to achieve their goals, and white people can be discriminators, or they can be It is an ordinary person who participated in the civil war to liberate black slaves and could not find a job. So it breaks a certain mindset of ours.
While watching this drama, I also thought that more than 100 years after the Chinese Exclusion Act passed, our world seems to have reached a place that seems to be similar to the past, such as a wall that we knew the effect was not good, but insisted on building; such as gradually Tightening immigration policies; such as discrimination and crimes against minorities; such as a group of people systematically excluding people of a certain ethnic group ... This show can be broadcast, and it may be thanks to the fact that many people like to ridicule The " political correctness " of the east wind, right?
In the era of Bruce Lee, this drama could not have appeared, because it was difficult for even black people to be the protagonists at that time, let alone the Chinese who participated in the development process of the United States far later. Now that the show has finally aired, from the first episode, it has the potential to become an excellent gathering.
This article refers to the following articles:
Zhu Ping and Chao Longqi: "A New Exploration of the Reasons for Chinese Immigrants in the Early America"
Annian Huang: "The Chinese Exclusion Tide in America in the Late 19th Century from Historical Comics"
Du Dan: "Shadows of Chinatown, San Francisco's Gang Society."
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