Betty Brown, Texas Republican, Asks Asian-Americans To Simplify Names

As the Houston Chronicle reported Thursday, Betty Brown, a Republican state representative, is facing numerous demands that she apologize for having said that voters of Asian descent should adopt names that are "easier for Americans to deal with."

From the Chronicle:

The comments caused the Texas Democratic Party on Wednesday to demand an apology from state Rep. Betty Brown, R-Terrell. But a spokesman for Brown said her comments were only an attempt to overcome problems with identifying Asian names for voting purposes.

The exchange occurred late Tuesday as the House Elections Committee heard testimony from Ramey Ko, a representative of the Organization of Chinese Americans.

Ko told the committee that people of Chinese, Japanese and Korean descent often have problems voting and other forms of identification because they may have a legal transliterated name and then a common English name that is used on their driver's license on school registrations.

Brown's spokesman has said she was not trying to make a racially motivated comment. Her comments did, however, cause politicians as far away as New York to call on her to apologize for her statements.

As Kristv.com reports, one such complaint came from New York City Councilman John Liu:

In a letter to Brown sent Thursday, Liu called on her to either apologize or resign.

"It's outrageous and insulting for you to suggest it would 'behoove' us to adopt another name, to give up our birthright and a part of our own identity, in order to exercise our right to vote," he said.

WATCH:

Comments

[Changzilla]

11:44 AM on 04/21/2009

Ha, I read the little blurb about this from the Onion on my Google Reader and I thought it was a joke at first. I think her comments are absurd. Most Asian names are not that hard to pronounce. I'm half Korean and half white but I have a very Korean-sounding name (Sun Hee). People still manage to screw up a two syllable first name that is said phoenetically and I get junk mail addressed to Mr. Chang all the time.

I go by Sunny just because I grew up with my parents calling me that. I never really considered it a betrayal to my heritage and of course, if people want to call me Sun Hee they are free to. I feel sad when people think that they need to 'fix' their names so that idiot Americans don't have to figure out how to say a foreign name. My dad's name is Young Jin and most of his co-workers just started calling him Jimmy, even though his name is not hard to pronounce either.

[nananars]

10:20 AM on 04/15/2009

As much as I love laughing at racist texans, I (an asian american) don't really think she was being racist in this case. If you actually listen to what she said, she was asking whether the transliterations of chinese names into english might be more phonetic, which would presumably make them easier to pronounce for english speakers. She even says that she's not asking for people to change their names. The speaker replied that the transliterations were governed by certain standards, which she might not have known (without her being a racist or bigot). If you ask me, the practice of many Asian parents giving their children americanized first names is much more harmful, and sends children mixed messages about their heritage.

[Ken Hong]

12:16 PM on 04/14/2009

I know about 30 Sunny Kims...

[acsenray]

05:49 PM on 04/13/2009

Regardless of the idiocy of insular Texas politicians, isn't there a hint of an actual social issue here? Why do so many Asian-origin Americans find it necessary to adopt an "American" (i.e., English or European-origin) name for daily use? The problem is that some Asians use two different names in official settings. Isn't that what caused the identification problems at the polling place? Our American culture is flexible enough for an American to have a name from any world culture. Why make any concession that implies that in order to be truly American one must have an English or European-origin name?

[Foreground]

05:42 AM on 04/14/2009

Well, quite honestly, English doesn't have some of the sounds that are ubiquitous in other languages, making the original name mangled and often rediculous, not to mention the occasional unfortunate homonyms. Sometimes its easier to have someone call you "Sally" or "Aaron" than mangle "Saumya" or giggle immaturely everytime they say "Abra."

[acsenray]

04:41 PM on 04/15/2009

So what? Not everyone is going to pronounce everything exactly right. But by conceding to this, you're basically conceding that non-European names will never be as "American" as European names. Give Americans the benefit of the doubt and the room to mature into a more inclusive viewpoint. After one generation of giggling, it will no longer become a giggle-inducing matter.

[eskimohio]

11:16 AM on 04/12/2009

I think Betty Brown’s intentions and motives are good but Asians should not have to break all ties to their heritage. Asian Americans should be required to change their names to common Asian food words that are recognized by most Americans or names of well known Asian TV characters. No American would have trouble pronouncing: Sushi, Kimchee or Hop Sing and Asians’ cultural heritage would still be preserved. Try it again with my idea Senator Brown; I think it would be much better received.

[Rick Hawkins]

04:05 PM on 04/13/2009

Wouldn't it just be easier to teach Texans to read?

[Ken Hong]

12:17 PM on 04/14/2009

Good one!

[JustSayMaybe]

05:55 PM on 04/11/2009

"...you and your citizens..." Bizarre phrasing, sounds like she's implying that Asian-Americans are a different set of citizens... perhaps second-class citizens... whose names we need not respect for ease of reading in American English. Considering the broad inability for many to speak/read/write American English well ("could care less", "did good", its/it's, etc.) we're going to have to REALLY simplify Asian names.

Yes, later she focused on the discrepancy issue, but her initial suggestions were simply to have easier names adopted by him and his citizens. I'm sure the "citizens" word choice was not well thought through, perhaps she meant "you and your people". Because that's less condescending... in Texas, anyhow.

[Ken Hong]

12:15 PM on 04/14/2009

She so much wanted to say "you people" but caught herself every time. Maybe she's not so clueless after all. But she could have saved herself a lot of trouble by just using the term "Asian American"...

[Mudder 13]

11:08 AM on 04/11/2009

Why doesn't this bright lady instruct the poll judges to look at the voters other unique identfiers such as drivers license number or social security number if they can't pronounce the name in question? or would it be easier to ask an entire race of people to change for her? who is working for who? I'm confused?

[munki]

11:55 PM on 04/10/2009

Wow... there are so many names not limited Asians... we cannot read...

What kind of comment is this?

[skippy20008]

11:48 PM on 04/10/2009

She's so right. Yao Ming, for example. It's so hard to pronounce and spell.

[Foreground]

11:35 PM on 04/10/2009

Now, I may be wrong, but I believe the lady's problem is not with furinur names, per se, but that many naturalized Asian Americans identify themselves with their actual name (romanized) and the American name they choose to be called so that other Americans won't mangle their names, depending on which form of identification they use.

IE, on their passport they're first name is listed as Xiaoyu, but on their driver's license it's Tiffany, which would make it difficult to verify their identity when it comes time to vote.

Giving her the benefit of the doubt, she MAY have simply meant that Asian Americans should choose one or the other for their legal purposes (preferably the original, in my opinion, but I never changed my Indian name, despite it having pronunciations that don't quite exist in English), and maybe keep their american name as a nickname (which is what a few of the nurses I work with do, though about an even number do the mix-n'-match thing as well), which is a fair suggestion.

[Ken Hong]

12:15 PM on 04/14/2009

Furinur? That's funny!

[mirza]

11:03 PM on 04/10/2009

The height of the ridiculous!

[OLMEQ]

10:02 PM on 04/10/2009

This is what Amerikkka is all about. White folks think everyone is put here for their pleasure and use....

[Dayahka]

09:48 PM on 04/10/2009

Anyone who has gone to China or anywhere in SE Asia knows that all the English-speaking people (of which there are 400 million in China alone) give themselves an "English" name because they know their own names are hard for foreigners to pronounce. This is a common and widespread phenomenon.

So, having someone suggest that Asians should change their names to make it easier for others is perfectly reasonable. It is not reasonable to suggest that they should change the name in order to vote, but that could be one of many good reasons to do so. How do you pronounce the Chinese words Zhou or Zho or Zhang, for example? (It's Jew, Joe, and Jang, by the way.) The only major change I would make to this lady's suggestion that that she should have added Russian, Slav, Eastern European, Hindi, and Arabic names to the list.

[lord corleon]

10:43 PM on 04/10/2009

Add in Finnish while you're at it. :)

[jas1984]

11:30 PM on 04/10/2009

Hey did anybody ask the Duke basketball coach to change his name. I won't even try to spell it, but he has the right to use it.

[Pyfagorus]

10:45 PM on 04/10/2009

A lot of German, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Native American... and yes! even Irish, Scottish, and *English* names (how do you say "Heseltine"?) are also hard for some people to pronounce. Where does this stop? Do only people *not* of Western European ancestry need to worry about a possible name change?

Anyway, the argument about pronunciation doesn't seem to hold water. Wasn't Brown's main point about making the job easier for poll workers? Poll workers don't need to be able to pronounce your name, they only need to be able to identify it correctly on paper.

[AlaskanToo]

11:35 PM on 04/10/2009

Excellent point

[Tyler126]

08:35 PM on 04/10/2009

I don't think she's racist, just a few marbles short.

http://www.blables.com/comics/?id=38

[jas1984]

11:31 PM on 04/10/2009

I'm from texas and she may be a few marbles short, but she may not be an outright bigot, but she is a racist no doubt

[Melanie226]

08:28 PM on 04/10/2009

Can we vote Texas out of the Union now? Seriously, they have inflicted enough damage on the rest of us, or at least put them on a 5-year timeout, where their representatives aren't allowed to vote or make public statements.