Vincent Chin was a 27-year-old Chinese American raised in Metro Detroit. A week before his wedding, June 19, 1982, he went to the Fancy Pants strip club in Highland Park with a few buddies for his bachelor’s party. There, they encountered two autoworkers, Ronald Ebens and Michael Nitz, who, like many at the time, blamed the Japanese for the U.S. auto industry’s troubles. At the time, the American auto industry was in a crushing recession and much of the hostility was directed at Japan. (President Bush senior ahd been making speechs and mentioning such only a few days before)Mistaking Chin for a Japanese American, two white autoworkers began to harass Vincent with racial epithets and a fight broke out. Even though Chin was not Japanese and worked in the auto industry himself as a draftsman, Ebens was heard saying, “It’s because of you little m—f—s that we’re out of work,” as well as other anti-Asian racial epithets.
The men were thrown out of the bar, and the fight continued in the parking lot and into the night. Ebens and Nitz searched for Chin and his friends, and upon finding them after a half hour pursuit, Nitz held Chin in a bear hug while Ebens struck Chin’s head four times with a baseball bat, cracking his skull.
Vincent Chin died four days later. His wedding guests attended his funeral instead.
2 comments:
horrible! And sadly I'd never even heard of this.
Makes my blood boil.
It's a case that has always haunted me. I blame George Bush Sr. for this death as eh was blowing a lot of anti-Asian countries rhetoric to deflect blame for our own troubled economy under his regime.
Post a Comment