This week, Tammy interviews the playwright and TV writer Hansol Jung. They talk about Hansol’s childhood in South Africa and South Korea, the feeling of being 70% fluent in both Korean and English, religion and structural sexism in the recent Korean presidential election, race in theater and TV, building queer characters, and how Rent changed everything.
Hello from a South Korean ballot box! (Tammy wishes.)
This week, Andy and Tammy talk to the political scientist Neta C. Crawford* of Boston University (soon, Oxford University) about the human and ecological costs of the war in Ukraine, the China dimension, and what a global movement for peace should strive for.
Today we talk about—what else?—the events in Ukraine this past week :-(
We chat with Sophie Pinkham, an essayist, reporter, and expert on the region. In 2016, she published Black Square: Adventures in Post-Soviet Ukraine (read an excerpt in Dissent). She has written about politics after the Maidan protests (The New Yorker), the election of President Volodymyr Zelensky (The New York Review of Books), and, just yesterday, Zelensky and the war (New York).
We discuss our initial reactions to the news of invasion, why so many people didn’t expect it to happen, U.S. jingoism, the impact of social media and propaganda, criticisms of “the left,” speculations about the future, and the comparability of China–Taiwan.
The podsquad reunites in Amurica. This week, we talk about the murders of two women in New York City and the recall of school board members in San Francisco.
Christina Yuna Lee and Michelle Go died in nightmarish attacks. We process our feelings and explore how Asian Americans, policymakers, and members of the general public are interpreting/using the women’s deaths. Why do we always fall back on law-enforcement responses? How do stigmas against people who aren’t housed, or those who have mental illness, affect our analysis of “hate crimes”? How are Asian communities in New York and New Jersey responding? What does women’s safety mean? What’s the abolitionist horizon?
San Franciscans recently voted to remove three people from the school board—and Asian Americans were a big part of the action. Jay wrote about how this all boils down to anxiety over admissions to a selective high school. But the recall might also be seen as a tech-funded campaign against all things “woke.” What’s going on? How do immigrant politics graft onto the US’s left-right spectrum? Are Asian voters basically social Darwinians? What does this mean for criminal-legal policy, specifically the upcoming Chesa Boudin recall? For Asian-American organizing?
Thanks to the PNW listeners who came to our IRL lunch over the weekend. And thanks to all of you for supporting the pod. Stay in touch via Substack or:
Today’s episode is a conversation with Eugene Lim, the author of the novel Search History. Eugene’s one of our favorite writers. We talk about experimental fiction, Asian writers, Eugene’s life as a school librarian, what constitutes good and bad writing, identity questions in fiction, and we even take questions from the audience who watched this talk on Discord.
If you’d like to be part of our next BOOK TIME, please sign up for our newsletter subscription at goodbye.substack.com for $5 a month and you can join our discord community.
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit goodbye.substack.com/subscribe
The podsquad returns for a wide-ranging chat on all things, sort of, broadly, sometimes diasporically China.
Awkwafina made the rounds on social media, with a screenshot semi-apology(?) regarding her use of Black speech. We offer a hermeneutic reading.
It’s the 10th anniversary of Linsanity. What did, and what does, Jeremy mean to Asian America? Jay and Andy revisit analyses from the time.
Chinese government bros have upped their game, offense and defense, on English-language Twitter. What’s the use of an official reply guy?
And finally, we’re watching the Olympics in Beijing! Yes, all Olympics are terrible (insert leftist critique), but so are the short track judges, says Tammy. Plus: Andy on the opening ceremonies and Jay on Eileen Gu.
We have an IRL picnic coming up in Seattle and an ongoing book club. Subscribe and join our Discord community to find out more.
The film features scenes of quotidian working life in a period when the government has begun to promote the “Chinese Dream,” spanning textile and sex doll factories to etiquette school and social media influencers all the way to luxurious water parks and tropical vacation resorts. Together, these scenes raise provocative questions about China’s blindingly rapid development, the uneven pace of upward mobility, and whether China is an exotic outlier or a recognizably modern society, comparable with life in the US and other societies worldwide (all to music by Dan Deacon).
Jessica and Kira took the time to chat with us and many from our Discord community about the film’s initial conception, the origins of the title and Jessica’s own exploration of family history, the strangeness of the major award circuit, and the ethics of making a commercial documentary. They also break down many of the more memorable scenes, including a dinner party among the ultra-rich and a crypto farm in the middle of the countryside.
But for most of us, the easiest way to watch it at home is to subscribe to and stream from Paramount+ (look for trial offers!).
The second half of this episode consists of questions from our Discord members. If you’re interested in joining the conversation with us and tons of other cool people, please think about subscribing! Check us out via Patreon and Substack, contact us via email (timetosaygoodbyepod@gmail.com), Twitter, and the Discord!
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit goodbye.substack.com/subscribe
It’s Jay and Tammy this week, talking trash about Andy.
Plus:
* Pandemic alcoholism and human bonds: We read and discuss an essay in Jezebel, “I Got Sober in the Pandemic. It Saved My Life.” What has this tragic time clarified and obscured? What’s the off-ramp?
* Does a day-trader’s lunch budget say anything about inflation? People were mad about this New York Times story, but the Big Mac Index remains durable (Tammy gets the description about half-right). The tech stock market (read: Peloton, Netflix, Amazon) seems less durable.
* The Supreme Court will hear the Harvard / University of North Carolina case on affirmative action, with Asian American plaintiffs front and center. We assess the history of race and class in admissions and consider the wedge that is Asian America.
1:08:00 – If you’re on China/international relations/war/basketball/tech Twitter, you’ll have seen that Chamath went full-on tankie… which relates to the debate over a recent article in The Nation: “What Should the Left Do About China?” by David Klion. The piece explores the lefty political spectrum, and features input from Andy and several friends of the pod. We dig in on the question of how complicit we are as “Americans.” In a time of (cold-)warring hegemons, what kind of dissenters should we be?
There seems to be a panic over school closures—and a backlash against teachers and their unions. But how many US public schools have had to “go remote” because of Covid? Are these physical closures reasonable? Why are people blaming educators for everything from “learning loss” to the downfall of the Democratic party? What “shock doctrine” tactics do we need to look out for?
