Serve the People (3 of 3)

Now, we don't control the police or fire departments; we have little say over the use of tax-money or the schools; the sanitation department doesn't serve our needs; we pay rent all our lives to mostly non-Chinese real estate companies and landlords; and we, or our brothers, or sons, are forced to fight in a war against Asian people. All these things are controlled and decided mostly by well-off white people who live outside of our community. It's as if we Asians (Chinese) in Chinatown are living in a colony controlled by foreigners (the rich, outside whites). In fact, Chinatown is not only a ghetto, but a colony of sorts. What we have to do is begin to gain power to run our own community. That means, for example, if the city sanitation department is unable or unwilling to do the job that we pay them for (through the taxes), then we say good-by to the largely white city sanitation department, and take back our money from the city and do it ourselves! The same with medical, welfare, educational, anti-poverty and other services that the city is supposed to provide us with the taxes that we pay. We've got to take back what's ours, and serve our own needs by our own efforts. We'll do it much better and cheaper, too. But, in order to achieve this objective of self-determination of Asian-Americans, and the total community control of all the public services in Chinese community, we must get ourselves really together and build our Chinese-YELLOW POWER.

As a first step in this long struggle for Chinese Power, a group of us have begun a series of programs that serve the needs of our people. These include: 1) regular publication of this community paper in which we would exchange ideas and experience to help us achieve Chinese people's power; 2) free health-care program to inform and educate our people about the various health hazards common in our neighborhood, and also to meet some important health needs of the Chinese people (especially in the area of TB prevention and detection, and Vitamin deficiencies); 3) Chinatown Draft Help to inform our brothers about how they could lawfully get out of the draft and the Army so that they wouldn't have to fight or die in this stupid, useless, racist war in Vietnam. Since most of us are young, and none of us rich, we'll have to work really hard and use every bit of our Asian ingenuity to get these programs going. These programs can succeed and expand only if you become actively involved in them.

We are not a bunch of "do-gooders" out to save somebody else; we only know that our own freedom and happiness are tied-in with the freedom and happiness of every Chinese and every Asian person. We are not going to turn ourselves into a bureaucratic agency to hand out charity; our programs will be the beginning blocks of the movement for Chinese, YELLOW POWER. We are not out to demand this phoney reform or that, but to fight for the total self-determination of the Asian people in Chinatown. Our programs are a step on a road of thousand-li that leads to the freedom and power for all non-white (YELLOW, BROWN, BLACK) peoples of this community.

POWER TO THE COURAGEOUS, HARDWORKING, PROUD ASIAN-AMERICAN PEOPLE!

< 1 2

Comments on this Article? Go to our forums