In Hong Kong, racial minorities, such as Filipinos, constitute a distinct cultural group. It is an academic frame for Filipino in Hong Kong. This article compares two media texts to explore the matter of race in Hong Kong and the historical and contemporary ideology in media texts that shape Hong Kong society’s concept and attitude towards Filipino and the extension to people with darker skin. The first media text is from a TVB's drama series, “Barrack O’Karma". The second media text is from the movie, Still Human. Both media texts narrate the way Hong Kongese treat Filipin domestic helper (FDH).
The first media text is about a recent supernatural romantic Canto drama in Hong Kong, Barrack O’Karma. The picture on the left is one of the episodes in which a Hong Kong actress painted herself in a darker shade to portray her character as a FDHs. The way the show portrayed the character reproduces many of the key ideological presumptions of racism. Racism is a complex social system that discriminates against people of other races except for white . By comparing with her character in the picture on the right, it is clear that the actress’ normal skin tone is lighter. Moreover, the picture in the frame shows that she seemed trapped and unpleasant, sitting in the middle of the Hong Kong family. The woman on her right and the man on her left put their hands on her shoulder with smiley faces, intertextually framing the FDH as submissive. The actress imitated FDH’s skin tone, inaccurate Chinese accent, and frizzy hair texture in the show. When the family were recruiting for a domestic helper, they said, “is there anyone uglier?” when they saw the character the actress portrayed. This shaped the cultural ideology of the doxa that Filipinos are ugly because of how they look, as shown in the media text. The international Migrant Alliance argues that the show is disrespecting minority groups. The misuse of the title was also accused of discrimination among people of colour. The episode's title was “Barrack O’Karma”, which allude the former American president’s name Barrack Obama.
Ideology in media texts dominates the way people see the world. In fact, the status quo is accepted because it is made to look natural and normal . Despite Hong Kong’s reputation as a cosmopolitan city, Filipinos have been constituting a distinct third cultural group in Hong Kong's history. Since Filipinos are occupationally and racially linked to Hong Kong society, their class ideology is lower in society. The media text idealised the cultural orthodoxy of Filipino migrant workers in Hong Kong as simple-minded, lazy, and even ugly labour because of their race. Other than that, the media text connotates and normalises the social status of Hong Kongese and Filipino. That is, FDHs alleviate Hong Kong families’ burden by doing house chores and caring for their children in exchange for low-paid wages. This create the cultural doxa of Hong Kong families are the capitalist in hiring FDHs, the labourer. French social philosopher Pierre Bourdieu suggested that doxa is the intrinsic perception cultivated by history and habits, which eventually reinforces a universal point of view and continually acknowledges the power of distinction. The truth of the identity of Filipino is not only low-skilled labour, but some are also born and raised in Hong Kong. They are familiar with the local etiquette, such as not littering, giving the elderly seats, and lining up. Some receive the same education level as local Hong Kongese. The idea of heterodoxy can apply to this phenomenon. Heterodoxy is the liberal subversive sense that the underlying belief system remains unchanged after differing opinions are allowed on the subject. The action of darkening the Hong Kong actress is similar to the brown face action back in the eighteenth century in the United States. At that time, the United States was still practising slavery, and black-faced dress-up performances were played by black people with white makeup and made fun of black people with burlesque performances to entertain the audience. These black-faced drag shows were popular at the time, and they were extended to paint lighter brown to mock the Chinese during the California Nuggets boom in the mid-19th century, and together with the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 produced a message to preserve American national integrity. The Jazz Singer, the first sound film in the history of 1927, also used a black-faced drag singer as the backbone of the story, which shows its popularity. However, Hollywood movies started using actors of the same race to portray a particular race of character in recent years, and even Hollywood movies use black American cast to lead the main role. The media text ignores the historical change on the subject. However, it keeps using the idea of brownface to promote the underlying belief system to dishonour and mock the Filipinos, and that they are the lower class because of their race.
One of the reasons that Hong Kong is a big capital city is that they were once a British colony. The European ideology normalises white as a non-race cultural group. In the concept of whiteness, with the history of British colonialism, Hong Kongese is conceptually privileged white people. It is an unavoidable doxa between whiteness as the symbol of authority and dominance and the material lives of people who are white. That is, there is no straightforward singular relationship between whiteness as a signifier of dominance and authority and the lived experience of white people. Therefore, Hong Kongese under look, as in discrimination against Filipinos not only because of their occupation but also because of their appearance. In the drama, one of the scenes was when the family were hiring a domestic helper, they immediately said, "are there any uglier Filipino?" when they saw the actress who portrayed the character. The presumed judgement of Hong Kongese is superior to FDH further becomes a racial orthodoxy. The orthodoxy is an implicit racial prejudice that remains unquestionable in Hong Kong society. John Comaroff also suggests that colonialism in Europe sets the fundamental presumption that the differences between white (colonisers) and natives (colonised) are arbitrary. The same theory can be applied to the relationship between Hong Kongese and Filipino, as shown in the media text. As Filipinos belong to migrant workers. Therefore, racial distinction and superior culture become the belief that is so normal, and there appear to be no alternatives. Because the orthodox is supported by the ideology.
The second media text is another Canto movie about an FDH and a Hong Kongese employer. The media text denotes their amicable relationship. The movie is about a master-servant relationship between an FDH and a disabled old man. After his work injury, the old man lost his ability to care for himself, so he needed a domestic helper. However, the FDH cannot fully understand Chinese and the master could not understand English as well. In the beginning, there were contradictions between them because of the language barrier. The master understood the FDH needed a job because she was poor, so he was willing to trust her and solve the problem in communication, such as using hand gestures. Moreover, the movie used a Filipina to act as an FDH. Which shows respect for the Philippine cultural group.
The second media text challenges the orthodoxy that Hong Kongese should be more privileged than Filipino. In Hong Kong, FDHs usually receive racially distinctive treatment. Stereotyping is the process of constructing misleading and reductionist representations of cultural groups, in this case, the media define the character of Filipino by racially stereotyping them as low-skilled workers, indifferent and the inability to maintain good work ethic. The media text first represents the ideology of FDH's lower class identity because of her race, such as she cannot have dinner at the same table as the master but have to eat in the kitchen. Furthermore, her ignorance is that she is more prone to be fooled and mocked by the shopkeeper in the market because of her race. Nevertheless, the media text connotates the changes in the official meaning, the racial orthodox in Hong Kong society. The issue of racism towards Filipino migrant workers has always been a heterodoxy, furthermore, a criticism in Hong Kong. There was multiple protests on the street every year emphasising equal treatment to FDHs. News such as employers' mental and physical abuse FDH raise concerns among the International Migrants Alliance. Therefore, the media text redefines the ideologies relating to Filipino migrant workers to the diversity orthodoxy to stress the importance of racial inclusion. The authority should recognise and support the different races' cultures. In the movie, the message can be seen from the master invited her to dinner at the same table. Moreover, the master was sentimental about her unfortunate experiences, such as being treated unfairly in Hong Kong because of her race, and she could only opt for low-skilled work.
Marxism theory suggests that ideology is a side effect of the economic system in any culture. It blinds people’s interpretation to the biased thought of excluding the minority group. The ideological components of Hong Kong society discriminate against Filipino. They stereotyped Filipino as uglier as they have darker skin and flatter nose. Their Chinese accents sound weird, so people prejudged the rest of their community as lazy and stupid . The second media text argues that the racial orthodox that Filipino are unintelligent because they can only opt for low-skilled work, such as domestic help, is false consciousness. Additionally, Filipinas suffer from the discrimination of race and are being excluded as the proletariat. In Marxism, the class level of the proletariat is at the bottom of society. They are regarded as ‘vestigial’. Therefore, the second media text conveys the message that society should redefine that ideology and respect the minority group.
When comparing the two media texts, both can depict Filipino migrant workers. They both bring out how the social norm, the doxa dehumanises FDHs. The movie in the second media text was released before the drama in the first media text. But the matter represented in the first media test remains a heterodoxy even though the second media text tried to rectify the social norm. It signifies the disregard for the matter of racial stereotyping. It reflects the hegemonic racial ideologies that convince and dominate the society to believe they should treat Filipino migrant workers differently because of their race. It is obvious that the first media text connotates the ideology that Filipino with darker skin has lower authority. It is a hegemonic action to normalise this ideology in society. The second media text justifies the wrong normality. It signified the unfair treatment towards Filipino. It raised the concern that Hong Kong should find some actors that can more accurately portray that race to fill the role. The two media texts are attitudinal . They affect how society treats Filipino. Especially the tradition of disrespecting FDHs, became a collective culture. While people move through a social world shaped by histories of colonialism, Filipinos’ race remains a socially constituted identity that constraints them.
The genre of these two media types unintentionally shaped Hong Kong society's false intrinsic belief system. In this essay, the significance of textual analysis of media is illustrated in an attempt to understand how elements and concepts contribute to depictions and understandings of cultural groups. In order to convey the intended meaning to the reader, each media text analysed used different techniques, concepts, and ideologies. The media texts demonstrated a consistent, long-standing, both positive and negative portrayal of Filipino migrant workers, as well as the false portrayal of FDH’s identity due to their race.
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