Petition Against Disguise.com [Archive]

kasia

10-10-2002, 10:40 PM

my dad was a grassroots organizer at berkeley during the 70's and suggests the following:

1. putting a counter on the page so that the company will get an idea of how much traffic it gets and therefore how many people will be influenced.

2. putting the names, addresses, and contact numbers and email addresses of the executives of the company on the page.

3. listing the names of each and every store that carries this costume on the page. asking people to boycott these stores until each one provides proof that the costumes have been pulled.

4. having a download function so that other asian organizations can download the petition, bring it to their meetings, have their members sign it, and send it in themselves.

i know this is a lot of work, so i will help with getting the information. i would encourage anyone else who has the time and is pissed off by these costumes to do the same.

my suggestion: send an email out to everyone in your address book with the petition link. http://petition.yellowworld.org. ask them to sign and to forward it to everyone in their address book.

i also like arex's comment: "buyer beware". any kid dressed as a chinese man trick or treating at my apartment will not only get no candy but a slamming door in his face. and if his parents are accompanying him, i will make a scene.

kasia

10-10-2002, 10:43 PM

may i also note that the webmaster did an incredible job with the petition. very well-worded. thanks for putting the time in on behalf of the yellowworld community.

achtungbaby

10-10-2002, 11:08 PM

Thanks for the suggestions!

I guess I have my work cut out for me tonight:( Most of what your dad suggested can be done without too much of a hitch...but everyone can definitely help out by sending the link to everyone in their address book.

I'll have a pdf of the petition ready by tomorrow, hopefully.

Wow, it's been a while since I've worked on a petition...!

deez nuts

10-11-2002, 04:45 AM

Yah good job, AB.

Craig

10-11-2002, 05:42 AM

Why not post to the other sites with large Asian audiences and tell them about the petition ? I think it'll be more effective if the posters are currently more frequently seen names at the site.

achtungbaby

10-11-2002, 01:20 PM

I'm doin' my best...but I'm just one person:(

I've tried sending "informal" email/press releases to other sites but haven't received much of a response yet.

It's very important that we keep the pressure on now. Organizations will respond more quickly when the pressure is consistent and from all sides.

Craig

10-11-2002, 02:19 PM

Saw your message at modelminority.com. I emailed a couple of places and made a couple of posts. I noticed some of the messages mentioned boycotting "Target". There's another petition running right now for that.

What about any of the college students on the board ? They can try the local Asian clubs, Chinese Students Association, etc. I remember at my old school they used to have a mailing list or something.

Also, if anybody wants to do any legwork, below is a link to a few dozen of the local Indonesian Students Associations in the US.

http://www.permias.org/daftar_permias.phtml

achtungbaby

10-11-2002, 02:23 PM

Thanks Craig. I'll be back in about an hour...

Please keep gettin' the word out everyone...

deez nuts

10-11-2002, 03:24 PM

I've basically told everyone at work and all my friends to sign the petition and to spread the word via e-mail word of mouth etc etc. Alot of them already signed and told their friends, so I'm kinda pleased from my end.

optiontoo

10-11-2002, 04:35 PM

Is disguise.com the manufacturer of the costume? Or are they merely one of several retail distributors?

Craig

10-11-2002, 05:25 PM

Originally posted by optiontoo@Oct 12 2002, 12:35 AM
Is disguise.com the manufacturer of the costume? Or are they merely one of several retail distributors?

Actually, Disguise is the local American subdivision of the Cesar Group, which according to their website is the largest maker of costumes worldwide.

http://www.cesar-group.com/cesar_anglais/index.html

Maybe AB should get rid of the ".com" added to Disguise, since it's not officially part of the name or a common representation of the business.

kasia

10-11-2002, 08:14 PM

One of the executives of the corporate office called me this morning (upon threat of a lawsuit). He apologized for upsetting the asian community and informed me that they are in the process of pulling the costumes. Upon my request that he write a letter memorializing our discussion, he hesitated and suggested that i write the letter instead. Upon my request that the costumes be pulled by october 18, he stated that he needed to get off the phone and would instead have his legal counsel call me. His attorney did not call.

My request was clear. A letter is being sent to the company and we expect the costumes to be pulled by October 18th. The letter will be posted on the front page. On October 18th, a nationwide investigation will be conducted to confirm that the costumes are pulled. If they are not, we will proceed with legal action. This is all I can say on-line without giving away too much. The company has been put on notice and failure to comply will likely result in a legal judgment against them.

Please private message me if you are willing to assist with the investigation on October 18th. All of my correspondences so far have been made on behalf of yellowworld.

craig: thank you for posting their addresses and contact information. that was the only way i was able to get in touch with them.

deez nuts

10-12-2002, 05:50 AM

Nice Job, Kasia. Props, woman props.

achtungbaby

10-12-2002, 01:26 PM

Please let me know if you'd like to have your name/email added to the petition's "about" section. You can check it out here:

http://petition.yellowworld.org/about.php

Craig

10-13-2002, 09:28 AM

Anybody up for checking out a few of the following links for this site ? It's a listing of over 150 different Korean Students Associations in the US.

http://www.geocities.com/mokkim/ksa.html

achtungbaby

10-13-2002, 09:32 AM

Originally posted by Craig@Oct 13 2002, 09:28 AM
Anybody up for checking out a few of the following links for this site ? It's a listing of over 150 different Korean Students Associations in the US.

http://www.geocities.com/mokkim/ksa.html
Wow, nice resource! Thanks Craig...I guess I'll be cutting/pasting for the next hour...

Craig

10-13-2002, 10:33 AM

Originally posted by achtungbaby@Oct 13 2002, 05:32 PM
Originally posted by Craig@Oct 13 2002, 09:28 AM
Anybody up for checking out a few of the following links for this site ?  It's a listing of over 150 different Korean Students Associations in the US.

http://www.geocities.com/mokkim/ksa.html
Wow, nice resource! Thanks Craig...I guess I'll be cutting/pasting for the next hour...

Here's a pretty comprehensive link for various Taiwanese Students Associations in the USA and Canda, plus a few other groups including the different Asian groups at the school and a few professional orgs. Just go to the 7 bars in the middle of the page adjacent to all the "Go" buttons.

http://www.brown.edu/Students/Brown_Taiwan...ociety/lnx.html (http://www.brown.edu/Students/Brown_Taiwan_Society/lnx.html)

kasia

10-13-2002, 05:55 PM

Saturday, 5:35 p.m. - 455 signatures.

think we can get at least 1000 by tomorrow night? please help out!

kimpossible

10-13-2002, 11:02 PM

Guys, I hate to say this but you might want to check over some of the 'signatures'. I think you'll know why and prolly anticipated this.

kasia

10-13-2002, 11:24 PM

Originally posted by Hello_Hapa@Oct 14 2002, 07:02 AM
Guys, I hate to say this but you might want to check over some of the 'signatures'. I think you'll know why and prolly anticipated this.
i only saw about 3-4 like that though. out of 640, that's nothing to worry about.

kimpossible

10-13-2002, 11:33 PM

Yep. Just wanted to call attention to some of the questionable ones. In case they were to be edited out.

achtungbaby

10-14-2002, 12:21 AM

The word is definitely getting out, people. politicalcircus.com was nice enough to make "kung-fool" their cover story, and props to modelminority.com for also running our story.

I think it's time to expand our efforts a tad and call Disguise this week to let them know how we feel about this.

kasia

10-14-2002, 12:29 AM

Originally posted by achtungbaby@Oct 14 2002, 08:21 AM
The word is definitely getting out, people. politicalcircus.com was nice enough to make "kung-fool" their cover story, and props to modelminority.com for also running our story.

I think it's time to expand our efforts a tad and call Disguise this week to let them know how we feel about this.
:lol:

yellowworld rocks!

controversy

10-14-2002, 01:39 AM

okay first, i'd like to say FINALLY!
finally, i have found a place where Asian alike are teaming up against stuff like this.
may I also say I am ashamed that my Asian friends find this "hilarious" and "not offensive" as they did with the entire A&F ordeal?
Big ups to achtungbaby for getting this going, I have passed the petition onto many people, as well as emailed everybody and their mothers, and post up the link on numerous websites. continue the good work!

ilovepartygirls

10-14-2002, 02:07 AM

yo wuddup peoples. i just wanted to say that yea this does,to some people, categorize asians in a negative way but then again I had a thought.

what if the designer just made this costume based on the many characters in movies and comic books that are morons and half wits that get their asses whooped by the super hero i.e. bruce lee and jackie chan? what if this costume wasnt meant to be offesnive at all? and maybe peeps are getting offended for the wrong reason? maybe the "loser" bandana is their simply because the character is a loser who cant fight and not saying that asians are losers.

now i know its kidna far fetched but what if those reasons are the real reasons the costume was made? if they are would people still be offended?

just my 2 cents

achtungbaby

10-14-2002, 02:13 AM

Originally posted by controversy@Oct 14 2002, 01:39 AM
okay first, i'd like to say FINALLY!
finally, i have found a place where Asian alike are teaming up against stuff like this.
may I also say I am ashamed that my Asian friends find this "hilarious" and "not offensive" as they did with the entire A&F ordeal?
Big ups to achtungbaby for getting this going, I have passed the petition onto many people, as well as emailed everybody and their mothers, and post up the link on numerous websites. continue the good work!
Hello, welcome! Thanks for helping us out. I've also heard from others that they were much more offended by A&F than this, typically because: 1) it's for Halloween, so it's okay to make ugly costumes (even if the only ones are of Asians); and 2) Hey, I shop at A&F! (actually I don't but you get the point).

achtungbaby

10-14-2002, 02:20 AM

Originally posted by ilovepartygirls@Oct 14 2002, 02:07 AM
what if the designer just made this costume based on the many characters in movies and comic books that are morons and half wits that get their asses whooped by the super hero i.e. bruce lee and jackie chan? what if this costume wasnt meant to be offesnive at all? and maybe peeps are getting offended for the wrong reason? maybe the "loser" bandana is their simply because the character is a loser who cant fight and not saying that asians are losers.

now i know its kidna far fetched but what if those reasons are the real reasons the costume was made? if they are would people still be offended?

just my 2 cents
Hello, thanks for joining yw.

To respond:

1) Disguise is a multi-million dollar company and being sensitive to this kinda shit is *very* important to them (which is why they didn't make an Osama bin Laden mask to offend all the white people).

2) Even if they didn't mean it, if they didn't mean harm or anything, that's fine, but it's still important for them to recall the product, issue and apology, and refund customers. Just because you didn't have bad intentions doesn't make it "all white."

Craig

10-14-2002, 07:22 AM

I think they should keep all the signatures in there. The few bad ones aren't that numerous, I think less than 1 in a 100. I also saw like 2 double posts where the guy (or girl) must have accidently hit the submit button twice or server hiccup or something. I looked at the petitiononline signatures for A&F and it both were more common there, but they didn't see to delete them.

AB, KC, don't think the MM article is going to generate much, since it's off the frontpage now and didn't have that many reads. However, I think the momentum is rolling now for all the emails and posts. Yesterday I was predicting 800 for today, and now it's at 800 or so. Definitelly going to get a lot more hits today, easily passing 1K (before noon probably).

tapestrybabe

10-14-2002, 09:31 AM

yeah, i even emailed my family members about this petition... and i actually see my sisters signature on there... #765.. word is definitely getting around.. not just within the asian community.. but amongst non asians too....

kasia

10-14-2002, 09:34 AM

Originally posted by Craig@Oct 14 2002, 03:22 PM
I think they should keep all the signatures in there. The few bad ones aren't that numerous, I think less than 1 in a 100. I also saw like 2 double posts where the guy (or girl) must have accidently hit the submit button twice or server hiccup or something. I looked at the petitiononline signatures for A&F and it both were more common there, but they didn't see to delete them.

AB, KC, don't think the MM article is going to generate much, since it's off the frontpage now and didn't have that many reads. However, I think the momentum is rolling now for all the emails and posts. Yesterday I was predicting 800 for today, and now it's at 800 or so. Definitelly going to get a lot more hits today, easily passing 1K (before noon probably).
what's the mm article? the politica circus one is still up. 1000K by noon would be nice... but 10,000 by tomorrow night would be nicer :)

achtungbaby

10-14-2002, 02:42 PM

Ummm...someone remind me to to not leave the email notification thing on for every time someone leaves a message in there:)

Arex

10-14-2002, 03:05 PM

Well, the petition's broken 1000 signatures! Good job you guys!

Alex

iris

10-16-2002, 11:55 AM

We just received our petition from the University of Southern California and from the University of Missouri-Columbia. Both from their Asian-American Associations. It is now going around our university (Washington University). I hope this helps. We will be sending it on to other colleges and universities.

It is admirable the time and effort you all have put in for a good cause. Keep up the good work.

kimpossible

10-16-2002, 01:49 PM

nearly 5000!

jo-sun

10-16-2002, 01:54 PM

Originally posted by achtungbaby@Oct 14 2002, 10:20 AM
1)  Disguise is a multi-million dollar company and being sensitive to this kinda shit is *very* important to them (which is why they didn't make an Osama bin Laden mask to offend all the white people).  

2)  Even if they didn't mean it, if they didn't mean harm or anything, that's fine, but it's still important for them to recall the product, issue and apology, and refund customers.  Just because you didn't have bad intentions doesn't make it "all white."

Careful, because you are exhibiting the same behaviors that you proclaim to disdain so strongly.

1. Do you think the decision not to create a OBL mask is only to avoid offending white people? How about the country in general? Think about it - this company is headquartered in a very diverse community with strong representation by people of many races. They know "white people" are not their only customers.

2. What's with the "all white" comment? Asian racist humor is OK?