Rant of the Exiles

A response to this well-written  article . I am unlucky. In the lottery of life, I came up empty. I lost because I have college educated parents who placed achievement over athletics, were Asian, not very tall, and not very good at sports. I live in a safe neighborhood and was unfortunate enough to have attended a local high school that had a nationally ranked speech and debate team but a very crappy basketball team. Due to the lack of diversity in my student population, I am not playing in the National Basketball Association. That's why I support affirmative action for the NBA. I was shocked after attending a Golden State Warriors game recently. Most of the players were black. This does not reflect the demographic of California. Upon further research, I discovered the NBA is 78% black. I could not believe this lack of diversity. Clearly, blacks are overrepresented in the NBA whereas Asians are an underrepresented minority. We must begin reversing this trend today. 1) Th...

I received two mass emails in the past month urging me to petition against Senate Constitutional Amendment 5 (SCA-5). And they obviously worked because the bill died in the womb . Here's how one email started out: Hope you have all heard about SCA-5, which if passed, will reduce the ASIAN students enrollment at [University of California schools] by 60% from its current 38% to around 16%, purely because of being Asians. The passage of SCA-5 as a state proposition would repeal the prohibition on consideration of race or gender in public education programs. This type of consideration is called affirmative action and was repealed in 1996 under Proposition 209. Now imagine being a Chinese parent in Cupertino, Fremont, Palo Alto and other affluent bay area ethnic enclaves. Your kids live in a pressure cooker of AP classes, language immersion, sports, music, and legions of paid tutors and advisers. You hear stories about kids getting into elite schools because they started a co...

Most people see the Bible as a collection of sayings. It’s a book of pithy sayings, rules, and moral fables that have no relationship with each other. It’s a toolkit when you have a problem and you pick the right tool and fix your flat tire or hammer the nail. If you have trouble with careless spending, read Proverbs. If you have marital issues, read Song of Solomon. If you're depressed, read the Psalms. If you need some excitement, read Revelation. It’s not that the Bible can’t be read that way – it certainly can. But it’s so much more than a collection of wisdom, prophecy, and rules. The Bible is a story of God’s creative and redemptive work in humanity. It is a love story. And everything in the book is connected to everything else. The beauty of a great story is its ability to make connections – to make connections within itself and to make connections with the audience.  I read the Hunger Games trilogy awhile go and really enjoyed it. Suzanne Collins knows how to tell...

I am a fidgety person. I cannot sit still. And when seated, I love shaking my leg and it drives my wife crazy. Motion has a calming effect on me. It helps me concentrate. I especially need to do something with my hands. I remember in middle school all my friends (three Asian guys) would twirl their writing devices around their thumb. They would sit there listening to the teacher and spend the entire class session twirling their pens. I was always bitter I wasn't coordinated enough to do it. My sixth grade teacher, Ms. Delbridge, let me entertain myself with modeling clay during her class. I would make tanks and alien creatures.  She allowed it because she knew I was listening. Every now and then, I would pause to ask or answer a question and then go back to molding my gray block. I never had a problem staying engaged in that class - both because of the content and because of the creative freedom she gave me. Fast forward almost twenty years. My former company sends m...

An addiction is a form of security. It provides comfort, stability, and a refuge. Recently I have wondered if Christianity is an addiction. Can theology enslave? Can the desire for certainty be addictive? It's not the object of the addiction that characterizes an addict, it's the addictive behavior itself. An addict is unreflective, emotionally reactive, and has out of control behavior.  Addiction to certainty is refusing to be less than 100% sure about anything God-related. It is the desire for the well-defined. It is the world in black and white. It makes rules more important than people. It reeks of pride and arrogance. It is a methodically constructed fortress of faith that sees every visitor as a potential threat. It runs each person through a careful screening process to determine whether friend or foe.  I've met parents who get extremely defensive when topics such as evolution, popular music, and gay marriage are broached. I watched a couple tense ...

(My take on a popular meme) Everywhere I look, people are in relationships. They gaze into the unwavering eyes of their significant other. They fixate over their companion while walking in the day. In the evening, their faces gleam from the glow of romance. A month ago, I took the plunge and joined them. I got a smartphone. She was my first and we dated for 30 days. She was good to me. She helped me arrange my appointments. She was great with my kids. And she kept me in the loop with everything going on. We played a lot of games together too (Bloons TD 5). Good times. But there were downsides. I never imagined dating someone so high-maintenance. I felt like I had to check in with her at all times. She constantly demanded my attention. The worst thing is she made ME feel like I was the needy one. I couldn't believe how quickly she would get drained. I could hang with my old pals for days on end. But with her, after an hour of games, she was completely us...

Sometimes it feels like married people conspire to make marriage appear better than it really is. It's not that marriage is bad but there are many misconceptions about what marriage looks like in today's society. We value romance and individual gratification over commitment and self-control.   I appreciate how colleges even offer classes to address this.  One misconception I would immediately clear up about marriage is that it will not fix you. I don't mean that marriage won't help in the following areas. Marriage is a wonderful context to enjoy companionship, experience sexual fulfillment, and boost self-image. But the act of tying the knot does not remedy our core longings. In the short term, marriage may appear to meet these needs but over the long-run, it exposes our issues and magnifies the consequences. Here are three areas that getting married does not fix: 1) Loneliness:  You get married thinking "Wow, now I have a lifelong companion - someone ...