Ethnicity and Inequality in Hawai'i

8 Conclusion

8 Conclusion n spring 2007, as I finalized the manuscript of this book, three highly publicized ethnicity-related incidents occurred in Hawai‘i, two of which were extremely violent. These ethnic altercations captured the attention of Hawai‘i residents because their violent and abusive nature represented such a stark challenge to the prevalent view of cordial and tolerant relationships between individuals from different ethnic groups. In February, a real-life Hawai‘i version of the race-related car encounters depicted in the Academy Award–winning film Crash took place in the parking lot of a shopping center in Waikele in west O‘ahu. According to newspaper accounts of this incident (Boylan and Pang 2007: A1; Hench 2007: B4; Platte 2007: B3), an SUV (sport-utility vehicle) driven by a twenty-six-year-old White male Iraq war veteran accidentally struck a parked car while entering a parking stall. A sixteen-year-old male, described as “extremely angry” according to a police affidavit, exited the parked car and began kicking the doors of the SUV while yelling “fucking Haoles” at its occupants, who also included the soldier’s twenty-threeyear -old wife, also White, and their three-year-old child. As events unfolded , the young male was shortly joined by his forty-five-year-old father who had been in an ice cream shop when the accident occurred, the soldier and his wife left their SUV, and a violent encounter ensued among the four people. The police arrested the father and son for beating the soldier and his wife to the extent that they both lost consciousness, had their noses I broken, and suffered concussions. Given his youth, the son’s case was referred to Family Court, and he subsequently pled guilty to assault and was sentenced to a year in a juvenile detention facility. The father was charged with two counts of second-degree assault in the case, and in September 2007 he pled guilty to one count of second-degree assault and one count of third-degree assault . While he and his son were not identified as Native Hawaiian in newspaper and television news accounts of the incident, they do have a recognizable Hawaiian last name. The reporting of this information resulted in the perception by the public that they are Native Hawaiian, as evidenced by a comment to a reporter published by the press: “You know that Hawaiians like to settle disputes by fighting” (cited in Platte 2007: B3). Another violent encounter involving a White victim occurred in April 2007 at a beach park in Nanakuli on the leeward coast of O‘ahu (Park 2007). Christopher Reuther was a thirty-four-year-old photography editor from North Carolina who arrived in Honolulu on April 22 to visit the University of Hawai‘i Law School, one of four law schools to which he had been accepted. Before the day was over, he was reportedly punched in the neck causing a severe brain hemorrhage that left him clinically dead two days later. After arriving in Honolulu, Reuther, who was said to have a zeal for the natural environment, drove a rental car to attend a lu‘au and later went to the beach park to camp for the night. Shortly before midnight, he was taking photos, one of his other “passions” in life, when he had a fatal encounter with a twentyone -year-old local male from Nanakuli, who reportedly became upset with Reuther’s picture taking and delivered the lethal blow to his neck. His alleged assailant was charged with reckless manslaughter in his killing. In yet another incident in May 2007, a popular radio talk show personality, Larry Price, was interviewing a state senator, Gary Hooser, on his morning program to discuss the work of the state Senate during the recently concluded legislative session (Au 2007: A6).1 At one point during the interview, Price, who is Native Hawaiian, said to Hooser, who is White, “You keep using the word ‘honest,’ senator. Where you from?” After Hooser answered that he was from Kapa‘a, Kaua‘i, Price asked him, “Yeah, where were you were born and raised?” Hooser responded that he was born in California and graduated from one of the public high schools on O‘ahu. Price then asked him, “You got blue eyes?” Hooser laughed and said he does, and replied,“Does that matter?” Price responded somewhat testily,“Yes, to us it does. Because when local people hear somebody from the mainland talk about...