"I am Asian . . .

[pnwmom]

. . . so I know a lot of doctors."

Andrew Yang just said that in a debate. Whoa.

I also happen to know a lot of doctors. I wouldn't say, "I'm white so I know a lot of doctors."

And what would it say about me if I did?

Link to tweet

[we can do it]

1. Yeah WTF was that?

First a bribe.....

[babylonsister]

2. Ha! So does anyone who has ever had a serious illness, if

they were lucky enough to have insurance.

He's obviously not a politician.

[mathematic]

3. It was a tongue in cheek appeal to casual ("positive") racism

The line didn't land so it made it seem like he meant it seriously. It's strange and attention grabbing, which is what the Yang campaign is going for apparently.

[pnwmom]

4. How do you know it was tongue in cheek? He didn't look like it was tongue in cheek

and it didn't seem that way to me.

[mathematic]

5. I'm familiar with his speaking style

It's along the lines of "I'm the opposite of Trump, an 'Asian man who likes math'", which he said in the last debate.

If you want an answer that refers to something concrete, you can see that he begins to crack a smile as he continues his response about doctors.

[Hekate]

6. In a previous generation the proud boast "My son, the doctor" was a Jewish meme...

Just to give it a little perspective.

Take an immigrant population that values education as the way to get ahead and knows how to push their kids to succeed in school, and in a generation or a generation and a half, you end up with doctors, engineers, and teachers in good numbers.

My husband grew up in New York and is Jewish. He knows this story from his generation (we are both now over 70)

I grew up in Hawaii pegged as a generic haole, and all through my school years my teachers and doctors were largely Japanese-American.

Yang is a Chinese name and he's a younger generation than me.

I think we are just looking at an immigrant-wave story.