r/asianamerican

Hey everyone,

I’ve been seeing a ton of IG reels from Rick Hu (iamrickhu) pop up on my feed lately. I think its great to see an Asian face crushing it in the corporate and financial world and it seems he definitely projects a lot of confidence and acts as a strong face for the community.

For those who don't know his background, his official credentials look incredibly solid on paper. According to his official corporate profiles, he built and became the Managing Director of Northwestern Mutual’s Chinatown office at just 25 years old, and he’s now the Founder and CEO of Midas Wealth. He's even been recognized on Forbes' Best-In-State Wealth Advisors list. Now, he runs an online coaching/motivation platform called Unleashed Mindset.

Despite the impressive resume, I’ve noticed a few things in his content that give me pause, and I wanted to see what the consensus is here:

-He talks a lot about breaking a generational curse and frequently references his parents in a way that feels pretty critical. He mentions how they worked 100 hour weeks, but then turns around and talks down on that lifestyle, even though those brutal hours are exactly what gave him a place to stay, an education, and the baseline stability to succeed in the first place.

-He regularly takes shots at people who choose traditional high earning Asian career paths, like becoming doctors, lawyers, or software engineers, implying that his version of "success" and entrepreneurial mindset is superior.

-While his Northwestern Mutual/Midas background is public, his reels can feel like standard "wealth influencer" content. It's hard to tell what exactly makes him successful versus how much of his current income is coming from selling motivation and coaching through Unleashed Mindset.

Has anyone here ever actually consulted with Rick, gone through his financial planning services, or tried his online coaching? Is his advice legitimate, or is it just the classic "selling a lifestyle" framework packaged with a lot of hustle-culture rhetoric?

Hey everyone! first time posting here, so apologies if this is a little rambly.

I’m Taiwanese, but I actually grew up in mainland China before moving to the US in high school. And lately I’ve been realizing how weirdly “in‑between” that makes my identity.

In China, I was always the “Taiwanese kid.”
In Taiwan, I’m the “kid who grew up in China.”
In the US, I’m just “Asian,”

Culturally, I feel like I’m carrying three different operating systems in my head, and none of them fully match the environment I’m in. My Mandarin has a mix of accents, my English is fluent but still feels like a second skin, and my sense of “home” is split across places that don’t really talk to each other.

Sometimes it feels cool, like I can move between worlds.
Other times it feels like I don’t fully belong to any of them.

I’m curious if anyone else here grew up in one Asian culture, is ethnically from another, and then ended up in the US. How did you make sense of your identity? Did you ever feel like you were constantly code‑switching even within the Asian community?

Would love to hear other people’s experiences.

Question- If you’re able to converse at least at a basic level in Cantonese and Mandarin, and assuming you’re an English speaker too, do you consider yourself bilingual or trilingual?

Hi! I created a catalog of books about Mixed-Race Asian characters written by Mixed authors. The books are organized by which ethnicities/ identities are included, and I've got a solid start, but your help adding to this list is much appreciated! Please let me know if you have any to add.

The UCLA Asian American Studies Center released a free massive online textbook on Asian American history and culture. It's authored by a rather jaw-droppingly impressive list of Asian American studies academic all-stars, and I highly recommend this resource for anyone wanting to learn more about Asian American history, issues, and cultural production. AND AGAIN, IT'S FREE!!!

https://www.foundationsandfutures.org/

Check it out yourself, send it to your friends. It's beautiful, it's multimedia, it's accessible, and it's extremely well researched and written by some of the top scholars of the field.

Adding to an ever growing list of live action Japanese media adaptions including the upcoming Resident Evil and Legend of Zelda films, neither Elden Ring or Gundam has casted any male Asian actors in any role.

I'll pass on spending money on these films as well.

Not trying to start some oppression Olympics, but I’ve noticed something really consistent in Australia (and honestly online too):

A lot of self-proclaimed “progressives” who act super socially aware when it comes to racism against Black people will turn around and say the most casually racist, dismissive, or dehumanising stuff about Asians like it’s completely acceptable.
They’ll go on and on about Aboriginal issues, constantly policing everyone’s language and acting like they’re the moral authority on racism… but the moment Asians get brought up, suddenly it’s:

“Asians are the most racist anyway”

“Stop complaining, you’re doing fine”

“Model minority, you guys are privileged”

“At least you’re not Black/Indigenous”

“You don’t face real racism"

And if you bring up anti-Asian discrimination, hiring bias, bullying, COVID racism, dating racism, etc, you get treated like you’re being dramatic or trying to steal attention.

Meanwhile if someone said even half that stuff about Black people, they’d get absolutely nuked socially (as they should).

But with Asians, it’s like people feel safe being openly disrespectful, because they assume Asians won’t clap back, or they think we’re too “successful” to be allowed to talk about racism.

It’s honestly a weird mix of jealousy, stereotyping, and this idea that Asians are only allowed to exist as either:

quiet worker bees, or

convenient pawns in political arguments.

And the funniest part is these same people will call themselves anti-racist.

Has anyone else experienced this in Australia?
Why do you think anti-Asian racism gets treated like it’s not serious, even by people who claim to be progressive?

It's so common to make sweeping generalisations about India or indians and just slide with it . You can say whatever you want and noone really seems to care . I don't like to use the terms but saviour complex and holier than thou attitude is visible more than ever . You see a indian being rude to service staff ? " Must be a upper caste ". ( Even though treating service staff like dirt is a pan india problem )

Now naturally I can't be denying that indian women have it rough and it's obviously a challenge being a lady in india . Yet how many comments or even articles do you see with that generalise Iran ? Somehow suddenly ppl have nuance and it's the IRGC that's executing women ( yes it is not denying that ) but all this goes down the drain when it's about india.

Another example is how folks always somehow know that generalising all Israelis for their crimes in Palestine isn't ok. Even though a very large number of Israelis support one state solution and Israel would almost certainly still annex all of west bank under a non likud government.

The rant is specifically about progressives ofc , conservatives think we are subhuman or something.

Let's talk about it

I spent chunks of childhood in Southern US with few Asians. Over the past year I've distanced from all 3 remaining friends from elementary. It caused a lot of spiraling. All 3 are caring in their own way but all very oriented toward 2000s Southern racial hierarchy, even though most have moved to another part of the US. I'm Asian female and have moved around a lot, both different regions in US and diff parts of Asia... so I just saw this specific racial hierarchy as subjective rather than a truth...

- White female friend who casually stated micro-aggressions about Asians looking alike, anime being for losers, "Asian culture is cool really?" while very supportive and present otherwise.

- Asian guy friend who would accuse me of chasing white ppl while also dating a white woman, saying racial stereotypes about various groups and being like "how about this white guy, he's very attractive".

- Asian female friend who also makes sweeping stereotypes about all Asians (incl women) being unattractive etc but narrates how she is exceptional and her friends are all European and ppl think she doesn't look Asian.

All 3 fit the characteristics of kind supportive friends but then at random moments, a rigid racial hierarchy gets imposed on everything. For the Asian friends, it's almost a nonstop fixation, like every other conversation is filtered through that lens.

Curious if others have gone through something like this, and how it feels? I still often revisit like "Is this salvageable? Could I have empathized more, am I a bad friend?" It's easier to walk away from obviously bleh connections but these are from 20+ years ago, the female friends being pretty continuous friendships. But life is short right, and my time and energy are valuable.

And I've even tried to have the conversation or hinted at it in various ways over the course of many months but it didn't land or was met with "You misunderstood but thanks"

Ofc I think racism still exists, but maybe it's partly that I feel like I've been in enough beach town 90%+ white groups where I didn't feel like it improved my life in any way, it was just fine. Maybe I am experiencing this dissonance bc I speed ran white proximity and found no gold at the end of the rainbow? So I end up debating this whole premise and unable to bridge the gaps in our realities?

At least, I'm not aware of ethnic banks for other Asian American groups like Filipino or Indian Americans.

Hi all, I wanted to get some advice from folks who I strongly feel have experienced a similar situation. I (27F) am Korean-American, and I absolutely love and admire my mother (60F). My dad is a typical emotionally absent parent, and while he paid bills, my Mom did all the "parenting." She is highly motivated, smart, and capable, and I have so much respect for her.

Recently... a few things have been happening. I am not sure if it's the algorithm on her phone, or something else, but she has been becoming more right-leaning, and it is getting very difficult to have conversations with her. Specifically, she is becoming anti-vax (started because of COVID) and in general, has been spouting right wing talking points about immigration, social issues, etc. This is especially difficult for me because in my eyes, she has always been a champion for human rights and women's issues, and has generally inspired me to adopt these values as well. That said, she also is very much a product of her culture and generation, and is very set in her ways about certain things, like not liking tattoos, looks down on divorce, has traditional views on society, things of that nature.

With that being already difficult, I visited her this past weekend and gave some news that she did not like. I have been dating someone for almost a year, and he has three children from a previous marriage. She was immediately unhappy to hear this, and basically told me that I need to change my mind and made me feel super guilty. Like you would have thought I told her I was blowing up my life to join a polycule in the mountains (no judgment here! just trying to give an example). It was a really tense conversation and she was crying and telling me that I deserve so much better and that there are better men out there.

I expected her to be judgmental... but that was way worse than I would have expected. I completely understand why she has reservations; a lot of my friends do as well, and on paper, a 27 year old childless woman does not seem to match with a guy 10 years older than her with 3 kids. I tried to reassure her that we are not getting married or anything, I am just evaluating if he is a good long-term partner, just like I would with any other guy I've dated in the past. I understand that his situation poses unique challenges, but for right now, it is working, and I trust myself to leave when it is no longer working. She told me she trusts me to make the right decisions but almost implied that I would be choosing this relationship over her (she backtracked on this when I tried to call her out for giving me an ultimatum).

I just feel awful about the whole thing. She is not the most open minded person, I know this, but I feel in general that our entire relationship is changing. Between the politics and now this, I don't recognize my mother and it breaks my heart :(

Has anyone experienced something similar? How did you navigate it or come to terms with it?

I’m a mom raising two children in the US, and like many immigrant parents, I’ve been trying hard to help my kids maintain their heritage language.

Lately I’ve been wondering:

What do you think is the biggest challenge for children learning their heritage language while growing up in America?

And for families raising Chinese-speaking children specifically — does Chinese feel especially difficult compared to some other languages?

I’ve noticed that many kids can still:

• understand conversations
• speak with family members
• follow everyday Chinese

But once reading and writing become important, things suddenly get much harder.

Some children slowly stop reading Chinese altogether even if they can still understand spoken language pretty well.

And once reading becomes difficult, it feels like their access to the culture also becomes much more limited.

Books become inaccessible.
Independent exploration becomes harder.
A lot of cultural understanding starts depending entirely on parents translating or explaining things for them.

I keep wondering whether Chinese literacy is uniquely difficult for heritage learners because:

• character recognition requires so much long-term memory
• there’s less environmental reinforcement in the US
• reading development works differently from phonics-based languages
• or maybe heritage learners abroad are simply learning under very different conditions from children in China

Curious whether families with other heritage languages (Spanish, Korean, Arabic, Russian, etc.) experience similar challenges — or if Chinese really does feel different.

Would prefer non fiction books that cover various identities within AAPI, but I’m interested in any recs! Thanks 🙂