Asian-American leaders in the U.S. have demanded removal of an alleged ‘racist’ application called ‘Make Me Asian’ from Google’s Play store. The application allows users to edit their photos with Asian stereotype look. Leaders have sought removal of a similar application called ‘Make Me Indian’.
Washington pastor Peter Chin has launched a petition campaign on a website called change.org. Peter Chin writes on the site:
Google’s motto is “Don’t Be Evil”, which makes it difficult to fathom why they carry the “Make Me Asian” and “Make Me Indian” apps by KimberyDeiss on their Google Play Store. These apps overlay dated and racist stereotypes onto your photos: rice paddy hat, fu manchu mustache, slanty eyes and yellow skin – and voila, digital yellowface! Or you can pretend to be a Native American by slapping your picture with war paint, feather, and broaded nose, because we all know that that is all that it takes to represent “Indians”.
These apps perpetuate hateful and offensive stereotypes that are used to this very day to marginalize and humiliate Asians and Native Americans. They are not funny, and their use highlights a vicious double standard, where people are allowed to characterize Asians and Native Americans in a way that they never would do to other races or ethnic groups. Google is implicitly normalizing these characterizations by allowing them to proliferate on their branded Google Play store. THESE APPS NEED TO COME DOWN NOW.
The Make Me Indian app has received mostly poor ratings from the users with many calling it as racist. Aaron Bollingmo rates the app as Racist, saying “Extremely racist app. I’m sure hipsters love this thing. I for one feel it’s racist. What will they come out with next a black face app?”
Users slamming the Make Me Indian app
K McAllister says for the Make Me Asian app, “Does version 2.0 include other minorities? Seriously what genius created this? Why would Google approve this?”
Make Me Asian app also draws heat
Do you think Google should remove these two and similar apps from the Play store? Let us know in the comments section below: