Huie: “He can’t make himself white!”

On page 46 of “The Only Kid,” Yuen, Huie and their friends were in the midst of a casual conversation about Jimmy Chan and his prostitute when Huie blurted out a disturbing statement that I wanted to discuss. Yuen stated “A Chinese can do anything with fan gwai if he has money,” to which a Huie exclaimed “He can’t make himself white!” The once jovial crowd became exceedingly quiet and the mood of the room changed quite drastically. The characters quickly became uncomfortable because, as Huie states, the statement has some truth to it. No matter how much money you have, Huie argues in his five word statement that you can’t buy whiteness.

Being white in American society provides a straightforward path to success that is not as easily obtainable, if obtainable at all, for other minority races. I read this quote by Albion Tourgee that states that whiteness was “the most valuable sort of property, being the master-key that unlocks the golden door of opportunity” (Harris, 1748). Just by the color of one’s skin, Tourgee claims that a white person will be have more opportunities available to him/her. Therefore, Tourgee asserts that this intangible notion of whiteness as property is valuable in thriving in America’s racially polarized and oppressive society.

In his five word statement, Huie picks up on this underlying issue of whiteness as property in American society. We see that certain characters, like Rose or Jimmy Chan, try (or are economically persuaded) to “make [them]self white,” but ultimately do not entirely succeed (46). Jimmy states “I’m becoming an American citizen, not because I want to be like them, but because it’s good business.” But does legally becoming an American citizen open the “golden door[s] of opportunity” the same way that Tourgee claims the color of your skin does (Harris, 1748)? Just by analyzing Huie’s five word statement, I think he would dismiss Jimmy’s attempts to integrate in society by obtaining American citizenship. As Huie said, no matter how hard Jimmy tries, he can’t “make himself white” (46). This is a disgusting reality for Huie and the other characters in “The Other Kid” because Huie is basically declaring that he will never have the same rights as his white peers. I understand why the author portrayed the characters becoming incredible uncomfortable when Huie stated that. For these characters, Huie just brought to light a terrible reality that they have been trying so hard to forget about.