FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 17, 2004, Contact: Flora Chu (408)733-0008


JUSTICE FOR ANNA MAE HE
RETURN HER TO HER PARENTS!

In May 2004, a Tennessee court ordered that baby Anna Mae should not be returned to her Chinese parents. This order caused tremendous grief to Anna Mae's natural parents and created an outrage across the country and across communities. Scholars and specialists in child welfare and development were equally surprised by such court order as being not in the best interest of the child.

Here is the story. When Anna Mae was born in 1999, her parents, Jack and Casey He, a visiting Chinese couple, were faced with unexpected difficulties and they placed Anna Mae into what they thought was temporary foster care. Since then, the He family has been waging a five-year battle for the return of their daughter. In a decision that is fraught with cultural bias and misinformation about the Chinese culture and customs, the Tennessee court denied the return of Anna Mae to her parents, declared that Anna Mae's parents unfit and stripped them of their parental rights, and declared that Anna Mae should not be with her parents. Anna Mae's parents were shocked and distraught and are appealing this outrageous, culturally-biased decision.


J4NA believes that the Tennessee Court's decision,
(a) clearly harbored an ethnocentric bias against Anna Mae's heritage and culture;
(b) clearly demonstrated discriminatory stereotyping in its judgment against Anna Mae's parents, their 
          mannerisms, actions, and lifestyle, all because they are ethnic Chinese; 
     (c) is misinformed about the Chinese culture and customs, and
     (d) lacks understanding of the difficulties that New Americans face, and the decisions that they are forced
          to make.
Anna Mae, a New American, should grow up in a loving environment where her heritage and ancestry are embraced and celebrated, not disdained and discriminated against. Return her to her birth parents, where she belongs!

For more information on the case, please refer to an article now spearing in the March 2005 issue of Ladies Home Journal at justice.com/. A copy of the amicas brief detailing the ethnocentrism and bias in the Tennessee court's decision that was filed on behalf of the He family by the Organization of Chinese Americans - Greater Seattle Chapter (OCA-GS) can be found at www.ocaseattle.org .

Justice for New Americans (J4NA) is an advocacy organization whose mission is to eliminate biases and discrimination against New Americans. Many “New Americans” like Anna Mae face discrimination and bias resulting from a pervasive and implicit ethnocentric view of what Americans are or should be.

OCA - GREATER SEATTLE CHAPTER

EMBRACING THE HOPES AND ASPIRATIONS OF CHINESE AND ASIAN PACIFIC AMERICANS IN THE UNITED STATES