Join the Conspiracy of Hope - Perk for $50 Donation: Photo of Jimmy Mirikitani (Cats of Mirikitani) Donated by Corky Lee

[Pearl J. Park]

Dear friends, colleagues, and professionals,

Once people have died, it's too late. But that is precisely the time when Asian American leaders take action about the mental health issues in our communities. The few times Asian American organizations held workshops and panels about mental health was after the Virginia Tech massacre. Another was when we lost the beautiful and extraordinarily talented Chinese-American historian/writer Iris Chang to suicide. Always too late. Without the pretext of tragedy, it’s not socially acceptable for Asian Americans to talk about mental illness even as Asian American women between the ages of 15-24 continue to kill themselves at the highest rate out of any of the ethnic groups. There is complicity in silence. Can you be complicit? Can you be silent amid this pattern of facts? What is our moral imperative? You heard it first in the AIDS campaigns: Silence equals death. 

How do you create safety in cultures where it’s considered taboo to discuss mental illness? Media creates the buzz. The facts instigate the dialogue. "Can" the documentary film (amongourkin.org) depicts a protagonist who is not afraid to speak publicly about his mental illness, surely affecting culture. The film, without being released, is already inspiring ideas, conversation, and creative energy. Influenced by my Facebook posts about my film and the prevalence of depression among Asian American women, the Broadway veteran actor and playwright extraordinaire Christine Toy Johnson, (ChristineToyJohnson.com) started her script for EYE D, a theatre project about identity among women of color. To boot, a group of fantastic women of color, Christine and I gathered last November to talk about our identities and ourselves. Coming in late 2012! 

The truth is that the silence about mental illness has tragic and devastating consequences for you, me and our communities throughout the country. Korean Americans, in particular, are known for hiding their shame in order to save face. Death, even murder, seems preferable to losing face.

http://articles.latimes.com/2006/apr/10/local/me-bodies10

http://articles.latimes.com/2006/apr/11/local/me-murder11

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-05-17-koreatown_x.htm

http://www.laweekly.com/2006-04-13/news/community-in-pain/

Mental Health Taboos Fuel Korean American Suicides

http://iamkoream.com/mental-health-taboos-fuel-korean-american-suicides/#more-25808 

Watch Nolan Zane, Director of the National Asian American Center for Disparities Research, Univ. of California, Davis, speak about the stigma in Asian American cultures.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/cryforhelp/episodes/special-feature/nolan-zane-on-the-stigma-of-mental-illness/14/

We know that the mental health utilization rates by Asian Americans are less than the general population.
http://psychcentral.com/news/2008/09/24/asian-americans-shun-mental-health-care-2/2998.html

Systemic barriers are also an issue: therapists who do not understand the cultural milieus of their patients are hard pressed to understand and treat them appropriately. It's one of the many reasons why Asian Americans do not seek or stay in therapy. This is why we’re using this documentary to create cultural competency training for health care providers.

As an activist, I want to become obsolete. I want there to be no need for me to go to national health conferences to speak about issues in Asian American mental health. And no need for a film about recovery from mental illness because everyone will know someone who has recovered and is proud to tell the world about it. Every year, 1 out of every 5 people will struggle with a mental illness. I want every person who has ever felt the stigma of mental illness to be able to heal from their shame and pain. I want everyone who needs help to receive the support, attention and care they deserve without shame. It is our collective responsibility. It takes a village. It takes a culture and a revolution, beginning with you.

We currently have two perks, donated by the undisputed unofficial Asian American Photographer Laureate Corky Lee for donations of $50 and up. For every $50 gift made, we're giving away one 10" x 8" color photo of Jimmy Mirikitani (http://thecatsofmirikitani.com/) or the Lantern Procession for Buddha's Birthday in Union Square. Your choice. Be sure to claim a perk on our Indiegogo.com page: http://www.indiegogo.com/Can-a-documentary-film-by-Pearl-J-Park?a=350471

As a side note, producer/director Linda Hattendorf of 2006 Tribeca Film Festival Audience Award fame, The Cats of Mirikitani is a consulting editor on "Can." Xuan T. Vu, the principal editor of "Can," worked with Oscar-nominated and Emmy-winning documentary filmmaker, Dorothy Fadiman, as principal editor and associate producer on Fadiman's political documentary film (STEALING AMERICA: Vote by Vote, theatrically released in 2008. 

Silence equals death. Don't be complicit. Join the conspiracy of hope by donating today. Together we can make the need for mental health activism obsolete. 

To make a tax-deductible donation to this film's nonprofit fiscal sponsor Independent Feature Project, please click the "donate" button in the upper right-hand corner: https://market.ifp.org/newyork/fiscal/DonateNow.cfm?ProjectID=40

To make a donation to our IndieGoGo campaign, please click

http://www.indiegogo.com/Can-a-documentary-film-by-Pearl-J-Park?a=350471&i=wdgi

Sincerely,

Pearl

Pearl Ji-hyon Park
Producer/Director, Can
201-589-0623
lightf...@gmail.com

Please visit our website: amongourkin.org.
Blog: can-documentary.blogspot.com