Recognition

LIVING in the mecca of entertainment and filmmaking, it is unavoidable for Filipinos in Los Angeles to imbibe the Hollywood culture.
Films (whether fictitious or based on real-life events) and award-giving events like the Oscars and Golden Globes, have become an integral part of any Angeleno’s life.
Therefore, it is not surprising that Diego Luna’s historical biopic, Cesar Chavez, was met with outrage by Filipino-Americans, due to its alleged “inaccurate” depiction of real-life historical events on the life and times of United Farm Workers Movement (UFW) leader and founder Cesar Chavez.
The Filipino American National Historical Society (FANHS) opined that the Chavez film  “does not emphasize the importance of  the historic multi-ethnic alliance between Mexicans and Filipinos in the UFW.”
Dr. Dawn B. Mabalon,  a FANHS board member and San Francisco State University (SFSU) Associate Professor said:  “We respect Diego Luna’s vision of a film about the heroic rise of Cesar Chavez. But as a history of the farmworkers’ struggle, the film falls short by downplaying, erasing and silencing the significant role that Filipinos and others played in the heroic struggle for farmworkers’ justice in California.”
Mabalon argued that while the film was not a documentary in the strict sense, filmmakers still have “a responsibility to ensure that the history they present is accurate.”
“We hoped that the film would show how Filipino strike leaders such as Itliong, Pet Velasco, Philip Vera Cruz, Ben Gines, and Andy Imutan, and Mexican leaders such Chavez, Dolores Huerta and Gil Padilla, did the challenging work of organizing workers and crewing and sustaining a coalition and how their strategies, cooperation, and solidarity resulted in the nation’s first successful farm labor union, the United Farm Workers. It does not,” Mabalon said.
Some discrepancies in the film, as described by FANHS, include: (1) implying that the NFWA was the only union ever in farm labor. According to FANHS, Itliong and his fellow Filipinos have been organizing for labor rights since the 1920s and “were feared for their militance; (2) “The Filipino strike that begins on Sept. 8, 1965, is shown for a few seconds on screen and without context;” (3)  the film also did not depict the 1966 merger between the AWOC and the NFWA, which resulted in the birth of the UFW; (4) Filipino voice and presence in the UFW were also largely absent in the film; (5) While in history, there were several thousand Filipino strike participants, only a small group was shown briefly in the Grape Strike scenes in the movie; (6) Itliong only speaks one line to Chavez, and appears in just a few quick shots; he is always in the background and is absent throughout most of the film.
According to Itliong’s son, Johnny (who spearheaded the protesters at the red carpet event of the film) the movie did not show Larry Itliong’s participation in scenes which depicted the March to Sacramento and in the signing of the labor contract with grape-growers.
“Those are the pinnacle events in the UFW and they’re missing half the story. It’s an injustice to my father that he is not at that table,” the younger Itliong told ABS-CBN News.
“That was everything that he fought for — to get the bargaining rights on that piece of paper. And in the movie it shows him in the crowd as a spectator. That’s not right in my heart and I don’t think it’s right for our Filipino community to be a spectator to something that he was a major player in,” Johnny further said.
Just last year, the Filipino-American community reached a milestone in the recognition of these Delano “Manongs.”
In October 2013, the Asian Journal reported on the signing of legislation by California Governor Jerry Brown — AB 123, which incorporates the  inclusion of Filipino-American history in textbooks statewide.
This legislation was introduced by Fil-Am Assemblymember Rob Bonta (D-Alameda), which requires the State Board of Education to include the role of Fil-Ams in the farm worker movement in the state’s curriculum.
Bonta referred to Philip Vera Cruz and Larry Itliong as first-generation Filipino immigrants, who helped found the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee, before doing a merger with Chavez’s United Farm Workers.
The CA assemblymember also said that Cruz, Itliong and the Delano Manongs’ contributions to the farm worker movement  are largely forgotten in mainstream history books and in national media.
According to historians, before Chavez joined the board, it was Itliong who spearheaded the 1960s farm worker movement, coordinating strikes for better wage and living conditions for his colleagues.
Itliong, Vera Cruz and the Delano Manongs’ significant inclusion in history books was a momentous vindication for the Filipino-American community.
Beyond films and inaccurate depictions, what matters most is what’s written in history and regarded as “bible truth.”
And regardless of who we are or where we came from, we are all human beings — fighting for meaning and for recognition, in our human struggles and successes.
(AJPress)