As non-white immigrants as well as native born ethnic minorities make up an ever greater share of California's population, the ethnic press (both foreign and English language) plays an ever more important role in informing citizens of the state. What stories and ideas are circulating in these newspapers? A network of over 50 ethnic media editors from California -- called the New California Media -- help PNS compile a monthly column of gleanings from this vital but often overlooked segment of the news media.

CONGRESS COULD LEARN FROM CONFUCIUS WHEN IT COMES TO CHILD REARING

The U.S. House of Representatives, which recently passed a bill calling on states to treat juveniles charged with certain crimes as adult offenders, has endorsed the idea that brute force can be used to contain misbehaving youth.

This represents a radical departure from this country's traditional approach of tolerance. It also runs counter to ancient Chinese practices, which reflected the belief that education should be substituted for punishment, particularly with juveniles who were seen as immature, unstable and easily swayed by external influences.

We believe that Confucius' exhortation "to love all people through moral force" is still the correct approach to dealing with young people." Indeed, if juveniles who slip and commit some crime are treated like adults, they will lose their sense of contrition.

While the pendulum may have swung too far towards permissiveness, Congress has gone too far toward the opposite direction.

--The World Journal Daily (Chinese-language, San Francisco)

DRIVING WHILE BLACK

A recent 7-2 Supreme Court decision gave police officers blanket authority to search citizens during traffic stops.

This ruling, buried in many local newspapers, was front-page news on the streets of Black America.

Police encounters with black citizens form a troubling commentary on race relations and have jump-started some of our country's worst riots. The simple truth is that police officers treat black citizens differently than other citizens. It seems to be a game of power -- as scores of black men can painfully testify.

"If police feel they can stop and harass black drivers at will," asks a young black male, "what will happen now that the courts have given them the legal right to stop and search people without reasonable cause?"

--The Sun Reporter (San Francisco)

INDIAN AMERICANS DEBATE THE ROLE OF MNCS

The recent announcement that India will allow multi-national corporations (MNCs) to begin investing in the country is stirring intense debate among Indian-Americans.

"Exactly what will any of these companies do for India?" asks Rajeeve Srinivasan. "It is true that a Pepsi or a Sony or a Levi's brings in needed employment, but MNC's also do a lot of harm. For example, people are being weaned off traditional breakfast foods by advertising -- does anybody seriously believe that eating Kellogg's corn flakes at five times the price is better for you than eating idlis and chatni?"

Rajeevan Kattil disagrees: "It is downright insulting to suggest Indian consumers are so brainwashed they cannot make up their own minds about Kellogg's cereal vs. idli-sambar?" He argues that MNC's, "through managerial expertise, customer satisfaction, and operational excellence, would force inefficient, outdated, customer-insensitive firms to change..."

-- India Currents (San Jose)

MEXICO REPLICATES U.S. CRACKDOWN ON MIGRANTS

Police surveillance and deportations of undocumented immigrants along Mexico's southern borders have risen dramatically in the last few years, especially after the signing of the NAFTA treaty, according to reports from the Catholic diocese of Tapachula in the southern state of Chiapas.

Typically these migrants come from further south -- most are Honduran -- and cross Mexico to establish themselves in the United States. Until recently, many would temporarily return to their homelands, usually for family reasons, and retrace their paths back to the U.S. The crackdown is disrupting this back-and-forth pattern.

It has also stopped citizens of African countries, Eastern Europeans as well as Chinese, who occasionally cross the southern Mexican border seeking to get to the U.S.

--La Opinion (Los Angeles)

NORTH AMERICAN MUSLIMS LACK FORUM FOR INTELLECTUAL DEBATE

The challenge of a new millenium touches all Muslims. In North America, where we are beginning to find a voice and a bearing but are still far from attaining a critical mass in terms of impact, the question is, what must we be doing so Islamic renaissance becomes the dominant theme of the next century?

We must develop enough self-assurance to debate theological and related ideas intelligently in a tolerant and stimulating environment. We need an authentic forum for intellectual discussions. There is no need to fear ideas or to surrender our right of independent thinking to a handful of religious leaders. An intellectually alive and practicing Ummah (translate) offers the best hope for Islamic renaissance in the 21st century.

--Iqra Magazine (San Jose)

STRIPPING AWAY THE BEAUTY MYTH

As the dancers in the "Lusty Lady" theaters in Seattle and San Francisco recently discovered, a strip club managed by women can be just as exploitative as any other kind -- particularly when it comes to treatment of women of color. In other industries, women of color are often in the lowest-paying jobs, and at the Lusty Lady many were denied the chance of working in the more lucrative "Private Pleasures" booths because of management's desire to uphold the busty yet skinny blond as the standard of beauty.

Lusty Lady's dancers of color got together, and confronted management which eventually allowed them to perform in the booths. The dancers, encouraged, went on to uniuonize with Service Employees International Union Local 790, making this the only unionized strip club in the country.

--Third Force (Oakland)

A POST-COLD WAR STRUGGLE OVER PRINCIPLES DIVIDES THE WORLD

The Cold War has ended and political ideologies have crumbled but the world is still engaged in an intense struggle between those who want absolute freedom and those who want state intervention to ensure that the global gap between rich and poor, instead of widening, begins to narrow.

But the problem is that in today's world there is only one superpower state which is capable of imposing its standards values and principles on the peoples and governments of the world. And the new technologies have created a one-world economy which operates in the space occupied by the New York, Tokyo, London and Zurich stock markets. Silicon Valley now wields far more power over the world economy than the Imperial British Navy in the 19th century.

As a result, economic freedom, world trade and Western democracy are now victors in the global struggle over principle. But whether they will remain so ten or even five years from now is open to question.

--Al-Sharq Al Ausat (London, Arabic Language)

DISTRICT ELECTIONS COULD TURN SAN FRANCISCO INTO ASIAN POWER HOUSE

Because new immigrants are more likely to vote than any other citizens -- three out of four new voters are people born outside the United States -- new voters of Asian descent are emerging as the most decisive voting bloc in San Francisco, says David Lee of the Chinese Voter Education Project.

Lee believes that Chinese Americans, who make up 68 percent of the city's Asian Americans, could transform the city's power structure by the year 2000, especially if a new district voting plan goes into effect that year. The plan mandates that all candidates for supervisor must live in the particular district -- one of 11 in the city -- they seek to represent. Chinese Americans are a significant presence in at least four of the projected districts, including Chinatown which is now represented by a non-Chinese.

Currently two members of the city's 11-member board are of Asian American descent -- in itself a precedent in a city that for 150 years had only one Asian American on its governing body.

--Sing Tao (San Francisco - Chinese Language)