Sunday, September 10, 2006

Tom Cruise might be Asian

When I saw pictures of Tom Cruise's new-born daughter, Suri Cruise, the first thing I noticed was how Asian she looks. That's remarkable if you consider that neither of her parents are known to be Asian, and I'm not the only who thinks Suri Cruise looks Asian, as you can see from this news website in China:

WHERE DID SURI CRUISE GET HER "ASIAN" FEATURES FROM?

Since she's the daughter of well-known Hollywood stars, it's likely that she will become famous herself. And it certainly looks like it, since she's only 4 months old and she's already on the cover of Vanity Fair and even has a whole issue about her. Whether or not she does become famous, maybe she will make people think twice about what it means to be "White" as well as what race and ethnicity mean.

People who haven't seen pictures of Suri would assume that she's just another White baby, and what kind of image does "White baby" create in people's minds? Certainly nothing that looks like Suri Cruise. As you can see on comment #13 on this page about Suri, which says:

Now I understand completely why her name is Suri. It's short for surrogate. Suri is part Asian and there is no doubt about it. Check out those eyes and head of hair. Not a Caucasian baby you can't fool me.

"Not a Caucasian baby"?? "There's no doubt about it"??!! Then what does a Caucasian baby LOOK LIKE!? Obviously, whoever wrote that comment has some stereotypical image of White people in their head.

Now a part of me wants Suri Cruise to grow up and become very famous, so that her Asian features will be in the minds of every American some day. And the fact that people will know she's the daughter of Tom Cruise (who looks White) will hopefully make people think more about race and ethnicity; make people think more about the diversity of White people.

It's rare people like Suri Cruise, who isn't mixed-race (ostensibly) but still looks like a different race than her parents, who will hopefully make people think twice about what race looks like. Hopefully she will become so famous that she destroys the stereotype that White people can't look Asian. And at 4 months old, it looks like she's already started.



9 comments:

Anonymous said...

remember Bjork? ;)

Cristobal said...

Yeah. I haven't seen what Bjork's parents look like. She's Icelandic, so her Asian face probably comes from the Inuit people in Iceland. Suri Cruise, however, is a mystery.

Anonymous said...

inuits are from greenland. Iceland was wholly colonized by danes. Bjork could possibly be of Sami origin though (the samis are an indigenous northern european group...just google "bjork sami" for comparison photos)

Anonymous said...

Bjork is white, I always thought she was Asian.

Cristobal said...

Bjork is White but she looks Asian.

People need to realize that race isn't always clear. Just because someone looks Asian doesn't mean they are Asian.

Anonymous said...

Why is Asian the first to come to mind regarding Suri's looks? Why not Native American or Innuit?

Lot of White Americans have Native American ancestors, if Suri's Asiatic look is a recessive gene, then high probability one or both of the Cruise parents have an Amerindian ancestor.

Bjork likely had a Sami ancestor.

Anonymous said...

I may be the first person anywhere to say this but I will.

Suri looks JUST like her mother. She has the same small nose, and almost all infants, especially females, start off with flatter noses, and undeveloped bridges in children lead to lack of epicanthic folds (ie., "chinky" eyes).

Anonymous said...

White in a America is a joke. Well, rather, more like a White elephant!

Millions of 'white' people in America are white, but skin alone. Blacks, Latinos, SE Asians and even Native Americans have been passing for 'white' for as long as the US as required delineation based on census. Adding to that admixture of the last 100 years, more [recent] immigrant groups no perceived as "white" in Europe or elsewhere: Jews, Caucasians, Syrians...if White in the USA was based on anything more than coloring, it would literally half-en the "white" population well before digging up family histories or sampling DNA. But this isn't new, it it?

Anonymous said...

Tom Cruise has the same slanted eyes. That's where she gets those features. I was wondering if he was part Asian