People Magazine is being called out after horribly misidentifying Asian actors at a SAG Awards after party.
Daily Show correspondent Ronny Chieng, who also played Eddie Cheng in “Crazy Rich Asians,” was quick to point out the error in his Instagram story and then a Twitter post.
In the photo shared by People Magazine, Chieng and his wife, Hannah Pham were misidentified as Randall Park and his wife, Jae W. Suh, while Tan Kheng Hua was mistaken as Michele Yeoh.
Fellow “Crazy Rich Asians” actor Remy Hii, who played Alistair Cheng, tweeted in support of his co-star, explaining to journalists why this erasure of Asian identities is more serious than just an “honest mistake.”
“To the journalists consistently at fault, I refuse to believe you’ve never mistaken a Bomer for a Cavill, an Adams for a Fisher, a Hemsworth for a Hemsworth and yet it happens All the time with PoC,” he wrote.
“When you fail to recognize our faces, when you consistently misattribute our names as though any Asian performer is interchangeable, you erase our identities & you erase our humanity. You negate our achievements & talents with your ignorance. We’re not going to take it. Do better.”
However, this is not the first time People Magazine has had difficulty telling Asian people apart.
In 2013, the magazine reported that Sergey Brin, founder of Google was splitting with his wife, Anne Wojcicki due to his affair with a 27-year-old employee, Amanda Rosenberg — a half Chinese woman. However, People Magazine mistakenly used a stock photo of the wrong Asian woman.
Ridiculously enough, that incident was also not the first time People Magazine used a photo of the wrong Asian person.
Back in 2008, they interviewed Korean actor and singer, Rain, regarding his role in the film, “Speed Racer.” However, the photo accompanying the short interview was not that of Rain, but actually Karl Yune who played a minor role in the film.
Although this incident of mistaken identity definitely isn’t the first of its kind from People Magazine, hopefully it will be the last time.
