“Kill that Gook, You Gook”

Alan Takemoto's penetrating cartoon of a white officer ordering an Asian American soldier to "Kill that gook, you gook!", on the cover of the May 1972 issue of Gidra: The Monthly of the Asian American Experience hit at the heart of the singular experience that Americans of Asian descent faced during the Sixties: looking like the enemy. During the Global Sixties, the Vietnam War in particular was a flash point for political conflicts around the world. As transnational as the era was, issues such as imperialism, internationalism, colonialism, hegemony and racism that defined the Sixties on the world stage also played out within the borders of nation states. Gidra conveyed—even as it incubated—distinctly Asian American epistemological understandings, not only about the Vietnam War but also of other key issues such as Third World identity and alliances, community empowerment and responsibility, and inequalities of gender, class, and age.