A Chinese American woman received a response for a job application that read “me love you long time”
Block Club Chicago reports that a Chinese American woman’s job application was responded with “me love you long time.”
Connie Cheung had applied for a job at a Chicago-based employee recruitment company Chicago Search Group. In an email response, the company had replied “me love you long time” – a phrase infamously popularised by the 1987 film Full Metal Jacket.
In the film, a Vietnamese prostitute says the phrase to American troops as well as “sucky-sucky, 5 dollar.” Although Cheung had never seen the film, she said the phrase was used at her Florida high school.
James McMahon, the person who wrote the response to Cheung said the email was intended for his boss Brian Haugh. Cheung received the email when it was accidentally forwarded to her.
Nonetheless, Cheung still wondered how they would talk about her.
“Asian females have always been sexualized because of their history with Western males,” Cheung said. “It’s gross. That specific phrase is sexual. It’s not just toward my race, it’s sexual. That’s all I could think of, was, ‘Why? It’s 2019.’”
Cheung posted the email to Facebook publicly with the caption “when you apply for a job and the recruiting managers are emailing about you behind your back.”
When her friends contacted the company to in support of Cheung, Haugh replied “I am focused on bigger problems than your friend being offended by a movie quote. Sorry, but I just don’t have time for this.”
“It was an insensitive, inside joke only meant for my partner,” McMahon added. “It was an insensitive comment, I realize that. It was a racist comment, I realize that …I had no racist intentions. I’m not racist, I’m certainly not sexist.”
“I know I was 100 percent in the wrong. I wish it never happened, I wish I could take it back. It was a huge mistake and I’m sorry.”
