The Ultimate 25 Under 25: Mochi’s List of Young Asian American Influencers
When we set out to create a list of the most prominent young Asian Americans, it started, like most of our stories do, with a staff chat. The final list, which was heavily debated (is he/she still relevant? is his/her work role-model worthy?), is a product I’m extremely proud of. We always knew we wouldn’t have a problem coming up with a great group of names, but what I’m most happy with is the sheer amount of diversity we came across—age, ethnicity, profession and more. I won’t even get into the amazing people we couldn’t include because they were—gasp—26 or older. We hope that the potential people to add to this list just keeps growing, growing, and growing—tell us in the comments who you’d like to see the next time we do this!
—Stephanie Wu
Written and reported by Jasmine Ako, Susan Hirai, Nicole Tai, Christine Wei and Stephanie Wu
View and download the PDF here:
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Five full-Asian males out of a list of 25? Only two which exist outside of YouTube fame. Doesn’t surprise me.
And if we’re going to count Hapa’s (which experience a much different journey than full-Asians because of their ability to be accepted visually and play racially ambiguous roles) then you have to throw in Young Money rapper and Lil Wayne protege Tyga (half Vietnamese, half black), who is more famous than 80% of this list.
He doesn’t rep his Asian side very often, but neither do some of the people on this list.
TimDeLaGhetto (YouTube star) is huge as well, particularly in the South East Asian American communities.
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What about asian americans in business/tech? Tony Hsieh of Zappos, Steve Chen of Youtube?
It seems like this list is missing Tila Tequila. lol
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There is a difference between fame and influence! And Tyga hasn’t influenced many people to do anything.
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Let’s be real – this list was extremely biased and shows the disconnect between the viewpoints of Asian American males and Asian American females.
The Asian man is probably the least sexy figure in America (as evidenced by Hangover 2, Ken Jeong vs. Jamie Chung) and a fraction of that is due to the fact that Asian American women do not stand-up for their brothers and fathers. Yes, many Asian American men are awkward in some regards, making it difficult for them to support? Yes, it’s not easy. But still damn, if the women can’t even stick up for the men then what hope is there for a concept even tougher – pan-Asian unity for example.
I’m not saying Asian American women don’t struggle, but actually – they generally struggle much less than their male counterparts in America (in America only, yes I know in Asia it’s extremely sexist and biased in favor of males).
Hot debate. What do you think?
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I’m surprised you didn’t list Freddie Wong as an influence. he most recently made a video with Jon Favreau, the director of Cowboys and Aliens and has also worked with many other famous celebrities and yet he wasn’t listed. There’s also the group, Aziatix, who recently made their debut in the music industry, all their members being Asian Americans and they have released extremely popular music all over the world that has topped the charts. And to not even mention Far East Movement is just beyond me. They are the first full Asian American group to have topped the US music billboards and have been very popular even before their movement into mainstream media.
It’s a shame. I would’ve liked to see these people replace a few others in this list.
Where is Bubzbeauty aka Lindy Tsang and AJ Rafael?
Dilshad Vadsari…she’s from Pakistan right? So how is she Asian? Makes no sense
Putting percentages aside, I think it’s more important to consider who out of this list actually identifies themselves as Asian American. If we took a second look at the list with this in mind, it would be a little different. It’s hard to label them as Asian American influencers if they don’t see themselves as Asian American.
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Annyeonghaseyo!! I am JinJu. I was born in Seoul. I just moved here to the U.S. about 1 year ago. I found these 25 people very inspiring. I think you should have added Yuna Kim, the figure skater. She is really popular in korea!! ^_^
I would love to see people other than entertainers on the list. What about the influential young Asian Americans who are making a difference through public service in grassroots organizing, advocacy, and public policy? These people are inspirational and worthy of being role models!
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how come Jay Park was not included in this list? he’s still 24! and Taecyeon made it? first of all Taec was Korean-born in the first place so that means he would serve the army eventually..Jay Park is influential you might lash out that he made that Korea is gay comment but BOB’s nothing on you couldn’t have hit no.1 on the billboard if Jay had’nt made a cover of it and got NOY more airplay and is facing your haters influential enough for you? he showed us you can get back on your feet after a debacle…i don’t even know some of the people here..
@Diana
I doubt the ones who are making a difference with their righteous activities get to be noticed simply because there are so many activists regardless of race out there (so it’s difficult to stand out). The ones on this list have many followers (a lot more than those activists but if you scrolled through the list, Ryan Higa has donated to the Japanese earthquake victims, so in a way, he’s done public service too same Kevin Wu with his Kev Jumba fund youtube channel).
Yeah what about the guys of Far East Movement, all the Asian winning crews of ABDC, Harry Shum Jr…
TAECYEOOOOONNNNN <3333333333 WHOOOAAAAAA I HAD NO IDEA HE WOULD BE ON THIS LIST
LOL of course Kevin and Ryan are on here
haha "self-depricating humor"
Now this looks like an interesting list: http://blog.angryasianman.com/2009/05/30-most-influential-asian-americans.html
I had to comment because of this Honest Abe guy. As a Korean American (with a mixed family make-up of Korean and White), who has lived in both America and Korea, I found your comments offensive and self-absorbed.
To suggest that Asian women in America have it easier than Asian men is ridiculous. This shows that you are making statements that you cannot possibly have a foundation for. You are either a man or a woman and you cannot have personal experience being the other gender (with limitation, which I won’t discuss further since I see this is a site for teens, and I imagine they want to keep the content more PG 13 than R). Asian women, while perhaps considered attractive in America, are also turned into a fetish. While attitudes are certainly changing, the media has often portrayed Asian women as prostitutes and/or servants. I agree with you that Asian males are poorly depicted as unattractive, but I can say that I do not know any Asian women who do not, at least publicly, stand up for Asian men.
I also have to respond to your statement “And if we’re going to count Hapa’s (which experience a much different journey than full-Asians because of their ability to be accepted visually and play racially ambiguous roles)… .” Again you are either “Hapa” or not, so you can’t really know what the “Hapa” experience is. You speak about “pan-Asian unity,” but you denigrate a large number of Asians when you call one kind of Asian “Hapa,” or half, and another “full.” It is also offensive that you suggest that we should not even be counted. In your other comment, you speak of perceived attractiveness, and here you speak of visual acceptance. Perhaps you are too concerned with the surface of people. I have found that Hapas do have a unique experience, but ambiguity does not create ease. Living in a small town in the American south, I was lumped in with all minorities and treated as “not White.” Living in Korea, I was treated as “not Korean.” I don’t speak Korean as well as others may, which was mocked. Many Koreans disapproved of my family’s interracial marriage and my American citizenship. Americans told me they couldn’t remember my name because we “all look alike,” expected me to know every Asian in the community, and loved to rattle off made up Asian words at me. Those who acknowledge having a mixed background (because plenty of Asians have a mixed background regardless of whether they choose to acknowledge it) are treated as Asians in America and Americans in Asia.
You are perpetuating this with your self-centered comments and working against the “pan-Asian unity” that you are looking for.
Although I agree with some of the choices, I think anything that lists babies as something influential loses all its credibility. I’m a huge fan of the show “The Modern Family” and I have to say this: those babies are not any where near influential. Why? Because they havn’t done anything! But it’s not their fault, they’re just BABIES. I mean has any Asian American ever watched Modern Family and went, “You see that Asian baby right there? They’re really paving the way for us Asian Americans in this country.” HELL NO.
The article gives terrible reasons for why the babies should be listed. They were the 2010 Entertainment Weekly’s Entertainer of the Year, as part of the Modern Family ensemble cast. First of all the babies didn’t even have a large role in that cast, they never spoke a word. Second since when did becoming Entertainment Weekly’s Entertainer of the Year an achievement for any entertainer? The second reason is that they have a Twitter account run by their father with 10,000 followers. Does it even matter if the babies have Twitter? What could they possibly even say that would even remotely matter? They’re hungry? They love the color blue? Considering that they’re just babies and the Twitter is run by their father, it’s really not their Twitter account in practical terms. Not only that, but these babies are no longer on Modern Family (they used a different, older child actor to show time progression in the new season).
Some people this list entered the Olympics. THE OLYMPICS. If you were an Asian American athlete that entered the Olympics, wouldn’t you be happy that you were listed as one of the most influencing Asian Americans out there? Then be completely pissed that twin babies are in the same list as you, despite all your years of training to enter the largest, most competitive, most recognized and most respected athletic competition known as the Olympics?
Not saying everyone on that list shouldn’t be on that list, but it just lost all credibility for me when it had the babies in there.
I wrote a huge comment about the credibility of this article and it never got posted. It was constructive criticism but it never made it.
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