Shortcomings by Adrian Tomine follows the life of Ben Tanaka, who is Japanese American and the destruction of his relationship with Miko Hayashi, who is also Japanese American. Ben Tanaka is seen conversing with him closest and only friend, Alice Kim about his relationship with Miko and the problems they are going through. Shortcomings gave a different perception of Asian American characters showed in the media. Tomine uses each character to both back and dismantle stereotypes of Asian Americans. Shortcomings deals with how these characters interact with the sticky situations that occur while dealing with race and sexuality. Ben Tanaka is a 30 year old Japanese-American man living in Berkeley, California. He manages a local movie theater,
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Miko had found Ben’s porn stash and confronted him about it, but she was not upset that he had the porn just the fact that they were all Caucasian females and none with Asians. He thought that he was being attacked for liking porn with white women, while Miko was trying to make the point that maybe his porn stash is all white women because he dislikes Asian women. Alice moves to New York. Miko shortly after left for New York to do her internship and they were riding in the car and they come upon traffic and as Ben starts complaining there is sudden change in Miko’s attitude. He later finds out that she used the internship as an excuse to figure out whether are not she would break up with Ben or not, but she was not going to do it if he had just let her leave on a positive note. Ben, Alice, and Miko reunite in New York, but not quite the way Ben had hoped it. Even though Ben had went out with a couple white girls while Miko is in New York, he was infuriated by the fact Miko is now dating a white man. He explained his frustration to Alice and Meredith, Alice’s girlfriend, saying that it is okay for an Asian man to date a white woman, but for an Asian woman to date a white man it has to be because they have a fetishism. Meredith tried to understand Ben’s reasoning but the more she argued her point the more Ben would shut down her reasoning by comparing them to deviant
Miko had found Ben’s porn stash and confronted him about it, but she was not upset that he had the porn just the fact that they were all Caucasian females and none with Asians. He thought that he was being attacked for liking porn with white women, while Miko was trying to make the point that maybe his porn stash is all white women because he dislikes Asian women. Alice moves to New York. Miko shortly after left for New York to do her internship and they were riding in the car and they come upon traffic and as Ben starts complaining there is sudden change in Miko’s attitude. He later finds out that she used the internship as an excuse to figure out whether are not she would break up with Ben or not, but she was not going to do it if he had just let her leave on a positive note. Ben, Alice, and Miko reunite in New York, but not quite the way Ben had hoped it. Even though Ben had went out with a couple white girls while Miko is in New York, he was infuriated by the fact Miko is now dating a white man. He explained his frustration to Alice and Meredith, Alice’s girlfriend, saying that it is okay for an Asian man to date a white woman, but for an Asian woman to date a white man it has to be because they have a fetishism. Meredith tried to understand Ben’s reasoning but the more she argued her point the more Ben would shut down her reasoning by comparing them to deviant