The lives of Pacific American peoples are almost always romanticized on network television. In truth, the indigenous people of Hawai'i are forced to endure the legacy of U.S. colonialism and the ongoing depredations of militarism, nuclear testing, chemical waste disposal, international tourism, and global capitalist investment patterns that have combined to affect adversely the environment, culture, and health of native Hawaiians. Ever since U.S. troops deposed the legitimate government of Queen Liliuokalani in a 1893 coup, native Hawaiians have been denied the right of self-determination. In 1898, the annexation of Hawai'i by the United States was orchestrated through the combined efforts of haole (white> military, political, religious, and business leaders. A native Hawaiian soveriegnty movement is afoot, however, that seeks compensation for lands wrongfully annexed by the United States. "By a fragrant mix of chicanery, legal hocus-pocus and political corruption, this land-some of it of immense value-has never been distributed to its rightful heirs," writes Alexander Cockburn.

Living in urban and rural slum areas, native Hawaiians occupy the lower depths of a social order that heavily subsidizes the omnipresent U.S. military and encourages the investment of transnational capital in a one-dimensional tourist economy. As a matter of survival, native Hawaiians are forced to "live in a hostage economy where tourist industry employment means active participation in their own degradation. The "aloha spirit" of love, generosity, and extended family happiness attributed to the Hawaiian people diverts attention from the racism that undergirds life in this "island paradise."

Pacific Americans from Samoa and Guam have also been brought into the global system of capitalism, which has irreparably altered traditional structures of political, economic, and cultural life. Having left their island homes in Guam and American Samoa because of poor economic conditions, Pacific Americans now living on the U.S. mainland face a host of problems associated with nonemployment or underemployment. The loss of status, poverty, questions of identity, and maladjustment to mainland society continue to plague the community of Pacific Islanders.

The lush ancestral lands that were once home to native Hawaiians have been put to service by Euro-American interlopers as a favorite backdrop for a number of television programs. Still running in syndication, Hawaii Five-0 (1968-80) featured the heroics of Detective Steve McGarrett (Jack Lord), head of the elite state police unit in Honolulu. McGarrett's chief assistant was a younger white man, Detective Danny Williams (James MacArthur). Both were aided by darker subordinates, most notably Detective Chin Ho Kelly (Kam Fong) and Detective Kono Kalakaua (Zulu)>

The infantilization of Asian Pacific Islanders on television can be attributed t their subordination within the white-dominated racial hierarchy. "Even those whites who opposed slavery were convinced Hawaiians were like children," write Paul Jacobs and Saul Landau in their documentary analysis of U.S. racial history, "unable to govern themselves or make sensible judgments." In contrast to Pacific Americans, Asian Americans in Hawaii are more often represented as functioning with adult autonomy. In the episode "Killer Bee," for instance, a Chinese American psychiatrist by the name of Dr. Wong figures prominently in a story concernign mentally disturbed Vietnam veteran on a kindnapping spree. And of course, McGarrett's most formidable nemesis was the Asian criminal mastermind Wo Fat (Khigh Dhiegh).

Hawaii Five-0 was replaced by Magnum, P.I. (1980-88) in the CBS lineup after a twelve-year run. The elaborate production facilities constructed for Hawaii Five-0 were uesd in Magnum, P.I. , which "incorporated the rich landscape (both actual and symbolic) of the Hawaiian islands." The lush, exotic backdrop was as much an integral part of the new program as it was for its predecessor. Unlike Hawaii Five-0 , however, this paradisical setting was almost completely without a recurring nonwhite or indigenous presence such as represented by Chin Ho or Kono. As in Hawaii Five-0 , the central character was a haole . Private investigator Thomas Sullivan Magnum (Tom Sellek) was a Vietnam veteran who had been traumatized by his wartime experiences. Magnum was assisted in his exploits by an African American buddy from the navy, T.C. (Roger E. Mosley). Apart from T.C., a Japanese American police officer, Lieutenant Tanaka (Kwan Hi Lim), would appear on occasion, but for the most part Magnum, P.I. marked off this tropical paradise as the exclusive preserve of Euro-Americans.

Big Hawaii (1977) was an ill-fated one-hour adventure program that centered upon a wealthy, autocratic landowner by the name of Barrett Fears (John Dehner). Fears and his children were served by a parallel family of friendly and sympathetic Hawaiian helpers named Kalahani, including "Big Lulu" (Elizabeth Smith), Oscar (Bill Lucking), Garfield (Moe Keale), and Kimo (Remi Abellira). Barrett Fear's rebellious son Mitch (Cliff Potts) often found refuge from his own family in the bosom of the Kalahanis. This mixed relationship echoed the popular theme of nonwhite adults providing a surrogate family for the white child until the time comes when he must assume the mantle of leadership.

In The MacKenzies of Paradise Cove (1979), the caretaker function of Pacific Islanders was performed by Big Ben Kalikini (Moe Keale) and his wife Mrs. Kalikini (Leinaala Heine). Along with fishing-boat operator Cuda Weber (Clu Gulager), the Kalikinis were the unofficial guardians of five orphaned white children whose parents died in a sailing accident. Little Ben Kalikini (Sean Tyler Hall) was a friend of the MacKenzie children, at least until they reached adulthood, whereupon they presumably would go their separate ways in conformity with their respective racially determined destinies.

No more successful than Big Hawaii were two one-season wonders, Aloha Paradise (1981) and Hawaiian Heat (1984). A toney Hawaiian resort was the setting for Aloha Paradise , where Evelyn Pahinui (Mokihana) tended bar for the exclusively haole clientele. The premise of Hawaiian Heat devolved upon the culture shock experienced by two transplanted Chicago policemen-Polish American Andy Senkowski (Jeff McCracken) and Irish American Mac Riley (Robert Ginty)-carrying out undercover detective work in the surf-and-sun setting of Honolulu. Their commanding officer, Major Taro Oshira, played by veteran Japanese American actor Mako, prevented the two cops from overly enjoying their work by keeping a lid on their libidinous tropic appetites.

By the time the medical drama Island Son (1989-90) appeared, the paternalistic racism of the white interloper formula had become too obviously outworn. Instead, Richard Chamberlain starred as a medical doctor who left a successful practice on the mainland so that he could be with his adoptive Hawaiian parents and minister to the needs of the natives at Kamehameha Medical Center in Honolulu. Although still the focus of the program, Dr. Daniel Kulani (Chamberlain) worked with an Asian American chief surgeon, Dr. Kenji Fushida (Clyde Kusatsu).

The white man's fascination with the South Pacific perhaps found its most complete expression in the program Adventures in Paradise (1959-62). Like many Euro-American males who gained direct experience of U.S. colonial possessions in the Pacific as GIs, Adam Troy (Gardner McKay) was a Korean War veteran who had discovered his personal paradise. He captained his schooner the Tiki on chartered trips. At one point in the program, Troy had a Chinese American partner named Oliver Lee (Weaver Levy), but it was Asian Pacific women such as Sondi (Sondi Sodai, also Miss Thailand of 1960) and Kelly (Lani Kai) who saw to the needs of their white master. Adventures in Paradise was created by the bard of Asian Pacific exoticism himself, author James A. Michener.

Warner Bros. Television had a hit in its detective drama 77 Sunset Strip (1658-64) and applied the formula to Hawaiian Eye (1659-63), only this time using Honolulu instead of West Hollywood as the glamorous setting for the show. The program featured two detectives-Tom Lopaka (Robert Conrad) and Trac Steele (Anthony Eisley)-as partners at a detective agency they operated out of a plush hotel. The popular Hawaiian entertainer Poncie Ponce played a happy-go-lucky taxi cab driver named Kazuo Kim, who would often lend his good-natured assistance to the detectives. Poncie Ponce's pidgin English, a material reminder of colonial subjectivity, was a continual source of amusement to his social superiors.

In late 1991, a national audience received unexpected exposure to the grievances of Pacific Americans during a special ninety-minute edition of ABC News Nightline (1980-present). Broadcast on the eve of the fiftieth anniversary of the Japnaese attack on Pearl Harbor, a "trans-Pacific town meeting" is opened by host Ted Koppel with the stated intention of bringing "together people who are worlds apart." Reporting from the NHK Studio Broadcast Center in Tokyo, Japan, Koppel observes how the open hostility of Americans against their former World War II foe has been interpreted by the Japanese as "an unfair, unreasonable, even racist reaction." Koppel asks rhetorically whether Japan also might be accussed of being a "racist nation" itself, in light of unflattering comments made about African Americans and Hispanics by Japanese officials.

But in one of those rare "television moments" that sometimes slip through the network cordon sanitaire during live broadcasts, native Hawaiian activist Haunani-Kay Trask gets right to the heart of the matter. Via a satellite link with Hawaii, Trask questions a panel of Japanese public relations flak-catchers about the displacement of native Hawaiians by the international tourist industry led by Japan. Because Trask's statement is so at odds with network standards of "objectivity," it bears quoting at length:

Given that Japan is now an economic superpower in the Pacific Islands and that your effort to colonize the Pacific Islands through golf courses and through resorts is now dispossessing the native peoples of the Pacific Islands-and I refer of course to my own people, native Hawaiians, but also to Chamorros, and to Fijians, and to Tahitians...what is your moral responsibility to the native people on the Pacific Islands that you are evicting from their lands, their farmlands, when you come here to put up golf courses and resorts?