May might be Asian Heritage Month, but there hasn't been a lot to celebrate about the Asian North American male image lately.

The most prominent Asian-male name in the media at the moment is that of disturbed loner student Seung-Hui Cho, who carried out the Virginia Tech school massacre. Racist sentiments that arose from the tragedy inadvertently exposed a lack of other Asian-male images. Had there been more multifaceted representations of Asian North American men in the media–rather than just as foreigners, enemies, and geeks–perhaps the actions of one individual would have been recognized as simply that.

Local entrepreneur Phil Chow monitors the representation of Asians in the media as a hobby. Since the '90s, he has dutifully searched for and collected articles about Asians that have appeared in print and on the Internet.

In a phone interview, Chow says he became interested in the subject because he grew up as the only Asian at his school in Victoria in the '60s. He never saw himself reflected in the media, and when he did, he felt that "you come across as a fool. Plus, the kids would get their material to make fun of me from the media." They called him Tokyo Joe and mocked his "squinty eyes and buckteeth" and "ching-chong" language. (In December 2006 on The View, Rosie O'Donnell imitated the Chinese language in the same way and didn't issue an apology.)

"At one point," Chow says, "I was ashamed and basically hated my own skin colour."

One day, he found an article in the San Francisco Chronicle about how stereotypes affect interracial dating patterns. "It talked about the stereotypes of Asian men not being visible and portrayed as gangsters or geeks, or sexist and oppressive. And it was just like, 'Whoa, this article is validating what I've always felt.'

"There were those stereotypes in the media–the martial artist [Gedde Watanabe as the geeky foreign-exchange student] in Sixteen Candles.”¦In contrast, whenever I saw an Asian female on TV or the movies, she was paired up with a white guy. It makes you feel kinda unwanted.”¦It makes you feel unattractive."

While the number of Asian students attending B.C. schools has mushroomed since Chow's day, the media has been slow to reflect this changing reality.

The saying "two steps forward, one step back" certainly rings true here. Leading Asian men in action films, such as Jet Li and Jackie Chan, have given way to Asian American stars in a range of lead roles: John Cho as stoner Korean American investment banker Harold Lee in Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle; Daniel Dae Kim as one half of a Korean couple on Lost; and Masi Oka as Hiro, the nerdy Japanese salaryman with superpowers on Heroes. Nonetheless, Chow points out, "I do find it kinda funny that of all the major medical TV shows, there's never been an Asian male lead doctor, even though there are a lot of medical students [in real life] that are Asian males."

What's more, these aren't the actors who are likely to give any of the Hollywood A-list actors like Matthew McConaughey or George Clooney a run for their money. They lack the deciding factor of true Hollywood marketability: the looks.

While there are numerous hot leading-male actors who are African American and Latino, no Asian American male sex symbol has filled the void since the anomaly of Bruce Lee, who died in 1973. Male stars from Asia such as Chow Yun-Fat and Ken Watanabe have not garnered the same kind of hype that female counterpart Zhang Ziyi has. Survivor winner Yul Kwon, who Chow points out says he went on the show to help change the image of Asian men, was included in People's 2006 Sexiest Man Alive issue. Nevertheless, who has been a bigger Asian American male household name in recent years? American Idol reject William Hung, the Asian American Sambo.

In fact, the portrayal of Asian American women as the love interest in interracial relationships has become so ubiquitous it's a cliché. Steph Song's role in Everything's Gone Green, which is set in Vancouver, reflects the social reality here; in the Straight's own February 2007 sex survey, in response to the question "If you married outside your race, which would you prefer?" 29.8 percent of Vancouver men answered Asian, while only 9.7 percent of Vancouver women chose Asian men. Yet when there are so many other examples on-screen of Asian women in interracial relationships–Gong Li (Miami Vice), Lucy Liu (Lucky Number Slevin), Sandra Oh (Grey's Anatomy), Ming-Na Wen (ER)–is art imitating life or is life imitating art?

How often is an Asian male portrayed in an interracial relationship? Almost never. Although the CBC TV miniseries Dragon Boys featured Asian male lead characters with Caucasian women, the series focused on a negative aspect of the community: Asian organized crime.

Yet with China rising as both an economic and cultural force, and with the growth of Asian Canadian diasporas, studios and networks choose to ignore the opportunity to integrate Asian North American men at their own peril.