Tommy Ngo's "LOVE" Belt Caused Protesting at Santa Ana

Picture from Quí Nguyễn/CTV Người Việt

Almost 100 people came to protest singer Tommy Ngo outside of the Orange County Performing Arts Pavilion in Santa Ana on Sunday July 29, 2007 after Tommy Ngo was spotted wearing a red belt with the word LOVE and a star in the center of the "O" on the poster cover of "Nhung Tieng Hat va Nu Cuoi 5." According to some people, it is a resembling of the red flag with a yellow star of communists in Vietnam. One of the people there, Phuc Nguyen voiced out about the matter by criticizing Tommy Ngo for not knowing better of how sensitive the Vietnamese community is with communists. Also she said that Tommy Ngo’s wife well known singer Lynda Trang Dai was already in the news for doing shows in Vietnam. Other people who came to see the show ended up leaving after seeing the big protesting scene. Some tried to return their tickets but was refused. Many people felt threatened by the protestants, and it showed when they came out from the show with their face down trying to avoid the angry crowd. The protesting crowd yelled at people who went to see the show and called them out as followers of Viet Cong and even yelled at a five-year-old girl. The story just about ended when the show’s creator Andy Thanh came to greet the crowd with a few sorry words to explain that he knew nothing and he was only trying to do business and not supporting Viet Cong. As for the story about Tommy Ngo’s belt, it was just a misunderstanding because the star in the center of the "O" is not yellow but white so that does not reflect on the red flag and yellow star. Furthermore he said that if the star looked yellow on the poster, it was because of a misprint problem and so he had someone bought out the belt to show everyone.


Picture from Quí Nguyễn/CTV Người Việt

My Thoughts:
I understand that the poster is misleading but nevertheless there are better way to resolve the frustrating without protesting. I find this story so annoying because the people who protested are causing problems that are unnecessary. I don’t think Tommy Ngo wore the belt on purpose to bring trouble to him and or the show. Also I doubt that the company who made the belt cared whether or not the belt symbolized a flag from Vietnam. It is all too ridiculous! I said this before but I will say again that people are only trying to make a living, but some others just have to cause trouble whether it is on purpose or not. They have too much time and must be really bored to pay attention to a little detail on a poster. This kind of protesting not only disrupted a perfect show but for those innocent people who only wanted a relaxing time, they were ripped of the chance. Take a look at the picture above of a woman who took her time out to come and held up the “right flag”. The way she looked and in her eyes, do you see any fighting spirit? To me the picture well represented the whole mess of a few numbers causing trouble and others following blindly. One elder person called out to the show’s creators to not stab into the wounds of others. No one is doing that; only those people who protested bought the trouble upon themselves. Even worse was that the protestants picked on a 5 year old girl who had nothing to do with it; she was brought along by her mother and yet they accused Viet Cong for wrongdoing to innocent lives…



On another note, people from the younger generation that do not know much about any of the communist things and wanted to only go see the show will be put down. They will be annoyed and confused to why they cannot go see a music show normally. It is not only making the younger generation want to stay far away from the community and especially trying to learn more about the Vietnam War. I don’t think any of protestants’ behaviors reflect anything good on the Vietnamese community beside that they like to use numbers of people as a way to bully others and especially businesses. From the poster it looked like the red flag but if these people were reasonable people with some sense of knowledge, they would not act on such impulse and would resolve the problem behind the scene instead of rallying people to cause trouble. They are no less than a bunch of people at the marketplace cursing and yelling rudely. I truly feel sad for these people. And I’m starting to think that this is all Vietnamese people know of, and or do in order to get what they want. This is really embarrassing each and every time that the Vietnamese community decided to protest or boycott. We all know about the Vietnam War and how tragic it is and for many of us we cannot fully understand what others had gone through but that does not become a reason for people to constantly take advantage of the idea and the tragic event. There is a time when we need to move on from history and focus more on our present life. Obsessing over the past cannot change much for the future.

Check out the video below, and listen to what the people who showed up said. It really supports what I said because the protestant do not seem serious about the protesting but more like let’s do what others do, buy some screen time, and have fun kind of thing. These people say so loudly on video protesting against communism in Vietnam and yet they go to Vietnam every year. Lastly what they are doing here in America is not in any way hurting or putting an end to communism in Vietnam but they are hurting the Vietnamese community overseas. The Viet Cong are probably laughing at us for fighting against each other. And As far as I know this could all be another set up between business competitors. Also was it a coincident that Trinh Hoi was the MC? What are your thoughts?