The inappropriately named Unity Clothing Association has waged an ugly, offensive war against an urban fashions outfit called Visionz.

Reason: Visionz is owned by a Korean immigrant.

“Billy the Kid” Griffin is a popular black comedian who Visionz originally signed to an endorsement deal.

By early July, “Billy the Kid” Griffin was beginning to feel like a hunted man.

A stranger had approached his wife, noticing that she was wearing a T-shirt with a Visionz logo and asked her: “You like shrimp-fried rice?”

His 15-year-old daughter had come home in tears, inconsolable from a community picnic with nasty fliers with his name on them. He had stopped answering his cell phone altogether because everyone wanted to know the same thing: Why are you doing this to us?

But when the Unity Clothing Association brought the stand-up comedian to the table at a recent meeting in Largo, he remained defiant about his work promoting the Visionz line of urban sportswear. Yes, it was manufactured by Jung Won Kang, a Korean American businessman who was currently at odds with the association of local independent clothing store owners. The group considered him public enemy number one, something of a usurper — a carpetbagger with designs on their multimillion-dollar trade in high-end T-shirts and warm-up gear. But hey, Griffin’s family had to eat.

The next weekend at the Visionz store at Iverson Mall in Prince George’s County, Griffin says, there was an ugly standoff between his supporters and someone passing out the association’s fliers. It could have easily led to bloodshed. Griffin decided something had to give.

“I can’t look over my shoulders over no clothes,” he says. “I’m not going to jail over Visionz and it’s not mine. I don’t need nobody killing nobody over Visionz, and it’s not mine.”

The WaPo ran one of the flyers Unity’s circuating throughout the local black community. Unfortunately, they didn’t put it online. It’s awful. It features a cartoonish Korean businessman, complete with glasses, buck teeth, and a bowl haircut. Across the bottom reads: “Visionz — Shrimp Fried Rice of clothing.” A thought bubble emerging from the Korean caricature reads: “I took your nail salons, corners [sic] stores, dry cleaners & now I want your urban clothing stores and i can do it with Billy the Kid!”

(If any of you know where it’s availablae online, let me know.)

That deafening silence you hear would be [the absence of] Jesse Jackson, Kweisi Mfume and their respective entourages, storming D.C. to decry Unity’s use of hateful stereotypes to oppress a minority-owned business.

C’mon, fellas. Where you at?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 10th, 2004 at 9:57 pm by Radley Balko and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.