And Again

So I was shopping at Marshalls yesterday and this guy started to make small talk with me. Here is how our conversation continued:

Him (H): Were you born here?
Me (M): Yes.
H: Your English is very good!
M: -_- Thanks.
H: What are your other languages?
M: I don't speak any other languages. (just to f- with him)
H: I've always wanted to learn Chinese or Vietnamese.
M: Me too, me too.

At that point I was like, ugh, do not want to deal, so I walked to the cash registers. But while I was standing in line, I started to think, maybe I should have said something. I'm not really used to telling off someone but I while I was waiting, I grew more and more angry, and then I imagined him saying that stuff to someone else. Plus I really didn't want to forget the interaction and just chalk it up to ignorance, as if it's not worth my breath to say anything, because if everyone reacted to something racist in that manner, then those people would go on thinking that's all ok when it isn't.

So, after I paid, I noticed he was in line to pay. I stood off to the side as I waited for him to finish.

H: Back for more?
(yes, I'm back for more racism)
He was smiling as he said that, but as I started talking, his smile left his face.
M: I just wanted to say that I was offended that you assumed just because I have an Asian face that I would not know English. I think that what you said was racist and I hope you won't make generalizations like that to someone else.

And then I stormed off. And as I was walking away, my whole body was just filled with adrenaline because I had never done something like that so publicly. Hopefully my message got through to him and he'll think twice before saying those things to someone else.

Some responses from UCSD students who are API:

To Asian Americans at UCSD:

Perhaps the one thing that frustrates and disheartens me almost as much as the idiots the threw the racist party, said the racial slur, and hung the noose is the apathy— antagonism, even— Asian Americans have towards the BSU and their allies. I can’t seem to wrap around my mind why this is.

Why don’t you care?

Is it because when you look around you and see that the majority of this campus is Asian and you think our people have risen so far that you don’t realize that it was not so long ago that we were discriminated against we are still being discriminated against (should you have any doubt I refer you here and here)? Are your noses so engrossed in your biology or economics textbooks that you don’t see those crying around you and are numb to the pain of others? Or is it because we have forgotten, in our collective memory, the debt of gratitude that we have owed and still owe to the Black community? Maybe you just don’t understand why people are offended, then I urge you to read the multiple letters from faculty and students explaining why before you speak; ignorance can be forgiven — to a certain extent — but stupidity cannot.

Perhaps many of you do see the racism and discrimination around you but are you so concerned about graduating and getting a good job without causing any trouble that you are willing to let it happen?

Before you call the BSU and their allies a bunch of “selfish whiners” or “irrational” understand that they are not doing this for themselves; they’ve been through this institution and have already been victims of its racism. They are doing it so their brothers, sisters, sons, and daughters don’t have to go through it too. They are doing it so your brothers, sisters, sons, and daughters don’t have to go through it. Ask yourself the last thing you’ve done for social justice and the betterment of others before you open your mouth to criticize.

They are not asking much from you. They are not asking for your rights to be taken away from you so they can have theirs. They are simply asking to hold their hand in their time of need and whisper to them that you’ll be by their side as they have been by yours.

-Duc Tran

-----

Why? Because...

please understand that what you feel may not be what others may be feeling. please understand that the participating students, faculty, and community members are not acting irrationally! please understand that maybe you are questioning the actions of BSU and MEChA because you don’t understand the entire story. there is a reason why they are fighting for themselves, and for me, for you, and for our future.

what we are fighting for is not silence, passivity, or the slap to those who have stirred these events. we are fighting for justice, for understanding, for solidarity, for the future of our society and our world to put an end to hateful actions that personally threaten the mind, body, and soul of people of color and of people who are mistreated.

when i was in high school, i was apathetic to issues in my community that dealt with race and education. i saw a race riot happen in my own eyes by the violence of police targeting Black, Asian, Latino students and faculty at my school. my english teacher spoke to us to act out against why we didn’t have the quality of education that most of the other San Francisco schools were privileged to have. at that time, i didn’t see or feel the consequences. now that i am here at a public institution for higher education, i now understand the consequences because i believe i am educated to understand.

as a woman of color, i am fighting for my family who have struggled with racism when they immigrated to America, so that they can give me the privileged life that i am blessed with. i am fighting for my friends and peers, who i have personally felt racism affect them in all different ways, whether it is verbal or active. i am fighting for my classmates who’s trust and comfort in the UCSD community was lost when no progressive action was taken to educate their students or to prevent an action like hanging a noose at our symbolic geisel library occur. i am fighting for myself because i know that what i personally feel is anger, confusion, sadness, and disappointment. i am fighting because i have been educated by Thurgood Marshall College’s DOC program, by my experience at a high school placed in a struggling environment in one of the most diverse and rich cities in the country. i am fighting because i UNDERSTAND and FEEL the struggles, the voiceless emotions, the harmful consequences that will happen if i ignore what is happening now. if i don’t act now, i will regret it in the future, as i do about my apathy during my years in high school.

i see some of my peers, my chinese brother and sisters, my filipino brothers and sisters, my college mates question the actions of BSU, MEChA, KP, people of color, of mixed sexualities, of MIXED IDENTITIES.

if you want to know, why don’t you come up to us and ASK us why we are doing what we are doing? Don’t ask us to be quiet if you don’t even understand the story, the issues, the problems, THE STRUGGLE. please understand that maybe you are questioning our actions because you just don’t understand our story.

-rroni/bex

Solidarity

With all the racist acts that have been happening on my campus, I just have to keep reminding myself that there is a large support system out there for us and we have truth and right on our side.

Keep fighting the good fight.

http://stopracismucsd.wordpress.com/

Surgery

Coming across this post by one of my monolid role models reminded me of my recent trip to Las Vegas with my godparents. Note to self: do not travel with family if I can help it. Being around criticizing Asian adults 24/7 gets emotionally tiring. They pretty much hit upon every aspect of my life from my looks to my social life to my major. One of the things they said that really infuriated me was when they asked if I would get eyelid surgery, as if encouraging me to do so. I played a lot of scenes in my head of how I would have retaliated with a biting remark. But to sum up the main point: There's absolutely nothing wrong with my beautiful monolids, so why would I change a thing?

Sellout

If I, an Asian American womyn, date a white guy, does that make me a "sellout"? I hate when Asian American men say statements like these, as if to imply that I'm following some fairytale, White Knight fantasy and I have no independent thoughts of my own. When Asian men say this, I think it's just their own insecurity talking.

Racial State of Emergency

If one Googled "UCSD" and "Compton Cookout," you'll know what's been going on at my university for the past week, if you haven't heard already. Today, in my Filipino American Literature class, my professor dedicated the entire class time to discussing what happened and how students felt about it. I had a lot of thoughts going around in my head at the time, but didn't voice them out loud. Later, I sent an e-mail to my professor to tell him my thoughts.

At this moment, I feel really compressed, like a spring. I'm having a hard time working it all out in my head.

Here's what I wrote in the e-mail:
I wanted to thank you for holding a discussion about the party in class today. I really appreciated it when some of my professors last quarter dedicated some class time to talking about the tuition increase, especially because a lot of students were not aware of the context behind it all. I think as students, we tend to see ourselves living in an academic vacuum where outside events don't necessarily affect what's going on in the classroom. But that's not true because we are a part of a community on campus and the social affects the academic and vise versa.

I was actually surprised by some of the comments my peers made today about
the situation being blown out of proportion. Someone mentioned how there
have been other racially themed parties in the past that didn't get as
much negative attention so why should this one. But the problem with this
statement as I see it is that the people who are throwing these parties
come from a place of (usually white) privilege. They can have fun for a
few hours role playing another racial group but at the end of the night,
they have the ability to return to their safe, comfortable lives. If our
campus were predominately black, there's no way a party like this would
have happened. And that just shows the power discourse of the majority
believing that the minority is small enough to overcome and that it
doesn't have the strength to fight back. To say that this has happened and
will happen again in the future so there's no point in fighting it is only
to allow for such a cycle to continue.

So to answer the question you posed at the end of class: yes, I think it
is incredibly important to care about what's going on, because parties
like these could have been directed at any minority, which is dangerous
because hate speech and stereotype representation can lead to violence and
hate crimes. Vincent Chin is a clear example of this.
____________________________________________________

And this is what the Ethnic Studies department at my school wrote:
Ethnic Studies Faculty and Student Response to UCSD Campus Crisis Precipitated by the Event Dubbed the “Compton Cookout”

Asian American Films I've Seen

This is just a running list of films so I can keep track of API-related ones that I've seen.

American Revolutionary: The Evolution of Grace Lee Boggs (2013)
Oh, Saigon
New Year Baby
The Cats of Mirikitani
My America...Or Honk if You Love Buddha
a.k.a. Don Bonus
Chan is Missing
Daughter From Danang
The Slanted Screen
Slaying the Dragon
Red Doors
Second Class Veterans
First Person Plural
Fall of the I-Hotel
Picturing Oriental Girls
Children of Invention
Kimjongilia
Another America
On Strike! Ethnic Studies: 1969-1999
Better Luck Tomorrow
The Debut
Seeking Asian Female (2012)
Shanghai Kiss
Slaying the Dragon: Reloaded
Who Killed Vincent Chin? (1987) Watch on YouTube
Vincent Who? (2009) Watch on YouTube
Pass or Fail in Cambodia Town via America By The Numbers
Breathin': The Eddy Zheng Story
Twinsters (2015)
Touch (2011)

(updated 01/20/18)

Asian Eyes

Maybelline places all Asian eyes into one category:

Lump summing Asian Eyes

Don't ignore us, Maybelline

Race & the Media

Two interesting takes on race that I've come upon on the Internet this week.

When Will White People Stop Making Movies Like "Avatar"?

Kim Kardashian, a vanity fair skinned beauty