Born Asian

I was flipping channels last week and came upon this episode of "Good Times" in which Michael gets suspended because he calls George Washington a racist for having slaves and he goes on about how school doesn't teach him the kind of history he wants to learn. You can watch it here for the main storyline (4:05-8:15).

The most interesting line to me was this:

Michael: Mama, I’m ready to take my punishment. I knew when I was born Black, life wasn’t gonna be easy.
Florida: When you were born, you didn’t know you were Black.

Which was one of those revelation moments to me. When I was born, I didn't know I was Asian. I grew up being taught what it means to be Asian, from my family, from my friends, my community, school, society. I wasn't "born Asian," Asian is merely a category from the government. And I am still constantly learning/shifting what it means to be "Asian" and "American."

Oh another note, this was just my second episode of "Good Times" that I've seen, but if a lot of the episodes deals w/ issues like these, I definitely want to catch the rest of the series, especially to watch the Michael character, who is on his way to be quite the future activist. He goes to the library to learn about all the history stuff that his textbooks don't teach him. If only all high schoolers did this. But, isn't that supposed to be our education's job?