This video about Black children prefering white dolls makes me sad (and proud of the girl who filmed it). And that's partly because I have vivid memories of choosing dolls that were blond haired and blue eyed because that's what all the perfect little kids on the commercials looked like. All the girls at school who had long "corn silk" hair were also the ones praised for their beauty. Even the pictures I drew were of people who were white and that's not just because the "flesh" coloured crayon was white (by the way, FUCK YOU CRAYOLA for that). Hello parents, how did you not clue in on this?
I did internalize my status as inferior because I wasn't white. I wish I had at least grown up in Vancouver, 40 minutes west of that stupid suburb I that I did time in. Even if there weren't any yellow skinned people on TV at the time, I could've at least seen other yellow skinned people in real life other than my parents and the other token few in my school (many of whom were regularly humiliated in one way or another). If you're a parent thinking to move to a place or send your kid to a school where s/he's an ethnic minority, stop now. Don't do it. It doesn't matter if it means a big back yard or a great academic program of some sort. It will make your child miserable and bitter for a lifetime.
5 comments:
I'm grateful for growing up around other Asians--although sometimes I think it makes me... insensitive to some of the experiences of folks who did grow up as minorities.
I still always wrote stories where people had last names like Brown though.
but wouldn't that perpetuate the segregation of visible minorities? then there's the whole slippery slope thing - why even bother emigrating to a country where you're a visible minority? at least you had a few asians in your school. i lived in saskatchewan for 13 years - i was the token asian.
anonymous, it must've sucked to be THE token Asian. That is for damn sure. Thing is yeah having self segregated minority groups is not ideal but at the same time, who the hell wants to volunteer to be the sacrificial lamb? I felt like I was and didn't enjoy it. When there's even just a few Asians, it's not any more comfortable. The white kids expect that the Asian girl and Asian boy in the class to automatically be in love since it's a "natural" match and you have to deal with all that shit.
oh, and if it makes you feel better, my friend who is chinese-canadian from vancouver hated that too since most of the chinese were recent immigrants and everyone thought she didn't speak english and stuff like that.
Or there's the flip side where you've always been around a huge diversity of people and could be in a room of just latinos any time I wanted and I also work in the "hood" then I get to grad school (purposely not in ethnic studies cause I shouldnt have to to talk about intersections of ethnicity...) where I fucking have to explain my existence at all times. Okay yeah your experience is worse.
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