So having had some more days to reflect on Invisible Monsters and digest it some more, I feel a bit of a need to digree more on why the book was so powerful and how I managed to relate to it despite its most assuredly insane characters. Who, naturally, are simultaneously, in many regards sane. But that is another topic.
It's the third quote from the last post that really struck me. In the beginning of my first year of college, we did a few activities based on diversity sort of as due course - things any respectable college must have in some shape or form for all their freshman. In any case, we did two activities and got a rather boring, rather unengaging lecture (which, in my opinion, is one of the deepest flaws in diversity intiatives in most places, not just college campuses). The first activity was one in which you wrote down your reactions to words, like "Blonde" or "Black" or "Queer". This can be a good activity and I've participated in a well-done one, but this was not well done. That is also another story. What I'm really trying to get at is the second activity which was an identity one. On seven or so notecards we wrote down the word(s) that described us for a number of differeny categories that included gender, sexual orientation, age, race, ethnicity, social class, among others. Then we ranked each identity card based on its importance to us from 1 to 7. Next, we got rid of all the 1s (least important cards) and had to order the other cards based on their importance to us. Basically what that means is we had to pick what word that described us from those categories was the largest facet of our identities. Eek.
Ok, I realize I am rambling a bit, but I'm going to keep going anyways, so the choice is yours. Keep reading, or stop. I don't particularly care either way. So back to the story, you probably don't know this about me but I suffer from serious indecision. So I'm sitting in a chair trying to choose a card for this rather inane seeming activity and I find myself shuffling back and forth between three particular cards. One says "Asian", one says "Chinese", and the last one says, "Female". So that's it huh? Those are the three. But which is first? Which is most important? And I'm sitting there going how the hell am I supposed to be able to do this? Cram my whole life and whole life experience into a notecard with my rather neat handwriting spelling out these 5, 6, and 7 letter words. I'm just so tired of being labeled. But of course since nobody really cared about the activity (sad, I know, if only...) I just sucked it up and picked one. And I cheated a little. You see, I'd done the activity before with my orientation group and had picked "Female" that time, so this time, if my memory serves me correctly, I chose "Chinese". If I'd done it again, I'd probably have picked "Asian".
Because here's what I've realized and what I started realizing again or more or I'm not sure what the right word there is, but in any case, I'm so sick of being stereotyped based on how I look. All of those things you can tell based on a photograph of me (Ok, admittedly some people think I'm Korean though I don't actually know how they get there...). "You're so Asian." "You're only saying that cuz you're a girl." Here's the thing though, no one says I do something because I'm Chinese. Maybe that's why I chose Chinese over Asian the second time. (Of course, maybe it was just random, but I'm trying to make a point here). I don't know if people notice this but Asia is HUGE. And I know that now, "Asian" is pretty much synonymnous with "East Asian" but that's kinda harsh on the rest of the Asians. Everyone seems to know what being Asian means for me, and whether this is true or not, I can actually say that not everyone knows what it means to me that I'm Chinese, or rather Chinese-American. I'm not just being a nitpick, it's an important distinction. But again, another story. So here's my big problem. Everyone looks at me and goes Asian, female, maybe they throw in short just for kicks. But what does that mean? I can guess what they think it means off of the stereotypes but can you honestly bottle me up into two or three words?? You didn't even get to ethnicity, or personality, and I know that you just assumed I was straight.
Stop it. (This isn't just a message to you, it's one to me too.) Stop assigning words to people like you know them just by looking.
I mean, if that were true then we'd all be so damn similar I think we'd hate each other with more hate than (sadly) already exists in the world. And sure, sterotypes exist for a reason, like I don't already know that. I was good at math in high school; I play piano; hell, I even play violin. But I just don't want you to look at me and go check Asian, check piano, check math, check female, check feminist. Even if it
is true, can't you find it our for yourself and stop labeling me? I know it might mean that I won't fit into a nice little box in your brain and you won't fit into your respective one in mine, but I'll argue with you any day that it'll be totally worth it.
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*Edit: Just realized that for all my talk of being Chinese, I did name the blog Tickle Me
Asian. So what does that say about me? Still preaching to myself. And old habits die hard. And society has way too much power over my life still.
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