I love Margaret Cho in small, sporadic bunches like this.
I’m too tired to make a disclaimer, I try to speak lightly but if I write too much anyway, nobody will read this, thus I will be safe from persecution via over-used phrases and poor spelling. Also no, I don't want to have a tired American Apparel argument. They're here, they're awkwardly gender insincere, do something about it somewhere else. :
I love stereotypes. Obviously there are positively and negatively charged ones, which doesn’t necessarily make them more acceptable, but ones that people make people try to interpret others. No matter how PC socially aware you may want to project yourself as, we all have biases and our own odd stereotypes to make approximations about the people around us because sometimes it’s monotonous how similar we all are. It’s like tailoring a suit, you block these large patterns from a bolt of wool fabric, cutting, pinning, sewing, altering to fit around this person you are trying to understand their unique qualities. This isn’t to say I condone the beliefs of the Westboro Baptist Church and all these defensive arguments I expect to be landed on me, but I’m saying that stereotypes aren't the treacherous villain we choose to typecast them as. They’re like Rodney Dangerfield, misunderstood.
That being said, now all the gross blegh-me stuff.
I am ethnically 1/2 Chinese, 3/8 Irish, 1/8 German. It seems boring, to me at least, but people ask me all. the. fucking. time.
What nationality are you? What are you? I mean, where do you come from?
First off, Americans (yes, specifically) need to learn the difference between ethnicity and nationality. Ethnicity, referring to the cultural ancestry of your lineage. Your race. This is often what you mean. Nationality is where you are from, so keep in mind you’re asking another American if they’re from America. And asking, “what are you?” is only going to get the default response of “human”; I am not a coat rack. That being said, sometimes it bugs me because it would be polite (or just kind) to wait to ask my name or engage me as a fellow bipedal mammal before playing the I’ve Got a Secret home game.
But I am understanding and not defensive, I promise. I understand your inquiry and even when you admit to me you were staring at me across the room trying to guess for a good 7 minutes “what you are”. And the typical guesses I get are: Chilean, Mexican, “Spanish”, Japanese, Korean, Portugese, Columbian and Thai. One of the main reasons I have to remember Spanish at all is because people will start speaking to me in straight up fluent Spanish to which my brain is processing “Izquierda? Wait, what’s ‘street’ again?”
Culture is a totally complex and individualistic variable that differs from person to person. And while I have parts of Asian American culture and Irish American that influence my offensive humor and overall really stale ethnic jokes, they’re very minor parts of who I am. I’m American for a reason, why do I need to sectionalize myself from the whole? I didn’t emigrate here and even if I did, other countries don’t need to assert their culture forcefully into everything. To generally sum up an Aziz Ansari monologue, do white people just go around high fiving each other for being in everything?
I hate having to fraction myself like I’m a walking pie chart, it projects onto me the worth as a fragmented person. I’m never Asian enough or Irish enough for someone. I remember a substitute teacher, who I had twice and actually had to have the exact conversation twice:
Teacher: “McCarthy…”
“Yes.”
“But that’s an Irish last name.”
“So it is.”
”How are you Irish? You can't be Irish.”
“Read the attendance sheet.”
To which followed he needed to know my whole ethnic life story when I hadn’t intended to foster any relationship, strained or otherwise, in the first place. Think about it. What have you gauged from me as a person with this knowledge before asking anything else about me? Do you know what I like to read? My political affiliation? My complex theories on Who’s The Boss?
Aside from pride in one’s heritage and cultural customs (which tend to be more Americanized after third generation or so), this separation we enforce ethnically can contribute to social issues and unfavorable, unalterable stereotypes.
One of my friends is from Hawaii originally and though I love him dearly, can also make sweeping generalizations that make me wince. He went on this jag about how Blasians or “Black Asians” are much more overtly sexualized than other Hapas (Asian mixed with other ethnic groups). I knew as a black person himself he wasn’t associated with other types of Hapa mixes. Not that I need to illustrate “my struggle” because a) I would not call it that unless I needed to get punched in the face and b) we all face adversity and misconceptions, but that was some bullshit. Frankly as a less stereotypically attractive Hapa in the conventional sense (hey man, gotta be honest), even I get people who hit on me purely for my genetic cocktail. One guy, no prior conversation, just wanted to tell me we would have attractive children. Oh thank you, I’m busy being 15 and not getting pregnant, but I’ll keep that proposition in mind.
During my gross core classes freshman year when I was learning about performance slash trying to just make things up and get through it so I can sleep, it popped up. Camila will remember I did this completely corny Yoko Ono inspired performance I eventually got forced to do at our Freshman show where I made a language translation tape in my own hackneyed Cantonese and Gaelic that used phrases friends and other people had said that had affected me. It played while I wrote on myself in the languages split into two halves of my body from 2 scrolls of text I had written behind me, until I smeared it all over myself into an ashy mess. Then I attempted to smear it on the faces of some unlucky audience members but it wouldn’t come off.
As the recording played of all these phrases that had haunted me, affixed themselves to me with statements as recent as a week before I started the project, people in the audience had laughed. Internally I felt dejected, it was awkward and I didn't understand it until I analyzed them from outside of myself. They actually were outlandish and ridiculous and they were funny because they were recognizably real and realized people were laughing with me; they related to their own experiences and possibly similar misconceptions they had perceived of others.
Photo by Mia MorrisI both loathe and love 17 year old me
I was really entrenched by it at that time, up until that point it had taken over my identity as being something else, some parts of an incomplete whole. And all of the Hapas I have ever known always talk about how fucking Asian they are, it dominates them in a very cloying desperation to be different, to be Asian. I really don’t care that you can use chopsticks, you have won the battle, you are indeed more Asian than I. Gift bag will be sent in the mail. I’m not saying I’m disengaged from my history, but if you’re limited to that as the only interesting part about you, then you’re not a particularly interesting person.
Also (white) people who try to teach me how to be Asian or prove how more in tune they are with Eastern culture: Fuck you. I have even less to prove to you than anyone else.
To you I’m a white person who’s just exotic enough to be of interest.
I always run out of venom and strife by this point and want a hot chocolate by this point. I'm not as good at holding grudges as I wish to be; they're so much work.
Essentially, we already have enough boring subcultures to differentiate each other. It's okay to fit into them and to stand out from them, just don't define yourself because you like blue m & m's, love Roswell or think Radiohead is an extremely underrated band (because they're not). If it's on Netflix Instant Watch, it's probably not obscure or mysterious and is indeed watched by several million people. It's dire to certainly be yourself and not follow what everyone else is doing like the Disney movies tell you just as it is to connect to people on an insignificant and deeper level.
This isn't to say I'm beyond it either, sarcasm is about unresolved manifestations bursting forth and it isn't something to be resolved or concluded. I'm going to dwell on it at least once a day or so in a repetitive, irritating cycle. But I'm not overwhelmed by it, it's just one of those neuroses people have, better than daddy issues right?
Also as a side note which probably unravels my whole belabored entry.
Asians: Get different stereotype jokes. We need something other than the riffs about tea, math homework and having sex while unable to pronounce the letter "L". I'm thinking polka dots, we're like fucking rabid polka dot Minnie Mouse maniacs with Nikon cameras. Just a suggestion.
I would need a book to write this right but I didn't even have the steam to finish two pages about things that shape my insecurities and self worth. But this is a blog, I don't get paid enough or at all, maaaan.
