Author: luis.6

Text Review- My Experience as an Asian Transracial Adoptee & Survivor

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The text I chose that addresses intercultural encounters and examines identity is an episode from the “Chatty Broads” podcast called “My Experience as an Asian Transracial Adoptee & Survivor”. In this episode, Kailee, the guest, talks about how her identity has changed throughout her life and her journey with self-hatred rooted in racism. Kailee is Korean, but got adopted by white, American parents when she was just 4 months old. She lived in a predominantly white town, and even mentions that in her whole high school, there were only 3 other Asian girls and 1 Black girl. This had a severe impact on her identity. Kailee says that she refused to identify as Asian, and throughout her adolescence, verbally said she identified as White. She was offended by her parents’ attempt to teach her about Korean culture as a child.

Kailee faced an internal conflict: “I looked at my life through a white lens… and so I have a lot of insight from the oppressing side and also from the oppressed”. Since American culture is rooted in white supremacy, Kailee from a young age subconsciously viewed White Americans as the One, and minorities, specifically Asians, as the Other. As such, she did not want to be associated with them. As a teenager, she worked at Abercrombie, and she explains that she used to hate when Asians walked into the store. She would be annoyed when they had broken English and even says she felt disgust towards them. Kailee felt better about herself by thinking she was above the other Asians.

This identity crisis that Kailee faced while growing up was rooted in internalized racism. She hated the fact that she was Asian. Kailee mentions that one of her self-hatred mechanisms was to tell guys at a party that her name was sushi, just to get their attention. This podcast episode was extremely insightful and I recommend that everyone gives it a listen. Kailee is extremely vulnurable and honest about how she dealt with being Asian in a predominantly White community. I thought it was so eye-opening how she admits to having disgust for people from her own race and she was basically in denial over identity. The most important takeway from this is that everyone has some sort of internalized racism, just because of the way oiur society works. The first step is recognizing it and unpacking why you think that , and then educating yourself to think differently. This is the only way to be truly anti-racist.

Yo, is this Racist- Paula Luis, Connor Wolford, Cong Wei

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Yo is this Racist podcast 

Paula Luis: Okay, welcome to the “Yo, is this Racist” podcast. My name is Paula Luis and I’m going to be one of your hosts for this podcast.

Connor Wolford: My name is Connor Wolford. I’ll be another one of your hosts for this podcast.

Cong Wei: My name is Cong Wei and yeah i’m one of the group in the podcast.

Paula: Yeah and our goal for today’s podcast is to just kind of talk about racial discrimination and the law enforcement process and then just kind of talk about the systemic injustices we see in the United States of America, specifically against African Americans so Cong, if you want to take it away with that that’d be great.

Cong: Okay starting with the broad topic, I will talk about racial discrimination in the law enforcement process, which is what I wrote about in the diary entries. Okay, the injustice in the United States is concentrated in the foreign aspect. First, there are many unjust and wrong cases in the US judicial system and many innocent people have been serving sentences or even executed. One of the examples is the Ferguson case. So the US judicial system has unjustly protected criminals who should have been severely punished. In particular, many African Americans believe that the US judicial system showed that dirty police abused force in recent years, in many cases of shooting and killing African Americans. Most of the police officers involved were actually involved in protests and even riots. The Ferguson case had a great impact in August 2014. Brown, an 18 year old young man in Ferguson, was intercepted and searched by a workplace officer without a weapon. But the police involved in the case were exempt from persecution. Many people believe that white police officers do not need to be punished after shooting an African-American teenager. This is absolutely racial discrimination and this result triggered the large scale protests and demonstrations across the United States.

Paula: just going off of that and I think a really relevant case in today’s time is obviously you know the death of George Floyd 

Cong: Yeah the other case was Floyd at the end of 2020. Its about the murder of George Floyd, a black male who was shot in the United States by a white police officer just for one day shoplifting in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Then, riots of varying degrees broke out in major cities across the United States. Although most of the demonstrations and protests were nonviolent, discussion after the incident quickly shifted from police violence to violent disturbance. American right wing media Fox News characterized protesters as anarchists who want to overthrow the US Government after the riots broke out. Former President Trump also denounced the protesters as radical leftists. This revived the Black Lives Matter movement that had faded out of public view in the past two years. Black people’s fate was considered a civil rights movement, since its inception. Because its radical protests strategy was not widely accepted by mainstream society at the beginning, Black people faced another major social movement about Black civil rights after the civil rights movement in the 1960s. The black civil rights movement in the 1960s is generally regarded as a milestone in the use of non violent means of social movements. The movement ended the segregated system and the series of discriminatory Jim Crow Laws and it promoted the monitoring of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, thereby officially, making racial discrimination illegal from the legal level and Martin Luther King is another leader of the civil rights movement in the 1960s, who also became a world known leader of the civil rights.

Paula: yeah obviously like this past year, I think we can all agree that has been a critical moment in terms of, you know, racial issues being brought to light and now talking about you know the George Floyd death that occurred last summer. One thing that came to mind when I was reflecting on that was that you know, obviously, George Floyd was discriminated against for being a black man because black men in our society are deemed as intimidating for no apparent reason and then, as I thought about that I thought about something that Matt James, who was the first Black bachelor, said a few weeks ago, in an interview. He said that he feels an immense pressure every day in his life because he feels the need to constantly make sure that his personality and the way he talks has to make up for his intimidating appearance and stature which I thought was really interesting because I, as a white woman, don’t really have to worry about how I present myself to the world, but then we have cases where black men are just deemed always as intimidating and threatening. It’s leading to a lot of wrongful deaths, which is what we are seeing in these recent years.

Connor: yeah definitely we have seen more of an uprising in the Black Lives matter Movement that happened after the George Floyd incident. I think it really showcased more of what a lot of people weren’t seeing or realizing what was happening in our country, especially towards black men being discriminated against, especially in police brutality.

Paula: yeah it’s definitely something that’s always been happening, but in recent years, it has come to light and it’s just it’s very crazy to think about some of these things that specifically African American men have to endure just because of their appearance like murders are happening because of this. That interview that Matt James had really made me reflect on that.

Connor: yeah and going off of the Black Lives Matter movement that everybody heard about, and everything, I kind of wanted to just start off saying something about how something that people don’t necessarily hear about or think about when it comes to racism kind of an entry that I did myself. I don’t know if you guys heard on the news, but there was a Coca Cola company that was sharing a specific slideshow that I found very racist, but a lot of people wouldn’t recognize it as racism at the beginning, because it wasn’t against black people. The incident in question was they had training for certain employees. In the slideshow it informed them on “how to be less white” and they were specifically telling them to be “less arrogant” and to be “more humble”and  “to break with white solidarity” in the world today, especially after the Black Lives Matter movement. And I just kind of wanted to say, because a lot of people wouldn’t realize that as racism or think about it, because most of the time when you think of racism you wouldn’t necessarily think of whites being oppressed or anything in that sort, so I just kind of wanted to know what you guys thought about that.

Paula: yeah I mean it’s definitely something to think about because I would say, at least for myself, I won’t speak for anyone else, but for myself when I think about racism, especially in the US, I instantly think about racism against Black people, against African Americans but we keep forgetting there are so many other types of racism. Especially, even now in these recent weeks, with the increase in all these Asian hate crimes that are happening, those are like other types of racism, so we definitely have to keep an open mind towards any type of racial discrimination, so that’s that’s kind of my take on it.

 

Cong: So, I want to say the recent, you know, anti Asian racism has appeared and is increasingly happening. So I think racial discrimination is very bad and the best thing that we should do is to avoid it

Paula: Yeah and just going off of that, now that we’re talking about different types of racism. Another one of my diary entries was regarding the Meghan Markle interview with Oprah and how she really talked about all of the racial discrimination she faced in the Royal Family. Tthen there was one instance where she talked about how the Royal Family was concerned with the baby’s skin color, how dark it would be specifically, and then it made me think. I’m from Puerto Rico so i’m Latin American and I mean you think about how even us as minorities, you know Latin Americans, there’s still a lot of racism and colorism in all Latin American countries so it’s something you don’t really think about because usually you think that minorities have our eyes open to all that sort stuff and we’re against that, but at the same time, even in minorities there is racism and there is colorism and a lot of it comes from just our society, which is what we’re talking about when we’re talking about systemic injustices. Our society right now is just built in a way that is rooted in racism. Our legal structure, the way we run, so I think that’s just something to think about. Very interesting that just because you are a minority it doesn’t really exempt you from anything like I think we still all have the responsibility to be anti racist and educate ourselves and try to have solidarity with everyone and try to free ourselves from these biases that are rooted in our society. This is what we talk about when we talk about systemic injustices. It’s not just one instance, it’s everything that is rooted with these racist ideals.So that’s kind of my takeaway from all of these diary and entries, and all the topics we’ve been discussing over the past few weeks, and this class.

Connor: yeah I feel like I learned a lot more and it taught me to open my eyes to more different kinds of racism that I might not have been more aware of. Especially seeing everything in the news and not focusing more on like what’s happening close to home and kind of helping out with that kind of stuff, but it has opened my eyes and I saw some different things that I was kind of unaware of.

Paula: Definitely, and I think like going back to the our topic for this podcast which is racial discrimination in the law enforcement process it definitely has opened my eyes because, you would think that the law enforcement process is fair and it brings justice but over these past few years I’ve been realizing that that’s not always the case. So it’s just important to be aware of these types of things because that’s the first step is just being aware of it, so that we can actually act on it and just try to inspire change in our society. That’s kind of my takeaway from this assignment. So anyone else, do you have any concluding thoughts to say before we wrap up today’s podcast?

Connor: No, I think we covered a lot today and i’m actually really happy with what we’ve learned and talked about.

Paula: me too, definitely. Cong do you have anything else to say or do we do wrap up today’s podcast?

Cong:I want to say that just to link to today’s topic with the class. This case may be, just like the civil rights movement in history, like John Lewis graphic novel The March and something like Dr Martin Luther King’s The Letter from Birmingham jaw and these activities may improve civil rights for minorities. I think it’s also something like the One and the Other theory. 

Paula: yeah. Well Thank you everyone for tuning in to this podcast we hope you enjoyed it and we hope you learn something from it.

 

Diary of Systemic Injustices Showcase: Hollywood’s Colorism Problem

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What I will be analyzing in my diary of systemic injustices showcase is colorism, specifically in Hollywood and the media. Over the last decades, there have definitely been improvements in the inclusion of Black people in Hollywood productions and the overall implementation of diversity. We are seeing so many more people that represent different races and ethnicities on our screens. Additionally, we are finally starting to see productions highlighting Black people getting the recognition they deserve. However, Black representation is still facing limitations which are brought by Hollywood’s colorism problem. Colorism refers to the discrimination against individuals with a dark skin tone among the same racial group. The range of female blackness seen in movies and TV is typically much more light-skinned than the range of blackness seen in society, it is not an accurate depiction of reality. Zendaya addressed it herself, admitting the privilege she has had by being light-skinned compared to “her darker sisters and brothers” (Onyejiaka). 

Even though we are seeing more Black people in Hollywood, we typically see them fitting the traditional European beauty standards (light-skinned, slim, straight hair, classically attractive, etc). This made me reflect on how I see Black beauty. I realized that I definitely find myself resonating more with Black actresses that fit “conventional” beauty standards. I look for qualities that I as a white woman have, instead of looking for qualities that are unique for Black people. The actresses that fit that European beauty standard more are the ones I find myself following on social media, watching their movies, etc. Though I am not proud of this subconscious behavior, now that I have recognized it, I will work on recognizing dark-skinned actresses and appreciating their natural Black features. I will also look for movies that have this Black representation and show true inclusivity. 

It is important to note that Hollywood’s colorism problem is not just towards Black people, but towards all types of minorities, such as Latinos and Asian-Americans. In the following video, we see different women from different races talking about this issue. One remark that resonated with me was about the Latinx community. One of the women says that the only thing that connects all Latinos in the US is colonialism. For example, the language (Spanish) is given to us by our colonizer. SImilarly, our beauty standards are also influenced by our colonizer. This made me think about “Things Fall Apart”, and how, towards the end, we see how the African villagers become the subaltern and essentially become dominated by their European colonizers, and now they are forced to adapt to their way of life. Both in “Things Fall Apart” and in Hollywood, we see how people are held to traditional European standards, and anything that differs is not accepted.

Works Cited:
Onyejiaka, Tiffany. “We Need to Talk About Hollywood’s Colorism Problem.” Teen Vogue, www.teenvogue.com/story/hollywoods-colorism-problem-cant-be-ignored

 

Context Presentation: Persepolis (film)

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Black Friday

The Iranian Revolution was not something that occurred from one day to another. It was the result of a multitude of events that took place during many years. Though events that led to the fall of the Pahlavi dynasty can be seen since 1977, it officially started in 1978 with the fire in the Cinema Rex. In this presentation, I will be focusing on an incident that happened a few weeks after the fire, specifically on September 8, 1978. This incident is known as “Black Friday” because of all of the lives that were tragically lost that day: 100 people died and 205 were injured. This event was also significant because it led to the victory of the revolution 6 months later.

On September 7, 1978, the government declared martial law to prevent anti-regime protests. Martial law is the imposition of military control of normal civil functions or suspension of civil law. It is usually declared in response to an emergency where civil forces are overwhelmed. On September 8, however, people went to protest the Pahlavi dictatorship in southern Tehran, especially in Jaleh Square, without knowing that martial law had been declared the day before. Even though the people were protesting in a civil and peaceful way, the Shah military forces had no mercy.  The soldiers were instructed to shoot and kill these protestors, which is what they did.

This event is considered to have led to the abolition of Iran’s monarchy a few months later because it is thought to have marked the point of no return. Just the day after, on September 9, This massacre played a big role in radicalizing the protest movement, uniting the opposition to the Shah, and mobilizing the masses. Black Friday also led to many more protests over the following months. Finally, in January of 1979, the Shaw ultimately left Iran and fled to Egypt, which cleared the way for the Iranian Revolution led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

 

“Black Friday, a Bloody Day Which Led to the Victory of the Islamic Revolution.” Khamenei.ir, Khamenei.ir, 8 Sept. 2019, english.khamenei.ir/news/7020/Black-Friday-a-bloody-day-which-led-to-the-victory-of-the-Islamic    

Maloney, Suzanne, and Keian Razipour. “The Iranian Revolution-A Timeline of Events.” Brookings, Brookings, 7 Feb. 2019, www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2019/01/24/the-iranian-revolution-a-timeline-of-events/