thank u for being ok with my craziness @isnt
What radicalized you?
When I was 21, I was in an emotionally abusive relationship. My ex was a self-loathing white guy who consumed Japanese culture as an escape from his reality. I wasn’t Japanese, but I was Asian, smaller, and I was an insecure people-pleaser. The only thing that mattered to me then was that someone chose me.
I didn’t have the language to articulate why I felt so icky and anxious but I set my needs aside to keep his unpredictable mood as stable as I could for as long as I could, but the verbal attacks and the manipulative tactics were inevitable. Eventually my instincts told me if I stayed in this relationship, he would get physically violent. I tried to break up with him gently but he started bawling and threatened to kill himself.
On a warm summer day, he took me to a secluded beach. We were supposed to have a nice time but he noticed I was a bit off. I tried my best to squash my feelings but he pried, so I gently complied, doing my absolute best to navigate the minefield covered in eggshells to explain my insecurities. But again, he exploded and we got into a short argument before he stormed off and left me stranded.
I gathered myself and walked to find the nearest bus stop but he returned and started heckling me from his car, honking his horn to humiliate me in public, though no one was around. I told him to leave me alone but he kept trying to get me into his car, which all my instincts told me not to do. When he pulled over and got out of his car I warned him not to touch me or I would call the police. As I walked away, he grabbed me from behind, pinning my arms to my side. I stomped on his feet as hard as I could and as soon as I freed myself, I grabbed him by the throat and screamed in his face not to touch me. I had never felt such heightened emotions and couldn’t recognize myself.
“Hi, I’m not sure if this is an emergency, but I’m in a domestic situation and I need help so things don’t escalate.” As I said this into the phone, my ex silently sat on the curb with his head in his hands. I stayed on with the dispatcher until the officers arrived. They questioned us separately. The one who spoke with me said, “He stranded you? That was low. You did the right thing to call. When he grabbed you, that was assault.” But he didn’t hurt me. He just grabbed me. Maybe he was trying to hug me? I probably hurt him more than he hurt me. As I made excuses for him, the officer told me I communicated boundaries that he crossed and even by touching me I was legally assaulted, and they were obligated to arrest him. I went to the station, made a statement and took a bus home, completely rattled.
The court ordered a no-contact rule so that was my last interaction with my ex, but he told all our mutual friends that I was vindictive and I called the cops to spite him. And for a while I believed that I was a terrible, toxic person, and really immature for letting things get so out of hand. As I grieved, I spent my days on Tumblr. A friend/roommate from art school (whose aesthetic I admired) had an account where she collected photos and portraits of the androgynous, the unusual, and Asian men. Maybe in retrospect it was a bit exoticizing, but mostly it was from a place of admiration—a different perspective from how my ex saw Asian people. For the first time, I saw Asian men (and through transitive property, myself) through a new lens, which planted a radical seed in my mind that I could be desirable.
The thought of not even be considered attractive by someone just because of my race was so completely—what I was doing. That’s what I was doing. I had internalized that racism and I unconsciously never considered Asian men. I was so ashamed of myself. But then I took another radical step: compassion. I told myself it wasn’t my fault; my idea of beauty was colonized by images and movies, and the faces I saw every day. There are oppressive systems at play that were responsible for my conditioning and I intuitively understood that I had a lot of “unlearning” to do.
That was when I started photographing myself. It was a way to build up my self-esteem. If people liked my picture, I could maybe post more. And they did, so I did. After hiding in the closet for two decades around growing up around white people, I had completely disconnected sexuality from my identity. So I got introspective and dove deep to catch all my blind spots. As it turns out, you internalize A LOT of racism, homophobia, and misogyny when you live on autopilot. “Not all men are like that. I’m not like that.” “I prefer to date outside of my race, it’s just a preference.” “I’m not gay, I don’t like labels.”—things I have said.
The internet in 2012-2013 was a completely different place. Memes went from being a term coined by Richard Dawkins in a dense book on genetics to visual jokes that spread like wildfire on social media. Discourse on social issues wasn’t common but I was excited to share all my aha-revelations. I quickly learned that talking about race made people uncomfortable. And angry. Followers unfollowed. Friends and coworkers unfriended me left and right. And not just anyone but REALLY nice people everyone liked. But even though the social anxiety metastasized into grief, I carried on for years; how could I not? How exactly does one un-think their thoughts and revert back to ignorance?
In 2012, Trayvon Martin was fatally shot, and the handling of his case sparked outrage and started a national conversation. In 2014, Michael Brown’s murder sparked a riot. This is nothing new, of course, but because of where we were as a culture, people started recording these traumatic interactions with racists civilians and police, and they spread like wildfire alongside the memes.
What frustrates me to no end is that while I was inadvertently ostracized for speaking uncomfortable truths, the same apathetic people who tried to shut me up started posting “fUcK rAciSm” after the 2016 elections when they were suddenly forced to choose a side, a choice made out of social convenience over morality, maybe? WELL WELL WELL, HOW THE TURN TABLES. But at least they’re talking. It can only mean that having a social conscience is mainstream.
And yes, I feel validated as hell but that’s about my own ego. If I ever lost a loved one to systemic violence, I could only hope the world knows about it, talks about it, and cares. I would hope I don’t get silenced and gaslit for speaking. This is why it’s important to talk, to listen, to protest, volunteer, donate, etc. Don’t come at me with that “actions speak louder than words,” “you’re yelling in an echo chamber” BS. We are where we are today as a culture because more people—people like me—are doing the messy work to unlearn, re-learn, and talk.
That’s what radicalized me. What radicalized you?
“Shaming is one of the deepest tools of imperialist, white supremacist, capitalist patriarchy because shame produces trauma and trauma often produces paralysis.“ -Bell Hooks
