Ever wished you were 100% white/asian ?

[hapalicious]

Ever been influenced by other people to wish you were either 100% caucasian or asian ?
Coz when i was lil' and lived in france, there was this japanese girl in my class who couldn t speak a word of French, we were the only 2 asian girls and because my friends knew me to be "half caucasian" they didn t mind using racist terms to qualify my Japanese friend. i don t think they ever realised it affected me, but at the time i looked like i was 100% Asian...weird....now i definitely look EA but at the time , looking way more Asian than my big sis and my peers i really wanted to be 100% white...not that i wanted to take part in their racist conversation, it s just that being friends w/them and them using racist terms (even if they didn t mean it, they were too little to understand and they must have heard it from their parents...they didn t necessarily approved) i didn t really feel like being part of their group....even if they considered me as part of the group.... and i felt really bad for my Japanese friend, because once we were by ourselves and this boy who didn t know us ( not knowing me...it implies he had no idea i was "half caucasain") said something racist and i felt like i didn t belong to either group....
Then i moved to Asia and met a lot of amazing EA, and i felt so good about myself ! ;D
When we moved back to France i went to this international school, and even if nothing was said, in my first 2 yrs at this school i felt the same anemosity towards Asian people that i had felt when i was little... and some caucasian peers would say stupid stuff like : oh...u re good in maths...u re obviously asian....i was probably just imagining it, but remembering how my French friends used to treat Asian people when i was little, i started making friends w/ Asian people only....and then again i started wishing i were 100% Asian...
any thoughts to share

[urba]

....

[Ian86]

Yeah... You start telling yourself that all your problems would be solved if you were a 100%.

Been there done that.

Very frustrating.

But you cant control how your race. You can control how you think about it though.

[snow2day4me]

ian86 said:

Yeah... You start telling yourself that all your problems would be solved if you were a 100%.

You start telling yourself that because on some level, it's true. Some problems WOULD be cured if the person afflicted with the condition wasn't born that way.

A guy with no legs might not have his problems of finding a decent job go away if he had legs, but I'm willing to bet whatever problems he has, all else being equal, would be MUCH easier to deal with if he *did* have legs. Why do you fear losing your legs (or other parts of your body)? Because you know your life quality would degrade if anything should happen to them. Obviously, some things are "better" than others in certain contexts.

Black people might not have all their problems solved by being white. But A LOT of their problems would simply go away if they could choose to be white. Thus, it seems perfectly plausible to me that while it cannot happen now, that a lot of problems would not exist had they not been black. It's for this reason blacks complain because the prejudice they face IS REAL.

Similarly, some of the issues we face being of mixed-race are very real and affect us in many different ways. It affects me personally since I will never be part of either "camp." Whites hardly EVER look at me as "one of them" and Asians don't either. Although looking more Asian causes me to be grouped with Asians as a whole, even though I am culturally more American. Even in France, when friends talk about "the American guy" they don't think/look at me. I'm not "American" enough because I don't look White. I am unable to identify either way, and quite honestly, it sucks.

I hear what you're saying. It seems to affect us all and were there a simple cure, I'm sure all of us would have already taken it.

Life sucks sometimes. What pisses me off the most is right now, there's not a damn thing we can do about it. In a few decades/centuries, it will change, but I'll be dead then, so it won't affect me much.

ian86 said:

But you cant control how your race. You can control how you think about it though.

Very true. But humans can only take so much from how others treat them. Humans are naturally inclined to want to fit in a group. It offered a reproductive advantage and thus humans who felt they should be part of a clan or group survived more than those who didn't. We all feel that way because we all evolved from the people who had those feelings. And when we do not "fit" in a particular group, we feel bad.

Sure, you can try to control how you think about it, but there are obvious practical limits. If you were the only black kid in your class with an even distribution of other kids (White/Asian/etc) you would think it's odd that you were the only one black, but if the other kids didn't make a big deal of it, you'd probably not think about it much. However, if every other kid started calling you a "black nigger" and laughed at you every day making fun of your hair, lips, and facial feature, after a few days, you'd probably feel like s***. No matter how much you "try to control how you think about it," what *others* do and think greatly affects how we are.

Hapalicious has been affected because *others* have thought certain things she didn't agree with. If it was an isolated case, it would probably be easy for her to forget it, but if it is institutionalized where she is facing it every day, as it seems was the case while she was in France, it would be a harder thing for her to "control." Only Hapalicious knows exactly where HER tolerance level is, but for most people, it doesn't seem like the tolerance level people have in general is as high as the general discrimination we see coming from others, which is why we complain about it so much.

[helles]

No, don't think it has ever crossed my mind either.

[picket]

Yes and no, but the opposite - sort of. LOL! I wish my mom were actually really white, instead of just thinking she is white. Yes, really, truly thinking she is white. It would be funny except it is so sad. And she thinks we kids are 1/2 white. Though we aren't but it some ways of course we are. I don't think anyone can understand.

[hapalicious]

Well, Weilee...i don t actually understand : Is your mother Asian and does she think she s white ? no kidding : i really wish i could understand .... the whole wish i were white/wish i were asian thing is over for me now...i m actually glad i m EA ...but i never gave your status a thought : asian wishing you were EA ? am i right ? or did i misunderstand ? hey pal, if the site was created it was probably in order for EA to communicate w/ other EA who could relate....maybe we can ( wink !) !

[spats]

Ever wished you were 100% white/asian ?

Yup, but that thought really depends on where I am currently (eg. In Japan I wish to look full Jap, in Aus, full Aus)
Basically, I just want to be able to fit in.

[picket]

hapalicious said:

Well, Weilee...i don t actually understand : Is your mother Asian and does she think she s white ? no kidding : i really wish i could understand .... the whole wish i were white/wish i were asian thing is over for me now...i m actually glad i m EA ...but i never gave your status a thought : asian wishing you were EA ? am i right ? or did i misunderstand ? hey pal, if the site was created it was probably in order for EA to communicate w/ other EA who could relate....maybe we can ( wink !) !

Thank you hapalicious for trying to understand. I don't bother trying to explain to people but maybe someone out there (other than my siblings) can understand. I guess trying to understand is the most important!!! LOL!!

Our dad says that our mom was really a very normal Chinese girl, even after moving to Los Angeles, until she had her first kid (my brother). She started acting strange, but like a lot of Asian families, we just kept it under the table. Going to a psychiatrist was SO out of the question. Even my dad today seems to hate the idea. It started with her when other (white) people would make some comments about her being Chinese. She would look at them and say "I'm not Chinese!" That would usually just shut the person up and my dad just assumed it was her was of telling them they were stupid. Slowly though things did change in her behavior that made him realize that there was something more going on. She slowly started taking down pictures of her family and replacing them with pictures of white movie stars and politicians. She even bought some picture frames with pictures of random white people in them (like they come in the store) and just leaving them there. I remember those pictures coming home from when I was about five. Talk about strange, LOL! She would refer to them as "Cousin Janie" and we kids thought she was just being funny and creative but my dad knew something was really wrong. Over time it got worse and worse and then a few years later we realized that she really thought she was white. It was some kind of delusion brought on by a base mental illness and the pressures of the white-dominated society that looked down upon her (the family therapist thinks). I don't know what it is but we cannot talk to her about it without her getting really agitated and sad. So we all made a decision (with the therapist) to just "go with it" instead of trying to force her to see things our way (the reality way). Her family doesn't understand at all but they say things like "we knew she was crazy" and "she was the crazy one" and honestly they have shunned us and don't seem to care that she doesn't consider them her family. My dad's side of the family goes along with it when they come over but some of the kids make fun of her by asking if she was related to Thomas Jefferson (or Britney Spears, ha ha) and she usually makes something up. Anyway in her mind she is white and we are half-white. So that's a long way to explain how I have a "eurasian mind" but that's how I was raised. My mom used to tell me that kids might tease me for being half-Chinese, uh, OK mom! LOL! She would tell us about Europe and how our ancestors came from there and to be proud, etc. After a while all that stuff kind of sunk in. For me, anyway. My brother and sister don't see it that way and to tell the truth they are worried that I might have gotten my mom's crazy gene! LOL! I hope not!!! Well, I told you it would be hard to understand and probably nobody does, but that's OK too. I figured a while ago that it might be a lonely mindset and just though I would check in here to see if maybe someone did understand or that there is someone who would be able to relate to me one way or another.

[Ian86]

^ Whoa... like go see a doctor. There is a such a thing as a crazy gene. It runs around in my family.

[hapalicious]

Not sure about the crazy gene stuff but it seems like you must have had a complicated childhood...actually it s pretty sad.....i can t relate on a personnal level, because no such thing ever hapened to me, but i think i understand what your feelings are like...and truthfully, it seems pretty normal to me that you feel eurasian because you had to grow up pretending to be EA in front of your mother....even if at school you were being your chinese self the fact that your mother saw you as EA probably gave you ..i dunno how to put it...maybe i guess a split personality because the people whom you were closest with didn t see you the same way..... people would look at you and see different things....some a chinese boy with a funny mother....and your mother...this EA kid ....Well, i don t know what to say....your story really touched me....and even if you re not actually EA you ve been partially raised as if you were....so i guess it comes as a given that you can identify yourself with both EA, and asians.... the only thing that s actually different from most EAs is that they can identify themselves as (obviously) EAs, asians and caucasians..... so thanks for sharing that story....it s given me something to think about ....just make sure you don t tell your kids you re EA and live by it .... anyways, hope you ll be able to discover who and what you truly are....hope i can help in the process We re there for you pal....and by the way, i m sorry you had to go under so much "pressure" (by this i mean denying what you really were) as a kid....

[spats]

Wow weilee, even though you're not genetically EA, I think you can be classified as one. You totally belong in this community.

[hapalicious]

agreed ! ^^

[picket]

Aw thanks! I really didn't think anyone would understand. Now I have to post in the "Do Men Cry" thread. Waaahhhh!!! J/K LOLZ!!!

[wilyam]

I've got one word for your predicament Hapalicious ---- bigotry. Recognize it, avoid it, hate it, overcome it. That is what will make you a better person. Its not easy but deal with it, take care.