Remember, EM POC only!
Sleepy as hell again, comrades, but I might as well get this posted up before I go ahead and rest.
That aside, let’s get those weekly EM POC vibes going!
Remember, EM POC only!
Sleepy as hell again, comrades, but I might as well get this posted up before I go ahead and rest.
That aside, let’s get those weekly EM POC vibes going!
Okay I need to rant about this godawful short story that one of my profs had us discuss today.
It’s called “To the New World” and it’s by Ryka Aoki. It’s really short, if you want to read it; I got through it in less than ten minutes. But you probably don’t want to read it, because it’s bad, lol. The gist of it is that it’s about a Vietnamese-American trans woman celebrating her dead grandma’s birthday and running into her racist white terf “friend”.
This story makes it seem like one can’t be vegan and Asian at the same time. The main character, Millie, has this moment where she heats up a non-vegan food to celebrate her grandma’s birthday and then thinks about how those foods are intrinsically connected to her childhood memories, while the racist white terf character, Sierra, talks a lot about veganism. So as an Asian vegan — am I supposed to draw the conclusion that going vegan is against my culture, or that it’s white terf shit, or something? lol
This story’s ending draws an allegorical connection between Millie’s grandmother escaping the Vietnam war to come to Amerikkka, and being trans. It talks about Amerikkka in glowing terms, i.e. “there’s cheap produce! omg! this is amazing” So am I supposed to draw the conclusion that uhh being trans is cool because it’s just like immigrating to the imperialist settler-colony that commits genocide around the world and at home for the sake of maintaining it’s hegemony?
I think the story is trying to end on a triumphant note, but said triumphant note includes a line where Millie thinks to herself that she should ask Sierra out? I mean personally I would not ask out a racist white terf, but I guess that’s just me.
There are completely unnecessary lines about East Asian people in it for like half the pages. Yes they’re said by Sierra and we’re not supposed to like her, but when I told my best friend some of the lines in this story he said that it felt like my professor had assigned me a microaggression to read, lol.
This is just pettiness, but I really disliked the writing style. The prose was just awkward and there were some really poorly placed similes.
Okay, first of all, for the story in particular, YIKES, WHAT THE FUCK!?
Second of all, as a vegan of color, I’ve always found the painting of veganism as “racist” and “colonialist” or even simply “white” super inconsiderate in that respect as well.
Aside from the fact that it’s obviously false, if I take a sentiment like “Veganism is white and racist!” at face value, what’s effectively being communicated is that I’m going against my race, culture, and people just by being vegan. It’s saying that if I’d rather be a vegan than be a carnist, then it’s inherently impossible for me to not be shameful about my blackness.
I’ve always found that incredibly toxic of non-vegan leftists to do. It’s especially frustrating when done by white carnists, but of course, it still makes my blood boil when done by carnists of color as well.
I’ve struggled with enough internalized racism by listening to reactionary white queers screech about how they believe that POC have higher rates of queerphobia; I sure as hell don’t want that same cycle repeated but for veganism instead.