I feel most of this blog has been focussed on my opinions and experiences with internalized racism so I’ve asked some people to contribute their own perspectives on internalized racism. The feedback I received was overwhelming and all of the insightful posts have made me consider issues I’ve never thought about before. Each of the responses I received were unique, and goes to show how internalized racism can manifest itself in such different ways.
I hope these stories resonates as much with you as they did with me:
I feel like internalized racism (and the process of unlearning it) is quintessential to the experience of being diasporic. I spent a lot of years perfecting my English because I used to be really ashamed of my accent, and even now I feel self-conscious sometimes when I speak because the fear of “slipping up” is always in the back of my mind. I say this with a certain level of resentment, but I guess I “pass” as someone who was born in an English-speaking environment now. This “achievement” came after years of denying my own ancestry and lying compulsively about being born in Canada and consciously Not associating myself with Chinese culture, saying things like, “I don’t think I really belong in China” and “they do things differently there” and “I’m more Canadian than anything else” until they became true. I used to hate Chinese as a language and I refused to speak it even when it was the most convenient because I was so ashamed of it and of myself. Nowadays I speak and write perfectly in English and I think Chinese is the most beautiful language I’ve ever heard or read but I can no longer communicate with my parents in complete sentences. Internalized racism is a self-fulfilling prophecy in this way. You convince yourself day after day that you don’t have an ancestry and one day you realize you really don’t. Not anymore.
-Coco Zhou
In the quiet suburb where I grew up, white was normal. Christian was normal. White picket fences and wholesome blond families were normal. Dark skin was not. My mixed race family was quite the cause for gossip. I remember listening to our tottering old mailwoman describe me as the “little Indian girl” to our neighbours. From a very young age, I understood that I was different. Each year on Christmas Eve, the majority of my neighbourhood would crowd into the local church for a special service. The adults would light candles and sing and the children would dress up as angels, twirling around in a horribly un-practiced dance routine. When I heard about the celebration from some friends I was instantly in awe. This was Christmas, and I wanted to be a part of the magic. My fairly agnostic parents appeased me, and agreed to attend the Christmas Eve service. When the call came for the young girls in the audience to come don the flowing white robes and golden halos I was quivering with excitement. However, as I looked around at the other girls dressed in white and gold, I realized each one of them was perfectly fair skinned. I stuck out horribly, the only dark skinned angel. I felt my stupid too-dark skin burn up, and hid beneath my thick, too-dark hair. I stumbled through the dance and returned to my seat, bursting with shame. It was obvious to me that I didn’t fit in. The next year I returned to the service, but ostracized myself from the angel dance. Angels were white, I reasoned. They were blond and blue-eyed. I sat in the pew as the fair-skinned girls in their pretty white dresses flew by, glowing halos framing their beautiful blond hair.
-Anonymous
For me, I never experienced internalized racism myself even though I lived in other country for half of my life. But I see a lot of my friends and other children who are moving into Hong Kong at very young age not thinking Korean is important to learn. Mainly because of the parents who prioritize the English education more than Korean education. I do understand that the parents are doing this so that they could adjust to new life and language and get good grades in school. But for me, it was different case since I HAD to speak Korean in order to communicated with parents and to help them. So whenever I see people not considering Korean as important language to speak; by speaking only in English even though they are asked questions in Korean or trying to communicated less in Korean even with their families. For my age, my friends were less about it but it got more serious as the younger ones came to Hong Kong in their early age. I heard a lot of complains from my art teacher in Hong Kong that current young students going abroad has lack of knowledge in language of Korea and History of Korea. I do understand why it is like that but still I felt it was quite ridiculous for “Koreans” to not feel anything toward their own countries “history” or “language”. On my perspective, maybe because I prefer to speak Korean often than any other languages except it is essential. One of the other things that I experience is standard beauty of “Asianess”. My mother when she meets neighbours, she sometimes jokingly(?) say how I need plastic surgery to make my eyes bigger and raise my nose to look more beautiful. Personally, I don’t think I am that pretty but still satisfied with how I look never considered putting knife on my face. Also, I see a lot of friends actually wanting plastic surgery and even considering them due to their unsatisfied look (possibly from social media which spread what is beautiful). I felt like it is also ridiculous since people are only valuing you according to your “outer beauty” instead of “inner beauty”. So I feel weird about it.
– Yumi Chung
I think one typical internalized racism I heard of is when police prioritize foreigner’s report on crimes such as stolen items before that of the locals. The Chinese “netizens” (people who comment online) made fun of this situation by posting advertisement online to recruit foreigners to help Chinese report stolen items so the police process the reports faster.
– Sirapatsorn Ruayrungruang
Like many other first-generation immigrants who arrived at Canada at a young age, I’ve internalized racism and I’m still working on purging it from my system. I suspect that internalized racism, especially when espoused by people of colour themselves, is more insidious, common and harmful than the sort of racism that is blatant and more easily recognizable. I have participated in stereotyping. When my Chinese-Canadian classmates did well in math, it was simply a case of “Asians are good at math”. When they didn’t, I saw the failure as an exception to the rule, an aberration. I applied the same unfair expectation to myself, which unhelpfully added to the distress and shame I experienced during the times I didn’t do so well at math myself. Another instance of internalized racism was the presumed superiority of an area where there were many white families to one where there were many families of colour. This even affected perceptions of high schools. A good environment was code for “many white students”, and that was more desirable than one with many Asian students. I also remember the times when I refused to speak Chinese in public, or acknowledge that I could, even when it was obvious that it make communication infinitely easier for the other person. I didn’t want to be Chinese during those moments, so I feigned an air of superiority and instead of being kind, I chose to be mean. Although I’ve never ventured into the territory of outright hatred for my heritage, I’ve watched a few friends dip a toe into those waters. They became eager to expunge any trace of Chinese-ness from their person and their life. The rejection of their culture, which was also my culture, really stung, as if it were a criticism of me. That was painful to witness.To recount every incident of internalized racism that I’ve personally been witness to would probably fill a phone book.– Susan Ding
