Amy Hosotsuji

Baby back, tender back, take it back. Soft back. Hard back, broken back back where we started back. Black back.

Bent and stretched - 2016

Um

Thx Nate Gerber for sharing this with me!

fongtranpoetry:

DON’T BE AN ACTIVIST

Don’t be that dirty A word: Activist Like a viral disease It always starts in college took that sociology or ethnic studies class joined that outreach recruitment center for underrepresented youth of color you wanted to hold it down for the struggle at the rally for undocumented student rights and then it happens you become an activist the symptoms will kick in fast and heavy

Your parents will tell you to get a real job Fox news will tell you you’re unpatriotic Your friends will call you too sensitive Your family will call you too liberal Your community will call you too communist

You’ll work at a non-profit organization cause you said you want to make a difference cause you certainly aren’t making any money even though your official job title is just program coordinator You’re really also the organization’s social media director youth outreach manager office technician staff personnel therapist grant writer program assessment evaluator and in-house cultural competency trainer You’ll wonder how many top ramen will it take before you give up on your close to impoverished 50hrs a week $800 Americorps monthly living stipend You will buy extra lip balm for all the future ass kissing you will do to potential grantees and funders all in the name of community …and to keep you job …cause your grant contract ends by the 2017 fiscal cycle way to stick to the man You’ll feel guilty for listening main stream hip-hop and that your favorite song is Tyga’s Rack City even though that song represents everything that you stand against misogyny, male patriarchy the commodification hypersexualization and dehumanization of womyn that beat is still so DAMN good rack city, rack rack city I mean Sac City, Sac City…ssstitch

Don’t be an activist because you’ll just be angry angry because you learned that everything evil in this world is rooted from colonialism, white patriarchy and capitalism

Paulo Friere called it when they made the matrix once become conscious, you can never go back and with liberation comes burden that burden sits heavy like asthma

Ignorance must really be bliss because it’s exhausting looking through Facebook newsfeed without saying “gooddammit this shit is fucked up” without seeing white people throw peace signs and make squinty eyes in pictures with the #asianpose without having another “conversation” with your well-intentioned but racist ass friend who commented on your scholarly post on “microaggressions in the classrooms” without seeing another fraternity throw another cinco de drinko “cross the border” party without seeing another newscaster blame the victim and defend the rapist without another black body being shot by another gunman named officer

and feeling like you can never do anything ironically enough you try to brush it off so you can procrastinate on your 8 page sociology paper on institutionalized racism in the California prison system

It will hurt it will hurt because it will come from your own people they tell you, you too cocky that you’re an opportunistic that left South Sacramento for a job at UC Davis and that you a sell out and so you buy into their thinking and they said you were never REALLY down and so you tell yourself that you were never REALLy down and they called you out for saying something problematic so you think of yourself as a problem you didn’t get enough petition signatures you didn’t stay long enough at the town hall meetings you didn’t mentor enough youth you weren’t there for your community when they needed it most and so you questions everything that you are everything that you stand for you hit this point of confusion of what it all means and you succumb to self-doubt and burn out you get tired of being tired and you tell yourself “I just want to be normal just like everyone else”

That heavy anxiety sitting on your shoulders makes you want to scratch your skin off but then you realize normal normal is that bystrander effect that MNC chokehold that stops you from raising your voice and forces you to turn you head away from injustice and face down at iphones screens Normal is making it easier for you to keep up with the Kardashians than to keep up with the sake of humanity Normal is that basic shit! Normal is that stuff that makes people cynical cause being cynical is always easier than critical Normal is making society a status quota number of soldiers pulled out the dowe jones down unemployment up climate change doesn’t exist Racist republicans still do and so we confuse normal for this substance that cynicism made ugly validation, acceptance, love

and you finally realize that it was never about you and it wasn’t about them but it was about everybody It was about humanness - Ubuntu a justice that institutions are incapable of achieving so you’ve been forced to dream you check your privilege for low paychecks to implement your social justice be the monkey wrench in the machine

activism is not a sprint it is a lifelong marathon and your most crucial asset in your run is the not the power in your legs but the strength of your heart so you must protect it You must pace to it to give it resiliency you will be your biggest critic but the minute you look far too much in your own steps you will lose vision so you must keep your head upright never lose sight of your finish line

this world does not need normal it needs relentless unafraid pursuit of compassion every action or inaction disrupts or perpetuates that power of oppression but you choose to upset the set up disrupt the corrupt stand against the standardization hunger strike for the hungry