#qtbipoc

This is Orientalism and Transphobia, and anti-EA racism.

Anon, I am so sorry that this is something you’re facing up against and you’re not alone in this in the slightest. This situation is deeply fucked up too, and I want you to know this is on them. This is on them and the society that has bred this mentality.

The hyperfeminisation and the hypersexualisation of BOTH Asian masculinity AND Asian femininity is not just an irritation or annoyance. It leads to dysphoria, situations that endanger our material safety, sexual harassment and sexual violence.

Yet all of the brutalisation of Asian bodies, the humiliation of Asian peoples are so normalised in a society because we have always been punching bags for other whites and even POC not belonging to our ethnicities.

Our predecessors frequently BUT NOT ALWAYS chose diplomacy and silence as survival mechanisms, and it has led to intergenerational consequences including society’s ignorance to our pain (if not outright assuming it doesn’t exist).

And at the same time we have constantly been subject to a specific form of racism that warps our struggles into “model minority myth” and being “insufficiently painful”, so even if we did call this shit out, many non-Asians and non-EA would not believe us.

"I come from a communal society where the individual is very closely tied to the group. We do not exist alone. We are part of something bigger, and there is this instinctive desire to contribute to the wholeness of that bigger thing, which anchors us. My family has been there for me in many selfless ways. I am aware enough to acknowledge that their actions are tinged with love and care, the desire to see me well; even if they have expressed those sentiments in questionable and sometimes hurtful ways. Two truths can co-exist. It’s this cognitive discordance that is usually at the base of most of our distress. It helps to know that people are complex beings, the product of their life experiences, with the capacity for kindness and cruelty. My family are not all saints or all devils. In all honesty, I cannot even predict how they would react if I were to come out to them. I like to think, nothing extreme or hurtful. Maybe a lot of preaching, but really, who can say? I am not ready for it, though. And that is alright. I am currently openly queer with only my close friends, and I do my sex writing under a pseudonym. I have a working relationship with family, and I am in a position where I can gently push back on anti-queer conversations or state my stance in silence. For the moment, this works. I am at peace with who I am. When my mental health permits, I am even joyful...I am learning to find joy in all that mess and let myself get lost in it."

Destiny Marshall's debut piece is a beautiful personal article that dives deep into the experience of radically claiming queerness and being joyful amongst community despite it not being safe to come out to them. This article describes the lived experience of many QTBIPOC who grapple with the reality of loving family and community even when expressing queerness around them isn’t possible or safe.