#romanipen

It finally happened. Romani discourse got me to delete my facebook. It wasn’t even the “fauxmani police” you guys constantly bemoan either, it was YOU.

First, hello. I am a transgender person. Sorry I didn’t herald this information with a huge banner on my profile pic or make dozens of tiktoks about it, but I am. There is a good chance I’ve been out and medically transitioning longer than you’ve known you had Roma heritage. But while we’re on the topic of allies attempting to educate people on their own marginalization like we don’t already know better than you ever will -

I believe the words used were “we need to adapt, or we will die”.........first off who is we? Roma got by for centuries without you. Without all of us. Nobody needs your advice. This may hurt your feelings, but people who are reconnecting to Romani culture for any reason need to remember their place within it. It doesn’t matter why any of us grew up outside the culture. The fact is that we DID, and if we’re not coming from a place of learning, we’re abusing the work done by the people responsible for everything we know about being Romani.

When people who were raised Romani ask you to keep traditions, it’s because they are the only truly tangible thing that connects us as a culture anymore. You also say repeatedly that we are not a monolith, and that’s quite true. Which is why nobody is asking you to keep every single tradition you know to be practiced by Romani. But refusing to listen to those in the culture who have gone out of their way to help you reconnect and learn? What do you want to get out of being Romani, exactly? Permission to put it in your bio on social media? An opportunity to condescend to people? Pretty scarves? Absolution of your white guilt? That’s called a costume.

As I mentioned previously, I’m a trans person. I was out to my Roma family and faced my share of rejection for it. Do you think I don’t know about conservative values within the culture? Do you really think I’m advocating for excommunication or repression when I suggest you should hold some traditions? Or did it really not occur to you that maybe I was referring to the way you wash your dishes or something equally innocuous?

Where the hell do you get off being raised English and criticizing Romani who are mistrustful of outsiders, exactly? Why does this continually need to be explained to you? Why do you think centuries of violent history magically don’t apply to you just because you have heritage? Why do you think there’s something about you that distinguishes you from anyone who could be lying about even having heritage at all? There’s not a radar and none of us are special. Sorry if that hurts your feelings. It’s not fair, but it’s the truth.

And don’t bring me more shit about your therapists and behaviors and thriving. I don’t care, and the argument doesn’t do what you think it does. You know there are laws right now that affect our people worldwide. Your therapists don’t know how many lashes you took for speaking Romanes. You have not BEEN HERE for the centuries of slaughter. You don’t have a right to criticize certain behaviors. You look like the xenophobe. Don’t even attempt to discuss anti-lgbtq+, sexist or xenophobic ideals within romanipen unless you plan to immediately follow up with the fact that colonialism and white supremacy were what injected them there in the first place. Then take a look at your role as a white settler within your own country and ask yourself if you should really be throwing stones.

Those of us reconnecting have very limited tools for education, and the ones we possess came to us through extreme risk for the ones that left them to us. They sacrificed time and safety so we could learn. They faced potential expulsion for the sake of educating us. Where is your respect for that effort? Where is the acknowledgement that everything we know about our Romani selves we know because of them? Telling people “I’m Romani” and comparing ourselves to photos of women on google doesn’t do a fucking thing for them or the culture.

Like, go to fucking college. Congregate with unmarried men on your period. Go be fucking gay. Shave your head and wear pants and literally do whatever but quit trashing the entire concept of upholding any semblance of Romani tradition as a points system that you are losing or some anti-individuality steamroller. Act remotely grateful that Roma put themselves at risk to teach you anything at all. Accept that you have learning to do.

Many of you claim that Israel “is racist, they mistreat Palestinians because their race, they are the greatest breacher of human rights in the world” and then when someone asks why you demonize Israel but you don’t criticize the many many more countries that actually have infringed on human rights, you fall silent. North Korea aside, let’s focus on another massive breach of human rights, the Pojramos of Rromani in Europe. The Rromani perished in a manner quite similar to the Jewish people during the Holocaust during the same period.

Ok you might say, well that was in the past. However, the suffering of Rromani populations persists even to today. Post- Pojramos, the Rromani received an extremely small amount of reparations from Germany. Still today, Rromani are highly persecuted throughout Europe. Many of whom live on the fringes of society due to persecution, racism, and the lasting scars of the Pojramos. Many live in poverty, and the employment and literacy rates are very low. I know in the Czech republic there was an instance of a hospital or doctor sterilizing Rromani women. The stereotypes of Rroma culture persist in Europe, and it is an absolute shame that the Rromani are basically ignored by both the media and the international community. 

As a Jewish person, I feel a connection with the Rromani community, as both of our ethnic groups have undergone the Spanish Inquisition, the horrors of Nazi Germany, and the alienation and stereotypes pinned on us by European society.