i find myself frustrated in a world in which even my family is infected with racism, in a home in which i rebel inwardly and occasionally outwardly at throwaway comments that betray its frightening, unthinking, hideous shadow. it makes me want to vomit.
'you talk as if you would never say anything like that,' said one of my younger sisters when i asked her why she felt justified in condemning an entire race of people by asserting that the behaviour of a girl she doesn't like very much is characteristic of all people of her nationality.
i looked at her in disbelief.
'because i never would.'
i don't even notice the nationalities of the people around me. i am interested in my friends' lineage because multiculturalism is one of the genuinely beautiful aspects of australian society. but i never think of them as defined by what they look like. strangers around me are people, not faces coloured and proportioned by a particular part of the world or by a particular branch of humanity.
the race riots that broke out last week in the shire numbed me. i pretended, if not that it was happening, that it didn't represent the manifestation of an undeniable undercurrent of abhorrent racism in australian culture. i downplayed it in my mind, shifted it to the dusty archives of my holiday head.
but it's there. it's in my family. it's at my work. it simmers on trains and on school playgrounds, and now it has spilled out, dark and oily, staining beaches and suburbs. one of my friends, who is half greek, had blonde put in her hair in an effort to look more 'aussie.' another friend told me of an indian colleague who experienced persecution. it's crazy because it's about race but it's not about race. it doesn't matter that india and greece and lebanon and israel are completely distinct entities unto themselves. racism is discrimination, but it doesn't discriminate. or think. it just looks and its eyes burn with a hatred boiled up with stereotypes and simplifications and a sense of superiority. its nose is turned up but it doesn't smell the sickly perfume polluting the air. and what does matter is that some people have coffee-coloured skin or different-shaped noses.
so now ethnic people endeavour to look a little less ethnic. and anglo-saxon people try to look less anglo-saxon. what is 'aussie'? i always cringe when someone i know says, for example, that their father is thai, and their mother is 'aussie.' 'oh,' i often enquire, 'is your mum aboriginal?' because if their father is not defined as 'aussie' because he is not white and their mother is defined as 'aussie' because she is, then there, right there, it seeps into everyday conversation. and i know, i know, most people don't mean to say that their thai father is any less australian than their anglo-saxon mother. but in principle such a statement declares that the australian identity is owned by the fair in colour and not shaped by the beautiful multiculturality that is represented in some form by the very offspring of a thai dad and an anglo mum.
racism is man's gravest threat to man - the maximum of hatred for a minimum of reason. abraham joshua heschel
'you talk as if you would never say anything like that,' said one of my younger sisters when i asked her why she felt justified in condemning an entire race of people by asserting that the behaviour of a girl she doesn't like very much is characteristic of all people of her nationality.
i looked at her in disbelief.
'because i never would.'
i don't even notice the nationalities of the people around me. i am interested in my friends' lineage because multiculturalism is one of the genuinely beautiful aspects of australian society. but i never think of them as defined by what they look like. strangers around me are people, not faces coloured and proportioned by a particular part of the world or by a particular branch of humanity.
the race riots that broke out last week in the shire numbed me. i pretended, if not that it was happening, that it didn't represent the manifestation of an undeniable undercurrent of abhorrent racism in australian culture. i downplayed it in my mind, shifted it to the dusty archives of my holiday head.
but it's there. it's in my family. it's at my work. it simmers on trains and on school playgrounds, and now it has spilled out, dark and oily, staining beaches and suburbs. one of my friends, who is half greek, had blonde put in her hair in an effort to look more 'aussie.' another friend told me of an indian colleague who experienced persecution. it's crazy because it's about race but it's not about race. it doesn't matter that india and greece and lebanon and israel are completely distinct entities unto themselves. racism is discrimination, but it doesn't discriminate. or think. it just looks and its eyes burn with a hatred boiled up with stereotypes and simplifications and a sense of superiority. its nose is turned up but it doesn't smell the sickly perfume polluting the air. and what does matter is that some people have coffee-coloured skin or different-shaped noses.
so now ethnic people endeavour to look a little less ethnic. and anglo-saxon people try to look less anglo-saxon. what is 'aussie'? i always cringe when someone i know says, for example, that their father is thai, and their mother is 'aussie.' 'oh,' i often enquire, 'is your mum aboriginal?' because if their father is not defined as 'aussie' because he is not white and their mother is defined as 'aussie' because she is, then there, right there, it seeps into everyday conversation. and i know, i know, most people don't mean to say that their thai father is any less australian than their anglo-saxon mother. but in principle such a statement declares that the australian identity is owned by the fair in colour and not shaped by the beautiful multiculturality that is represented in some form by the very offspring of a thai dad and an anglo mum.
racism is man's gravest threat to man - the maximum of hatred for a minimum of reason. abraham joshua heschel
alix exploded at 7:56 PM
0 comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home