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"oh, what happened to mixed-race thoughts parts i & ii???" shut up.

originally drafted (but never published) 30 january 2022.

so, it's not a secret online that i'm mixed-race: half white, half taiwanese.

my white family has lived in america for generations, and while we have records in our home which trace our ancestry back to medieval europe, it's been so long since their culture has had any noticeable effect on my family that i don't feel the need to claim it as my own. it's there for me if i wanted to learn, and it's part of my history, but "white american" suits me just fine when it comes to describing that part of my heritage.

on the other hand, my mother is a taiwanese immigrant, and she first met my father while he was living in taiwan (as a christian missionary— but let's not talk about that right now), a thing he did for eight and a half years. i grew up in an area full of chinese and other east/southeast asian immigrants; there was never the same pressure to assimilate to white american culture. as a result, i grew up very culturally asian, which is (one of) the reasons why i specify taiwan when i elaborate on being mixed.

but, while i've been told growing up that i have a bit more of my mother's face in my appearance, i don't look the way (americans, at least) think "asian" looks like: curly hair that never stops fluffing up, large eyes and long lashes, something about the nose. yet, even at my palest, i do not pass as white. people who know i'm mixed i often tell asian first, but for some reason it is alway a surprise i am white, too.

people do not look at me and think i am asian. or if they do, certainly not taiwanese or even anything similar. the kids at work were surprised every time i spoke to them in chinese for the first time: i do not look as if i would understand.

but i am. and i do.

but, there is something about growing up and learning abt racial inequality that has made being mixed… odd, to put a word down. yes, i am aware of america's history of white oppressors, and yes, i am keenly aware of the privileges i had growing up bc i had a parent who was born and raised and formally educated here.

but remember, i still grew up quite culturally asian: strict and heavy emphasis on grades and academic achievement; constant, suffocating pressure and expectations; a fairly emotionally repressed method of parent-child bonding. verbally, i was taught christian values such as honesty and obedience in what is probably a very white way (reading from the bible, going to church and sunday school), but i feel i absorbed them in a much more chinese way, by taking in the culture's emphasis on family and community (and how they intertwine), on duty to others, just by living in it.

and there is this problem that happens, where people will talk about things they are not qualified to talk about. most relevantly, this is white people talking abt racial oppression and becoming the dominant voice (whether on purpose or by accident) on a subjective experience they do not have. and this problem is as obvious as it is simple— because of the history of white imperialism, we have created a global stage where it is easier for them to hold meaningful power or live w/fewer stressors otherwise. this is very much a thing that exists and needs to be fixed. like, no notes there!!

however, online discourse, the stuff i came of age simply steeped in, does not seem to acknowledge the existence of mixed race/mixed culture people.

i do not know if i am being addressed in posts directed at "white people". i am white, yes, partly, and so i pay attention to their messages even if i do not feel as if i am white myself. but when it comes to those rare conversations about asian issues of being a model minority or getting exoticized, where do i fall?

this could very well just be a me thing, but because i hear so often, "white people shut up" (and for good reason), i don't know if i'm allowed to speak up on topics focused on asian struggles that i Most Definitely also experience.

i've seen too many online disasters where it turns out some white person is racefaking online for clout, or to be allowed an opinion on a discourse they really shouldn't have, and i fear that only half of me matters to people online. that there's this whiteness about me which paints itself all over my opinions.

do i continue to emphasize my asianness, or do i just quietly let it go and allow my everything to be painted over in White?

all this just to say that i'm about to step into a field of landmines here: genshin impact, its translation, and the fandom discourse surrounding it— specifically that of kaeluc and the term "sworn brothers".

(god have mercy on my fucking soul )

the shipping wars regarding kaeluc's translation has been raging on for months (and probably will continue for years if snk and eremika have been any example lol), with the argument's lynchpin lying within the original text vs. the english translation. i don't think the original chinese term is vague, per se, but chinese is a language where words can be used in a way that may seem extremely weird when literally translated and presented to an audience that has no cultural context. probably bc it's a language where every single word has a cultural context and history behind it.

however, just saying, "listen to me, i am chinese" doesn't actually always mean what we'd hope it to believe here. while it is true that you should listen to minority voices, the nuance here is that being chinese-diaspora doesn't necessarily mean you have an informed opinion, because— and this is something ugly that we all hate to acknowledge!— so often, heritage gets lost in immigration (and the subsequent assimilation). think marinette from miraculous ladybug sort of thing.

genshin impact is a game made in china, with all its deeply entrenched cultural nits going into its writing and creation; yet, i have seen people claim that their opinion should be superior simply because they are ethnically chinese, nevermind that they don't speak the language, or even put in an effort to understand its history or stories. (or sometimes were even adopted as babies by white people.)

as mentioned above, i do understand chinese to a certain extent, and i have the cultural background/education to understand or look up nuances of the language when studying it for translation. this is because not only did i grow up in this culture (at least, in a community-built-on-its-immigrants kind of way), but also because my mother has a very high level of education on the subject, even for native taiwanese standards, and has primed me to understand chinese things in a chinese way. therefore, i feel qualified to have a nuanced opinion on the part of this discourse that tends to form the core of everyone's opinion on the subject.

but does my whiteness overrule that?

it shouldn't, because even though i am white, it is by half; i am also half taiwanese.

but what if it's not enough? as mentioned above, diaspora children or adoptees might not have much or any connection to their heritage, so their voices naturally carry less weight in these kinds of conversations about culture. by all means, my mixed status should invalidate something going on here, right?

why does it feel like i can only be one or the other to the General Eyeballs of Judgement on the internet: white, or asian?

i know myself, and i know my experiences— i am asian, and my voice and experiences are greatly, profoundly affected by that. to pretend that is not the case simply because i do not look the part, because i also carry the history of a more recognized oppressor (because make no mistake: non-white people are not devoid of historical or continued cruelties), is to whitewash that part of me, my experiences, and my identity.

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