“Growing Up As An Asian American In The United States”
Growing up as an Asian American in the US is a unique experience. We are taught to suffer silently in the face of struggles deemed greater than our own. We are taught that Asian features may only be fetishized and never simply admired as beautiful. We are taught to normalize micro aggressions against us and our families. I remember making my mom cry one night when I came home from school saying I wished I was white. I remember watching Disney Channel and wondering why none of my favorite characters looked like me. I remember being in second grade and already grappling with my self identity as I searched for belonging among my white classmates. I remember looking through Justice catalogs and noticing none of the girls had small eyes like mine. It has long been a part of Asian American culture to allow these slights to go unnoticed. To not bring attention to ourselves. To pass these situations off as normal. To stand in solidarity with other minority communities yet never feeling like we had a space of our own.
It’s a sad truth to grow up and see that these are issues that are not discussed. It becomes difficult to find your voice when it feels like your whole life has been dedicated to suppressing it. The quiet struggles of the Asian American community have long gone unnoticed, but it doesn’t mean they were invisible. As the spotlight is finally shifting to our community, I hope with it sheds the realization that this is not a new phenomenon. I have grown up in a world where “white is might” and I have done everything in my power to blend into the background of society. Forfeiting my own heritage, mimicking my white counterparts, never feeling proud to be Asian. Believing with all my heart nobody would find me beautiful unless I was white. Feeling determined to disassociate with my Asian roots as a way to fit in. Learning to hide my discomfort in situations of appropriation and objectification that happen right in front of me.
Seeing the recent rise in violence against Asian Americans and Asian American women have left me feeling ashamed, hopeless, and terrified. I’ve struggled my whole life with shaping my identity around the white community I’ve grown up in, my white father, my white friends. Hearing and seeing the news has made me feel sick to my stomach with guilt for the ways I’ve silenced not only my own struggles, but the struggles of the Asian American community as a whole. I’ve been complicit in the narrative that these struggles don’t exist. I’ve been a bystander to the injustices me and my peers have faced throughout our lifetime. I’ve been too scared to come forward about my own truths out of fear of being targeted as different or being called invalid in my thoughts. I’ve misinterpreted appropriation as appreciation and allowed it to become acceptable.
As I hope to see change come, I hope to find that change within myself as well. While I work through the process of my upbringing and the indoctrination of my self preserved biases, I urge my fellow Asian Americans to analyze their own experiences growing up. We’ve all likely been victim to racial slights more often than we’d care to admit and while we hope to see these numbers lower, we must start by acknowledging our own pain. Your frustration and discomfort and grief is valid. Your experiences are valid. Your voice is valid. You yourself are just as valid as the next person. I am still learning to love myself and I hope you are all learning to as well. It is a long processing of unlearning the things we are taught and it will be hard and awkward and confusing and painful. However, it is something we must do in order to craft a new narrative for it means to grow up as an Asian American, not as the silent minority, but as proud citizens of our country and our culture.
By Lili Mckissen, 03/18/2021
