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  1. dots, feathers, and oh my

    December 1, 2010 by elenamary

    I received an invite to a  “Whiskey Drinking” party. Who doesn’t love whiskey? I said yes, to the invite, as I do to just about every Facebook invite I get, and didn’t pay to much attention to the rest of the invitation.

    My friend later told me that she too had been invited but that she didn’t want to attend the party because “They are inviting people to dress up as Pilgrims and Indians. I don’t want to go to a party where people are dressed-up as Indians and putting their hands to their mouths and making ‘woo’ ‘woo’ sounds.  It is racist.    I told my friend hosting it that I was uncomfortable with it and she told me that I could dress as a turkey.  I tried explaining this didn’t address the issue of racism.”

    I could see how my friend thought the party was racist but it didn’t quite hit me until I saw the pictures.

    It was when I saw the pictures that I realized “Holy shit! My friends threw a whiskey drinking party, during thanksgiving weekend, handed out face paint as well as construction paper for paper feather headbands. When did it ever become okay to put paint on your face for enjoyment at the expense of an oppressed group?“   When I expressed my concern to some of those in attendance I got different responses; “Well, some people were making fun of thanksgiving so they also added small pox face paint” or that face painting to be like another ethnicity was about as similar to my rainbow party costume, “It’s about as cool as dressing as a rainbow“, or that “Nobody actually *dressed* as indians, they put on construction-paper headbands and facepaint, kindergarten-style.”

    Adding small pox does not take away the pain of painting yourself to represent an ethnicity or race. Comparing a rainbow during a political demonstration bringing awareness to bikes,  to a hipster in a gentrified neighborhood dressed as a “Indian” during Thanksgiving lacks understanding  of  the oppression, genocide and overt and covert racism.   One of the party hosts tried to explain to me why she party’s this way: “I celebrate Thanksgiving because it reminds me to be thankful for my wonderful friends, and whiskey, and a sense of humor, and facepaint, danceparties, music, old warehouses, and good times. Enough said.”

    I am not chastising my friends for having fun, or dancing, or drinking, I love all these things (who doesn’t?!) I want people to have a good time, to acknowledge our childhood memories.  However, some of the things we did as children were hurtful, we weren’t wrong as children, we were children, we didn’t know better.  We know better now.
    I guess my friends just don’t get it. I don’t know how to help my friends understand that their partying, like this, hurts me and offends me.  Not only are they not trying to understand the pain caused, they are looking forward to the next event:

    “Private party hosted by my girlfriend and some other friends. The original wild turkey pilgrims and Indians party was 3 years ago in Italian Village. It took place in Franklinton this weekend but not associated with any group or organization. I had a blast and look forward to 2011′s.”

    Don’t get me wrong, I love my friends, if you asked them if racism was something we should tolerate they would all disagree.   I just don’t know how to get them to see how their own actions are hurtful and racist.  Maybe in June, we can hold a Juneteenth party, and put on black face, and drink forties, or if people are uncomfortable with that we can offer that  they dress as watermelons?

    Category Latinos, Ohio, personal, Politics, race | Tags: | 1 Comment

  2. White Man’s Burden, Again

    November 16, 2010 by elenamary

    I first blogged about this in 2004.

    This happens to me every year, and every year I get angry.

    Every year some self-righteous white man, feeling empowered with his white man’s burden, asks me to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for a homeless person.

    Today I was asked “Don’t you want to put a smile on a homeless child?” My response, “Do you really want to engage in that question with me?” He said “No”.  Smart man. But I informed him it was too late because he had already started talking.

    You see there are soooo many issues with it. The homeless shelters prefer the cans of peanut butter, jelly and bread, more than they prefer receiving a soggy sandwich.  The shelters in fact, have requested that sandwiches not be donated .   Making soggy sandwiches does not recognize nor bring awareness to any real issue surrounding homelessness, or hunger.   Rather, it counter serves  in that it gets privileged students to believe that they have now done a good deed and addressed the issue when at best they’ve wasted resources and instilled a false sense of positive contribution.

    It was infuriating to see the students buying coffees from inside the Wexner Center in order to stay warm while standing in the street making soggy sandwiches to put into Ziploc bags.   Take that coffee money, take your time, take those Ziploc bags and plastic gloves, and put it elsewhere where it can be less destructive.  What would be even cooler and better yet is if you did something that addressed the real issues of hunger in this country.

    Category Ohio, personal, Politics, race | Tags: ,,,,,, | 2 Comments

  3. take your racism out of my yard

    September 14, 2010 by elenamary

     I was seated at my desk when I heard lots of noise in my front yard.  Honestly, I figured someone was probably trying to cut a bike lock so I got up to go check it out.  I looked out the window and saw a lot of white people, with trash-bags and gloves, all wearing the same shirt that said “United Way” and “We Care”.  I was surprised at how angry I felt at seeing them. My chest pounded and I thought “If one of those fudgers picks up any trash from my yard I am going to scream.”  They didn’t because there wasn’t any to pick-up.

    People wanted to know why I felt so angry, here is a list of reasons:

    1.  It is patronizing and insulting that you think you care about my neighborhood but that I don’t?  I know my neighbors, they know me, we take care of our neighborhood.   We are not some lazy slobs who can’t take care of ourselves and need you to fix our woeful problems.

    2. This reeks of gentrification. Do you think our neighborhood would only be nicer if we cleaned it up a bit;  then your investment on those overpriced new college student apartments on the corner will be worth it?   Just protecting your investment are you?

    3. Our street doesn’t have any trash in fact street sweeping people just came through yesterday, so why do you think we need your help? Thanks for being so condescending.

    4.  Want to help our neighborhood? Ask what we need. Who are  you to tell us we need to clean?  Actually you didn’t even tell us let alone ask you just did it.  You know what our neighborhood actually needs?  More street lights, better sidewalks, and for you not to drive 45mph on our 25mph street as you use it as a thoroughfare to your jobs.

    5.  We are a mixed race neighborhood. It spews of racism and classism at the idea, that you know what is better for us, and send out white, well dressed people to take care of us.

    6. A complaint as much as a question, does your sense of entitlement that you can walk into my yard and decide what is appropriate come from your racism or your classism?  Or are they so intertwined that it is impossible to know where your entitlement comes from?  I am glad you didn’t try to take away my compost pile.

    7.  You made a judgement call, and although your intentions may have been good, your judgement of my neighborhood, of me, was insulting.  Let’s say you came over to my house uninvited, came into my kitchen and started to organize mop the floor, your intention may have been to help me clean-up but it would be insulting and unsolicited.

    So yes this list could be shorter (and most assuredly a bit redundant) but I think El Pocho Abogado summed it up best:

    I think when people do the basic kind of services in your neighborhood and UW doesn’t ask if you want to participate or give you notice, then it’s pretty patronizing. Most people don’t like to be thought of as charity cases. It’s pretty rude to assume they are. A lot of times those assumptions are tinged with racism.

    Category personal, race | Tags: ,,,,,,, | 1 Comment

  4. Hispanic Heritage Month

    September 8, 2010 by elenamary

    I’ve been asked to describe what it is to be Hispanic. I want to answer with a quote from Cherrie Moraga. We both came from one Mexican parent, one Anglo parent. Both of us struggling with our Xicana idenity and both of us abhoring the term Hispanic.

    “I call myself a Chicana writer. Not a Mexican-American writer, not an Hispanic writer, not a half-breed writer. To be a Chicana is not merely to name one’s racial/cultural identity, but also to name a politic, a politic that refuses assimilation into the U.S. mainstream. It acknowledges our mestizaje — Indian, Spanish, and Africano. After a decade of ‘hispanicization’ (a term superimposed upon us by Reagan-era bureaucrats), the term Chicano assumes even greater radicalism. With the misnomer ‘Hispanic,’ Anglo America prefers the Spanish-surnamed the illusion of blending into the ‘melting pot’ like any other white immigrant group. But the Latino is neither wholly immigrant nor wholly white; and here in this country, ‘Indian’ and ‘dark’ don’t melt.”– Cherrie Moraga

    Category Latinos, personal, Politics, race | Tags: ,,,,,,,,,, | 1 Comment

  5. what are you?

    August 3, 2010 by elenamary

    Directly next door to me live somewhere between 4 and 10 children.  Not really sure the house always seems to be in some kind of transition but there are three children aged 3, 4, and 5 who are always around.  The 5 year old, big sister, Steph, is the leader.  All three kids are black, and I’ve never seen anyone at there house who wasn’t black.  Our neighborhood is a mixed neighborhood but I would say it is still primarily black as well.   As such, the children long ago informed me after seeing my mom, that she was probably a light skinned black woman; I think because they just have never interacted with a Mexican before.

    I talk to the kids a lot and have grown accustomed to picking up extra things for them when I get stuff for Olguita. Extra Highlights magazines, bilingual children’s books, stickers, colorfully mint candies… little tokens.   As such they’ve grown quite accustomed to running to my front yard anytime they see me leaving or arriving.   A few months ago, I was leaving and Stephy came running with the other two on her tail.  “Laay-Nuh!” (yes that is how they say my name) “Laay-Nuh, are you white or are you light-skinded [sic]?”  All I could do at first was respond with a “Huh?” and the question was repeated verbatim.  My response “I guess I’m both of them”.

    Category personal, race | Tags: | No Comments

  6. Robert Cantu

    July 2, 2009 by elenamary

    High School sucked, racism made it suck more…but damn trying to hang someone while screaming racist slurs, come on Ohio, we can do better.
    From

    Teen Accused of Tying a Noose Around a Latino
    An Ohio teen accused of dragging a Latino young man in a parking lot with a noose last year has been sentenced to 10 days in jail.

    The 18-year-old pleaded no contest to ethnic intimidation in juvenile court Wednesday after dropping his original plea of not guilty. A charge of aggravated menacing was also dropped.
    Robert Cantu , 17, says a group of teenagers tied a noose around his neck and dragged him from a sidewalk to a parking lot while shouting racist slurs. He says a bystander intervened before the teens were able to follow through on their threat to hang him.

    Cantu’s family is now planning to sue the city of Mount Vernon, Ohio.

    (See Citizen Orange for more details about Robert Cantu and his attack)

    Category Latinos, Ohio, race | Tags: | 5 Comments

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