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Was this racist or am I just being sensitive?
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TLDR; a white friend used to tell me my eyes are small multiple times a day every day - was this just typical middle school teasing or were there racist undertones?

Iā€™ve wondered this for years, and honestly I think Iā€™m too in the middle of things to see things objectively. This person also recently got back in touch with me, which has brought up a lot of old feelings; most of my memories of her are of this thing, so Iā€™m feeling a bit iffy.

Iā€™m an East Asian woman in the UK, and I was literally the only non-white student in my school from primary to middle school (those schools were connected, so it was one school, but just wanted to show the ages Iā€™m talking about). Throughout my time at primary/middle school, my race was constantly pointed out, but luckily I have had very few explicitly racist experiences.

Middle school is where things started going to shit. Because man, middle schoolers can be brutal! This is also the time that I started becoming more self conscious about myself in terms of looks; especially at that age, all you want to do is fit in, you know? Anyway, the following thing is where I was never sure whether it was a micro aggression or just plain middle schoolers being middle schoolers:

I had a white ā€˜best friendā€™ from primary school, but in middle school she started telling me every day about how small my eyes are. (This continued a little throughout secondary school because we went to the same one, but we started drifting apart at that point.) She would also say other stuff about my body, which tbh, I didnā€™t really care about. But the eyes comment was by far the most frequent (she would tell me multiple times a day every day), and that one always felt off to me. I couldnā€™t articulate my feelings properly at the time - I was only just starting to become aware of the stereotypes and the history. Like, I was kind of aware it was a thing, but also not to the extent that I am now.

It also didnā€™t help that I was a very shy, nerdy and unpopular preteen, so I felt scared of losing one of the few people I considered to be a friend; how could I confront her about it when I myself was unsure she was doing anything wrong? Like it was literally just a gut feeling. And I could always imagine her response - that it wasnā€™t racist because my eyes actually are small, so how can it be racist when she was just commenting about MY eyes - it wasnā€™t like she was saying ā€œall East Asians have small eyesā€. And I do have small eyes so like, yes, itā€™s true? Plus, she did also comment on other stuff about my looks, so she could always claim that it was me that was making it into a racist thing (this convo never happened, but this is what I told myself to continue being friends). And now I really canā€™t figure out if Iā€™m just being sensitive or not.

Also, it didnā€™t seem like she necessarily thought that having eye shapes typical of East Asians was a bad thing - she fancied the actor Ki Hong Lee, so like??? Why did she so obsessively comment on my eyes???

(Thankfully, I have since discovered self-love and I actually really like my eyes - I think theyā€™re one of the best features of my face :))

I wish I had discovered social media sooner; while thereā€™s a lot of toxicity out there, I also started discovering more about things like micro aggressions and the importance of history in racism. But I only started going on social media after secondary school (I just never saw the appeal until then - and now Iā€™m addicted lol), and at that point it felt too late to talk to this girl about it.

Thanks for reading this long post if you did. I guess all this is to ask - would you guys see this as a racist micro aggression? Or was it just a typical kids being horrible situation? It did affect my self-esteem quite a lot and itā€™s taken me some time to accept and appreciate my face - but I guess thatā€™s a thing for all (pre)teenagers, no matter their race?

Edit: I just want to say thank you to everyone. Youā€™ve made me feel less alone in my experiences, and I feel like Iā€™ve finally been given ā€˜permissionā€™ to accept what happened and call it what it is. Iā€™m sorry for the slow response rate - it was like all the pain Iā€™d been holding at bay for years came crashing down, and Iā€™ve spent the past couple of days thinking about this, and it felt like too much to reply. But please know that I really, really appreciate your responses.

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Posted
11 months ago