March 2011
154 posts
7 tags
Years ago I used the word ‘nigga’ as part of a greeting and generally hated feminism. Bonus: I’m white and female. I just want to apologize for everyone who put up with me while I was stupid. This changed for me when I learned it was okay to be angry at men who told me to smile, and when people assumed I was my lesbian roommate’s new girlfriend after I cut my hair and...
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Me, a new worker in a department store: It looks like someone switched the tags on these shirts. They're not even the right brand.
An older, white coworker: Sometimes customers switch tags and put cheap prices on expensive clothes. Those Mexicans don't realize that the computers tell us the brands when we scan them. They can't read the screens, you know.
I was shocked that she made so many racist assumptions about our store's shoplifters.
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Me, a light-skinned biracial girl at a party last weekend: Okay, a Jack means categories.
White guy: How about minorities you would sleep with?
Me: As a minority, I find that offensive, like sleeping with us is a sacrifice.
He looks at me like he hadn't realized he was in "mixed" company and back-pedals ("I didn't mean it THAT way"); kisses my ass for the rest of the night, but never apologizes. Made me feel frustrated and invisible.
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“You wore a skirt to this show? What, are you trying to get raped?”
– Teenage boy to me a me, a 20 year-old woman at a Crystal Castles concert. Made me feel objectified and dehumanized.
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“Are there really that many gay people?!”
– My mother was looking at a photography project with twenty pictures of gay and trans identified people.
1 tag
We have a Facebook Page! Feel free to head on over and like it. :)
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“You’ll be fine! Just talk like a white person.”
– A white job-training counselor speaking to a young man of color about his upcoming job-interview.
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I am a 19 year-old bisexual woman and an RA at my college. Among many other events that I planned last fall for my residents, I included two that involved LGBT issues. My supervisor said, “I know that’s like your ‘thing,’ but please branch out and do other kinds of events.” Made me feel misunderstood, marginalized, and unable to stand up for what I believe in.
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Friend: Well what if we have a disabled kid? What happens then?
Her fiance: Well, then we drown them at birth. Problem solved.
As reported on my friend's blog. Made me feel like as a disabled person, able-bodied people think my life has no value.
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“You guys can blame racism and sexism if you fail. If you’re a white male...”
– I’m an Asian woman, he is white Australian male. During a conversation on the phone. Made me feel insulted and perplexed at his stupidity.
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Wheeling down the road in my neat little sporty wheelchair, and a group of men sticking their heads out of the betting shop door to clap at me and cheer me on. Made me feel patronised and mildly unsafe.
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People continually poke fun at me for having bad driving skills simply because I am an Asian woman. In reality, most people I know failed their driving tests at least once, whereas I passed my first time with not a single point off.
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Donate
Dear friends and allies,
This project’s work has always demanded a bit of time and, recently, a bit of funding as well. Please think about donating any amount you can to help us keep this project growing! (Literally any amount of currency could help out a lot - we’ve been paying out of pocket for the tumblr template and domain.)
You can click here to make a donation via PayPal.
...
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“It’s just so sad. It’s like… how can they even begin to think...”
– Student referring to rural Chinese children featured in an ethnographic article in my university women’s studies class in March 2011.
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I was in court representing a developmentally disabled client and the judge kept equating disabled people with children. It was incredibly condescending and paternalistic. He kept acting as if he was her protector and the only one who cared about her well-being, when he did nothing for her benefit. Made me feel powerless to correct this authority figure.
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“You must be new, they keep getting such cute nurses! I heard a medical student...”
– Said to me when (I, a female medical student) entered the exam room of this elderly man to discuss his diabetes.
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“How do you keep your schoolgirl figure?”
– Older male aviation worker while I was ordering a small frozen yogurt to go with my meal at a healthy food/snacks place. I’m pretty thin and get a lot of comments about it. This one was the creepiest. I was 18 and traveling home for spring break through Dallas-Ft. Worth Airport. I felt irked,...
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“If I did do Teach For America I’d probably be placed in the Mississippi...”
– A well-dressed, male presenting university student. Made me feel like wanting to teach more than ever before.
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The lecturer in a university lecture mentioned how the second-wave feminist movement was criticised by black feminists for privileging white, middle-class women. The white middle class guy behind me scoffed and said, “There’s no pleasing some people,” loud enough for everyone to hear.
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“Are you on your period?”
– Said to me, a cis woman, countless times when I’ve been angry.
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“There’s a difference between a racist and someone who tells racist jokes.”
– My friend discussing racist comments made by another friend. Made me sad, angry, exasperated, ashamed.
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“How come you act so gay but you’re like the straightest guy ever?”
– Said to me by someone in my class. I am bisexual. Made me feel angry and frusterated, like I had to pick one or the other.
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Girl at country themed bar: Hey, you're black...
Me, a 23-year old male: ...
Girl: I'm not racist or anything...but WTF are you doing here? There are Confederate rebel flags and sh*t here.
Me: ....
Girl: Oh, I know. You're here for the white girls.
Me: -_-
Girl: Buy me a drink.
Made me a bit uncomfortable.
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“Eastern Europeans are trashy. I know, because when my Eastern European...”
– White American Gender Studies professor in a War Narratives class. A Romanian citizen and immigrant, I was crying.
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In high school, my college counselor implored me to take the Spanish SAT II and apply to specific small liberal arts colleges that have “great financial aid programs for impoverished minorities”, despite the fact that my parents are doctors and, as a Pacific Islander, I speak very little Spanish.
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Guy hitting on me: So where are you from?
Me: You mean, what's my race?
Guy: Yes.
Me: I am Latina and Asian American.
Guy: I could tell you were Asian. (The guy starts to pull his eyes back and smiles.)
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I walk into a gas station market in California with about ten of my Latina/o and black high school students to buy snacks for our college road trip, and within five minutes, we hear, “SECURITY CHECK ON ALL AISLES.” We were all people of color.
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“Look at all those hot chicks. Doesn’t that make you want to at least try...”
– Friend, to me, 21 and gay.
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News
* We’ve just reached 3,000 Tumblr followers!
* As you may have noticed, our URL has changed. You can now find us simply at http://microaggressions.com. If you have any problems accessing our new site, please let us know.
* We think it’s a good time to publish a F.A.Q., for those of you curious about our project. If you have any questions you would like answered, please ask us...
4 tags
Me (then not out, bisexual first-generation Asian American woman): I'm involved with gay rights groups because it's a civil rights issue, not because it's a personal issue.
Mom: Why would you do this to hurt me? We raised you to be a good Asian girl.
When I was on the phone with both parents a few years ago, when I was 17.
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I asked for advanced science in 9th grade because I wanted my courses to count towards college admission. My high school counselor said, “Oh, but you’re not going to college.” I was 14 and in east Los Angeles. I am Latina and about to finish my PhD.
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Me: “I have some good news for you, but you can’t tell anyone!”
Friend: “Oh, you’re not gay anymore?”
The good news was that I had been made a prefect at school.
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Everyone at the hospital where I work wears scrubs, so it is sometimes hard to tell what any particular person’s role is. Invariably when a new Latina woman shows up, someone will ask if she’s a new housekeeper. And usually she’s a doctor.
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“There’s nothing wrong with a woman having a picture of her girlfriend at...”
– I’m a queer but straight-looking butch-loving femme with a picture of my butch wife at my desk. In a diversity awareness course. I wish the facilitator had picked up on it and addressed it.
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Straight female classmate: I don't know how to get rid of my stalker.
Male classmate: Tell him you're a lesbian.
Straight female classmate: I wouldn't be comfortable even saying that. I'm a good Christian.
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“That’s because you’re a girl; you don’t get what it’s...”
– A white guy in my grade to me, an Asian female, when I said I didn’t think architecture was interesting.
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Everyone I've met, ever: So what do you want to do for a career?
Me: Well politics, I guess. And then maybe someday I'd like to be President.
Everyone I've met, ever: LOL. Gays can't be president - who would be the first lady?
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“You know how how Latinos are… they aren’t as motivated.”
– Said to me, a white Latino, in New York when I was 30 years old.
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“We call Chinese to everyone who looks Asian. That’s what I meant.”
– Miss Universe 1996, in reference to her Twitter post calling North and South Korea “the Chinas”.
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“You don’t need any dessert. You could live off your body fat for three...”
– My grandma after dinner. My parents just sat there silently. Made me feel like crying.
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I go to a store with my girlfriend and she stands next to me. As I pay for my goods, the clerk always strikes up a conversation with her and not me, despite me being the one paying. I am completely ignored even during my attempts to make conversation. The clerk even goes so far as to bid my girlfriend goodbye. We’re an interracial (lesbian couple) - she’s white and I’m Indian....
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“Well face it, whenever you see a guy with a rag on his head on the street you...”
– As I was complaining to an aquaintance about an anti-Muslim teacher. Made me feel hurt, angry, shocked.
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My mom is very supportive of my little sister’s relationship with her boyfriend but says I can’t know yet and doesn’t want me to find a girlfriend because I’m gay. I’m 17 and my sister is 16.
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“Hey mister mailman,
Do you duty!
Here comes the lady with the African booty!...”
– High school students demonstrating an jump-rope chant they used to use. Made me frustrated that, by 18, my students still didn’t see anything wrong with this.
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“I just think that the feminist movement glorifies obesity. It should focus on...”
– Male friend and Gender Studies major, to a group of girls, all of whom have struggled with disordered eating and body image.
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“You and [the only other Asian kid in the school] should go to homecoming...”
– Friend from the same rural, blue-collar (in which I represented 33% of the non-white student body) town I’d lived in since kindergarten, in response to a Chinese boy moving into our town.
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We’re in the process of moving onto http://www.microaggressions.com! Please hold tight!
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“Don’t you ever think that they only look for ways to be offended?”
– My mother while talking about my argumentative paper about microaggressions - “they” being other races, sexualities, genders, etc. Made me feel confused, shocked.
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“I wouldn’t call myself a feminist anymore. I think I’m a realist...”
– My liberal white male live-in partner of 15 years. I am a white woman, 30s, home, candlelit dinner that I cooked for our night together. Made me feel blindsided, nauseous, unsafe, sad.