For a while I've been meaning to keep a journal of the isms I encounter on a regular basis. Not the isms that I encounter in media or news blogs or anything, but the everyday casual isms that real life people let fly in meat space. So this week I attempted to make an effort listen for and wrie down the ones I encountered on my way to and from work.
To make it easier and less obvious to do, I kept a log in my cell phone by just texting myself. However, with Mr. Laplain's birthday and having to cover for a couple of missed shifts at work, I kept forgetting to pay attention and so I don't have as many as I thought I would.
Again keep in mind I ever only go two places anyway.... to the bus (or taxi queue) to work. And to the bus (or taxi queue) back home. I live in the "nice" part of downtown in my city, and work near a pretty swanky area... which skews the demographics of the people I encounter a bit.
This week I mostly took the bus. I am fully reminded as to why I hate taking the bus.
RACIST
"...and I don't think they should be teaching the Quran in schools anyway. It's bad enough they can't teach the Bible anymore, but now they want to force all this Muslim stuff on us."
-Overheard at the bus stop waiting to go to work. Gray haired white man talking to somebody on his cell. He was gripping the phone so hard I could see his knuckles going white.
"I'm glad they hired the Asian Guy. We need to keep our competitve edge if we're going to keep up."
- Guy from the IT dept at work. Like seriously. He said this.
"So bring that one black girl you went with then?"
"What black girl?"
"The one I saw you with at REI"
"Purvi?? She's Indian!! She isn't black! Gross!"
"Oh man, sorry. I thought she was black. But bring her along yeah..."
"Naw man, she's got a boyfriend."
-Two teenaged looking White guys. Overheard while waiting outside the bus stop after work.
HOMOPHOBIC
"Well, he's certainly qualified for the job but I'm worried that he seemed a bit ...moody."
"Yes, I got a pretty negative vibe from him too. But do you think he was sensitive to the low office morale in general, tho?
"Yes, Jane he did seem a little bit effeminate, didn't he?"
"Ummm...Huh?"
- VP interjecting while the C.O.O and I discussed the most recent applicant we had just interviewed.
DISABLEIST
"Ken that was totally Lame, dude."
"Yeah dude way lame."
"Like Christopher Reeves, Lame."
"LOL Like The March of Dimes Lame!"
*HUGE LOLz ALL AROUND*
-Group of 20somethings Overheard on the bus going back home.
"I don't know what her problem is, she's bipolar or something but that's no excuse for being a bitch..."
-Some white woman walking into a restaurant while in converation with her brown skinned female friend.
FATPHOBIC
"I can't stand that fat fuck!"
-Some white guy coming out of the same restaurant, talking on his cell.
Observations:
It bothered me that I was way more sensitive to the racist things I'd overheard than I was to anything else. I kept dwelling on those things long after they happened, even tho everything listed above was objectionable.
It bothers me because I want everyone to feel the same amount of outrage I do about racism, cissexism and homophobia and transphobia in particular. I want them to feel an emotional connection to the slight. But the disableist comments didn't impact me in the same way. In fact it took me a second to remember I should write them down. So how can I expect everyone to have an emotional connection to MY oppressions, regardless of whether or not they experience them too, when I can't reciprocate?
Another thing I learned this week is that "Lame" really IS a slam against the disabled. I had once been of the opinion that the word had lost its original meaning and shouldn't be considered a slur... that nobody uses it to indicate an inability to walk anymore. But these taunts clearly demand that interpretation. OOPS. Well... no longer will I just let that word slide unchallenged.
I will try this experiment again this week. Again I was really disorganized this week and kept forgetting to tune in to my environment. I'd be lying to say that I'm looking forward to hearing even more BS like this tho.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Sunday, June 5, 2011
fish are jumpin
You'd think I'd have figured these things out by now, but I only just today realized how triggering the summer time is for me. All the extra sunshine, the heat, and the indoors humidity and the fucking houseflies that get in the house and never leave... all this brings me right back kicking and screaming to childhood summers spent in Oklahoma.
And I realize my stomach is tight and tense and I have a feeling of foreboding. I feel fat and heavy and weak. I feel hyper aware of all the ways my body isn't fitting me right, is weighing me down, restricting me to where I couldn't run even if I were being chased. I expect to be chased. Hunted. I expect to hear the screech of tires when I walk outside and somebody calling me and my granddaddy's whole family names. I expect gunfire.
I begin to feel like an animal of prey. I sniff the air around me in search of the scent that means danger, the foreign smells of a man in my house, for instance, my daddy in my mama's house, my granddaddy in my granny's, any man in my aunties... anywhere only us girls get to stay and be left the hell alone... except whenever the menfolk decide they want to pay a visit between drinking, gambling and breaking the law but no we are too damned polite to say no, not in my house, not here.
Instead I pick up the random scent of the garbage rotting in the kitchen. I always forget to take out the garbage, it was the one thing the menfolk were supposed to do but never did and so subconciously I leave it there waiting for a man to do what I know he won't... because at least the disappointment is familiar (oh the irony!). I go to the bathroom and expect to see the toilet lid up, marking MY home and sanctuary as THEIR territory, and I expect to smell that pungent piss smell men seem to leave behind them everywhere they go. And then I am afraid to see what I might see, smell what I might smell. If I smell piss in there wouldn't it be because I'm the one who made that pissy smell? What then does that make me? So I hold my breath and I strip naked and I shower and shower and shower...
Getting clean doesn't help. Taking the trash out doesn't help. No matter what, I jump at the slightest noises I want to be held but not touched, so I settle for being left alone and above all I am cranky for no damn good reason I can think of. At night I turn the fan on full blast, trying to blast the summer sweat off my body and I lay face down in the mattress and get this deep bone feeling that I'm scared and I want my mommy .....
I hate the motherfucking summer heat. I hate beautiful sunshiney days and blue skies. And when I say hate I mean that. I hate it in my soul. I hate it so much it physically hurts me. I've always blamed it on my eye condition (keratoconus) and how it predisposes me to be extremely photosensitive. But now I see how little that has to do with it.
It's amazing what the body remembers long after the mind has gone.
And I realize my stomach is tight and tense and I have a feeling of foreboding. I feel fat and heavy and weak. I feel hyper aware of all the ways my body isn't fitting me right, is weighing me down, restricting me to where I couldn't run even if I were being chased. I expect to be chased. Hunted. I expect to hear the screech of tires when I walk outside and somebody calling me and my granddaddy's whole family names. I expect gunfire.
I begin to feel like an animal of prey. I sniff the air around me in search of the scent that means danger, the foreign smells of a man in my house, for instance, my daddy in my mama's house, my granddaddy in my granny's, any man in my aunties... anywhere only us girls get to stay and be left the hell alone... except whenever the menfolk decide they want to pay a visit between drinking, gambling and breaking the law but no we are too damned polite to say no, not in my house, not here.
Instead I pick up the random scent of the garbage rotting in the kitchen. I always forget to take out the garbage, it was the one thing the menfolk were supposed to do but never did and so subconciously I leave it there waiting for a man to do what I know he won't... because at least the disappointment is familiar (oh the irony!). I go to the bathroom and expect to see the toilet lid up, marking MY home and sanctuary as THEIR territory, and I expect to smell that pungent piss smell men seem to leave behind them everywhere they go. And then I am afraid to see what I might see, smell what I might smell. If I smell piss in there wouldn't it be because I'm the one who made that pissy smell? What then does that make me? So I hold my breath and I strip naked and I shower and shower and shower...
Getting clean doesn't help. Taking the trash out doesn't help. No matter what, I jump at the slightest noises I want to be held but not touched, so I settle for being left alone and above all I am cranky for no damn good reason I can think of. At night I turn the fan on full blast, trying to blast the summer sweat off my body and I lay face down in the mattress and get this deep bone feeling that I'm scared and I want my mommy .....
I hate the motherfucking summer heat. I hate beautiful sunshiney days and blue skies. And when I say hate I mean that. I hate it in my soul. I hate it so much it physically hurts me. I've always blamed it on my eye condition (keratoconus) and how it predisposes me to be extremely photosensitive. But now I see how little that has to do with it.
It's amazing what the body remembers long after the mind has gone.
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