In this article about a new type of skin bleaching cream based on gene silencing technology, student/researcher Eman Ahmed-Muhsin (a Carleton University student who helped develop the cream) says “The market [for skin lightening cream] exists and we’re not going to increase or decrease that market.”
HMM.
Well, you’re helping to increase the supply of a commodity through your research into a cream which is more effective than the skin bleaching creams on the market right now. Doesn’t an increase in supply CHANGE THE MARKET? Whether it decreases or increases is irrelevant. The point is that people need to stop pretending that their actions have no consequences. When you make something available to people, you’re part of whatever problems that come out of those actions.
You and your fellow researchers are going to make money off the vanity and institutionalized racism of people living in Asian and African countries. You’re changing the market because you’ve seen that demand for these creams has increased, or you wouldn’t be doing this cosmetic research in the first place. You’re bloodsucking leeches and you’re not fooling anyone. And yes, researching, marketing, and manufacturing a cream with the goal of making dark skinned people more “beautiful” by lightening their complexion is racist. There’s no other word for it.
Happy October, adventurers! I went to an amazing show (BLOC PARTY.) yesterday, which was so amazing that I just got up and danced around a bit, again.
Anyway, I’m here to bring up something stupid I saw at the show. There was this really tall dude–now, I know really tall dudes cannot help being really tall, and some really tall dudes are awesome (I’m looking at you Ryan North)–who was wearing a top hat.
This guy is a fucking idiot.
It’s already hard for short people like me to see at shows, just because other people are tall. But to wear a top hat to a show is probably the rudest thing I’ve ever seen. It shows no consideration for people around you. I wish I could ban hats at shows completely, but whatever. In crowd situations, all types of hats get in the way of others, and block people’s view. I never wear my hat somewhere where I won’t have anywhere to put it, other than holding it for hours, because I refuse to wear my hat and block the view of people behind me. This asshole was just extremely lucky that I was in the second row from the front, and had a perfect view.
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I had this dream, where the glass covering the face of my watch kept falling out, or vanishing, and then it would reappear.
This is the latest in a long line of products and behaviours that exoticise and trivialize people from Asian countries. I came upon a really dumb website to-day. it is called asiajam.com. Here is its description:
Asian Fashion starts at AsiaJam.com. We carry a huge selection of the newest Asian Fashion from Japan, Hong Kong and Korea. You can find styles from Japanese Streetwear for teens to fruitsy t-shirts for girls which are ‘kawaii’ or cute!
Not content with fetishising Asian women and emasculating Asian men, hijacking the language of Asian countries as decorations and funny pictures, and trivializing the traditions of these people, we now need to mimic their style of dress! North America will not be content until we can compartmentalize everything about a culture, saving the stereotypical parts, and throwing out what makes these people “people”.
I realize that this is sort of a trivial (and somewhat egregious) leap to make, but let me remind you that this is most probably taking off from the popularity of Gwen’s Harajuku girls; who aren’t allowed to speak English in public (even though they can!) and who grossly misrepresent Asian and Asian American women as mysterious sexual objects. In light of this, AsiaJam.com becomes more than a harmless site where you can buy trendy Asian fashions, and more like another way to show how we in the west can hijack the culture of others without paying attention to the worth and value of people.
Personal issues have prevented me from posting here for awhile, but this one is long overdue.
Today is the national (and international, as it were) day of action against the injustice being done in the city of Jena, Louisiana, in the United States of America. The main campaign is to free 6 wrongfully convicted young black men from what has been called “modern day Jim Crow justice”, and take the state to task for its racist use of power.
It all started with two black students sitting under the “white tree” (so called because only white students sit under it at lunch) at their school. The next day, there were nooses hung from it, as a warning. This led to protests under the tree, by black students, threats from the DA to make the lives of the protesters miserable, clashes between white and black students, and the wrongful arrest of 6 African-American students.
Click here if you want to learn more. I’m really not doing this serious subject enough justice. I urge you all to read more and educate yourselves on this issue.
Some random thoughts, from me, as a person who randomly calls up folks and tries to get them to do surveys.
If you tell us that “now is not a good time”, we’ll call you back later. Say that you’re not interested in doing the survey at all. Or just say that you don’t want to be called back. If you tell us to call back at a certain time, you’ll probably get a call back around that scheduled time. Everything is computerized, so it’s not like we’ll “forget”.
If you’re rude to one of us on the phone, you’ll probably be called back. And maybe on the same day!
We have a certain number of surveys that need to be completed per day. We don’t work on commission, but if we don’t reach our quotas often enough, we can be fired. If you’re still fine with not doing a short survey (if they honestly tell you that it’ll be short, and you’re not doing anything), then that’s fine.
Calling me a faggot on the phone, or telling me to blow you, is really rude. So is answering the phone with a “what”? or a “yeah?” Also, saying “fuck off” doesn’t do anything except make for funny conversation on break.
We need to read all the questions, so stop trying to rush us. Even if something seems redundant. We’re trying to be objective, so we need to read everything the way it is on the screen, without reframing things too much, or skipping questions.
There’s more, but it’ll probably end up in a post later on.
On Wednesday, for the first time in my life, I started keeping a daily journal.
I guess you could consider this blog a form of journal but I think it’s quite different, at least in content.
I started writing a journal the old fashioned way: pen and paper. It’s actually in a sweet, sweet fake-leather bound book that my mom gave me for my birthday. At the time I was thinking “what you doin’? what am I supposed to do with this?” but time has proven me wrong.
Not to be confused with a diary, I’ve been writing more about things I’d like to accomplish, things I did accomplish, ideas I’ve had, and writing down thoughts on various things.
I’m a techie to the core and yet ironically it seems much easier to keep a journal on paper. I think it has to do with worth. I guess I feel there’s more worth to something tangible, something that I can hold in my hand, and probably sometime in the far future something that can be found and read. Contrast that to a text file that can be constantly revised, that gets buried and lost deep in a bunch of digital folders. It feels good to be creating such worth.
Unlike this blog, I also find the flow from my thoughts to the paper much less restricted. I find it interesting that as much as my perfectionism holds me back from writing something on this blog, it doesn’t interfere at all when it comes to writing trivial thoughts in the journal. I attribute that to the fact that while the blog is public for the world to judge, the journal really isn’t up on display so I’m not concerned with it being “perfect.”
I’m hoping that by keeping this journal it will let me organize my thoughts better, help me reflect on things, and ultimately keep me focused on my goals.
Maybe it will help me write more blog posts as well.
