relativity. a j inspired rant..

regarding our support for our immigrant community as they demand the legal rights they so clearly deserve and the place white people serve or how we can bridge that gap acknowledge difference and offer coalition offer support and the difference between where he is in the eye of the storm or where i am in a cold cold cold latin american country and what me must expect and hope for/from ourselves and those whose rights we would support

somewhere in the middle is the thing and the notion of creating community by offering coalition building support and that bravery cause that is hard to feel, being wrong and knowing it and doing the work to correct it. tough stuff. taught transgressions.

and here chileans laugh uproriously when i do impressions of mexicans and so do the chicano kids in my program does that make it ok? i suspect not and that i am wrong and now must correct yet again here it is completely acceptable to mimic the manner in which asians speak spanish i mean they do it in ads and it blows my mind literally leaves me fuming..

and in a certain sense i have to pick a careful trail between cultural relativity and predjudice.. after all i cannot tell off self righteously every single person who jokingly says maricon just like i cannot fight them every single time they call relatively harmless piropos but it still pisses me off makes me feel all itchy in my own skin and just want out for a minute but there is no out here where tvs in the metro show closeups of womens asses in "fashion shows" all day long and i wonder what right i have to tell this country that i want the fuck out because no i will not cook for my stupid chilean roomates if la duena is running late and i grow weary of people looking me up and down and i want my boy identity back

but what place do i have to stand on coming where i come from where the same kinds of issues and predjudice is simply masked by correct speech in the majority of the land or on the other hand actual attempts are made but in small lliberal communities.

i realized long ago that the same standards do not apply and if i have any hope of learning anything here it is not by arguing and fighting but by politely doing what needs to be done in order to gain the privelidge of the trust that i am given routinely and with such generosity

what is asked in return can sometimes seem tough, and sometimes it seems so little to ask of me that i must play a stupid gringa role or hear lectures about how much more spanish i ought to speak or i must dance a ranchera or help clean up or help cook or walk through doors that are opened for me or dress like a girl or laughingly brush off overly aggressive jerks and its a toss up cause sometimes i do and sometimes i dont, there are times when i ignore it pretend its just not happening and times when i try and figure just whose hand is on my ass and accidentally on purpose knee that fuckwad in the balls.. and it isnt like im right and they are all wrong

even though the nephew of la duena comes in military uniform to tell me that it is womens jobs to cook and have babies and yes i know he is kidding just like the north carolinian but i long ago stopped laughing at jokes like these,

i remember when it happened when i said i refuse to allow you to brazenly acknowledge both your position of elevated status relative to me and your unwillingness to change such a thing as if it were funny.

because it isnt. not to me. but the lines are shifting and tough. after all i on the basis of being gringo and white attend the wealthiest and most prestigious university in this country and bitch about the lack of tp. its such a shifty line. relativity.